I have been toying with the idea of giving a main character a pen pal since 2005 in the "guest room" when I was working on a story on my dad's laptop that ran (yes, I know) Windows 95 or 98. While I was working on something later that year (more than likely over the summer), the laptop froze and then crashed to the point where nothing would load anymore. (I believe the laptop was given to him when he got a job at Nortel, which unfortunately, laid off its workers. He is now a substitute teacher since 2006, and just had a birthday yesterday.)
Fast forward to 9 years later after finally giving up disks in the fall of 2007 in favor of a flash drive and going wireless with keyboards and mice (between 2010 and now in terms of flash drives, I have gone from 1GB to 8GB to finally 16GB - I hope I can get a 32GB flash drive soon. On the wireless side of things, I want a #24 Jeff Gordon or #14 Tony Stewart wireless keyboard and mouse (yes, I am a NASCAR fan--since 1991 at the age of five).) I am still toying with the idea of giving a main character of a story a pen pal, and I am on the verge of making it happen for sure in the case of Aaron.
(Fun Fact: I have NEVER had a pen pal growing up, but over the summer from 4th-5th grade, one of our assignments assigned by a teacher was to write a letter to her on how we were doing and what we were doing over the summer. She even wrote to me when I had finished 6th grade in the 1997-98 school year. Not sure if this counts as a pen pal, though.)
In regards to pen pal character ideas, I just can't seem to escape the state of North Carolina, OR Sanderson or Southeast Raleigh Magnet High (where I attended)--two of the best high schools in Wake County--for said pen pal to attend since the character is going to be in his/her late-teens (or, in HS terms, a senior). I also cannot seem to escape the idea of making the pen pal female, either. This one is no exception, despite the fact I have to give her a name and initials (yes, I am obsessed with arcade game high score screens, by the way).
One of her dreams is to attend North Carolina State University, or NCSU (both my mom and dad's alma mater) for short, despite one of her childhood friends keeps pressuring her to attend the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill (Fun Fact: As a Wolfpack (ACC) fan, I can stand neither the Tar Heels (UNC) nor the Blue Devils (Duke) in terms of men's basketball. I am also a fan of the Stanford Cardinal out in California (PAC-12) as well) against her wishes.
I think I want to make her and Aaron pen pals since childhood. I am also working on how they first meet in person as well, despite the fact Aaron (loosely based off my lifestyle/personality) starts in California from Saint Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands (his birthplace; also one of my favorite locations I would like to visit someday). (Fun Fact: I forgot this in a previous blog post, but his parents weren't born there. Also, his mother is from North Carolina; his father is from California.) I also got the idea for her from everything I had learned about the state of North Carolina since the 1998-99 year.
Another character in the project I am working on (*spoiler alert*) is someone who flies under everyone (including the main cast--more on them later)'s radar, and Aaron gets to know him, unfortunately, when sometimes he wishes he hadn't. He is inspired by some things I read about The Faculty, Pearl Harbor and Hollywood Homicide star Josh Hartnett and One Tree Hill and Crisis star James Lafferty, as well as Phantom Planet frontman Alex Greenwald--as well as various things I have learned about the state of California since the 1998-99 year (despite the fact I used to live there--the northern part near Monterey). He usually dresses in blue and comes off as mysterious, and basically everyone tells Aaron about him, kind of like the scene from the 2004 film Mean Girls where Lindsay Lohan's character, Cady Heron, asks people about Rachel McAdams' character, Regina George. Aaron's pen pal, unfortunately, knows about him as well. Like the pen pal, I still have to give him a name and initials as well.
I also got the idea for him back in the summer of 2011 after playing Race Drivin' on the SEGA Genesis and finally beating the Phantom Photon ghost car on the Original track a few times, and playing Extreme-G 2: XG2 and Hot Wheels: Turbo Racing as well as Cruis'n USA and the Rush series on the Nintendo 64, and in another project I was supposed to work on, he was supposed to be the younger brother of one of the main characters, his older sister. I also came up with characters in the 2011-12 year after playing various non-Sonic games on the SEGA Genesis as well.
Wow, I think I just said a mouthful, and I hope to get at least the first few chapters of the writing project done. Until next time...WM86 :)
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