“I Don’t Write Fiction!”
Overcoming my limitations
When people would ask me what kind of things I liked to write, I’d tell them, “A variety of things, but not fiction! That’s not my bag,” or words to that effect.
That was until I decided to attend a writer’s workshop in another city. Lo and behold, one of the speakers was a novelist, and one of our tasks was to write a short story. I wanted to hide my head in the sand and somehow get out of it. No excuses convinced our teacher, who reminded me, “Fiction is based on real life.” That relieved me. No fantastic details required, such as dragons or space ships, no impossible plot.
An idea began to form itself in my mind. My husband and I had recently visited an indigenous area of Mexico where his parents grew up. While staying in a relative’s home, we had unearthed some of his Mom’s old letters to a sister. There I learned more about that aunt’s story; she had remained single and lived and worked with relatives in the town. Asking around, we found that she had been treated more like a servant and suffered physical and emotional abuse.
My husband told me how his Mom had invited her sister to leave that situation and go…
