Where Did My Imagination Go?
Tracking down a dear friend from childhood
One of my favorite things is imagination — the ability to make things up in one’s head. Perhaps it’s a favorite because I’ve enjoyed imagining for most of my life.
As a child, I loved to exit the frustrations of normal life and escape in my mind to more interesting worlds. Confused at why I was staring off into space, my brother often would come up to me and try to jolt me back into reality. I would reluctantly relinquish my journey to distant lands, then try to smack him for interrupting such a lovely revery. Teachers constantly grew frustrated with the daydreamer in the back of the classroom, admonishing me to return to the (boring) matters at hand. It is no wonder that my grades were lackluster, and my parents irritated. Even as an adult, I could easily wander away to made-up places when life was just too much — or too little.
One of my favorite imaginary accomplishments was the creation of a fellow named William Bell, who took a good 10 years to emerge as a quirky facilitator of life, the protagonist of my self-published novel of the same name. I’m hard-pressed to “imagine” how he came to be and still amazed that I accomplished a life-long goal of writing a novel. The second book is under way and I hope to publish it in less than 10 years this time.
Recently, I noted that my imagination might be missing in action. Yes, William still comes through loud and strong, and I still enjoy making up stories for the little ones in my life. But my ability to venture into the world of imagination seems stilted. I love to write ghost stories, and for some reason, they don’t come as easily right now. I also miss how I used to easily slip away to a self-curated world of my very own.
So I decided to do a little digging into this issue.
First, I took a trip down memory lane, to see if I could revisit those daydreams of childhood. I vividly remember the big old barn behind our house in my growing-up years, where my brother and I created our very own spaces in the former horse stalls. We each had an office, we created a kitchen and other rooms, and spent hours making up interesting storylines and refining our digs. An old tree that resembled a mouth, thus called The Mouth, became another favorite haunt, with its own stories. In my early teenage years, I transformed my bedroom into a witch’s lair, complete with candles and witchy décor. All these great childhood activities had a core component: Imagination: The wonderful world of make believe.
My good pal Google offered a few nuggets about the issue. This Psychology Today article provided helpful tips on how to jumpstart one’s imagination: Staying open to new experiences, being curious about life and spending time in nature. One that resonated with me was being playful, with the focus on a playful state of mind or attitude rather than merely “playing,” although I would argue both are helpful. Sometimes we all could benefit from persuading the mind to ditch the to-do list, at least for a time, and let loose a bit. I also would add a hard one for me, and that is less time on electronic devices. It’s hard for a seed of imagination to sprout when being electronically bombarded, even if it’s our choice at any moment in time.
Recently, I had the opportunity to spend quality time with my four-year-old great niece. One of our favorite activities is swinging in the hammock while I tell her stories. It started with a series I told my daughters many moons ago, called “Alicia Delicia,” about a feisty, impetuous kid who seemed to get in trouble a lot (yes, she does sound familiar). But she was always remorseful, and after resolving the issues, the family would go out for ice cream and it was always “Delicia!” Silly little stories, which my girls loved, as does my great-niece. I was excited to share a new story with her and it was joyful to experience her active imagination at work, as she offered up possible characters and storylines, which we wove together into yet another story, until we had to jump up and pick more blueberries.
Perhaps it’s as simple as that: Sit in a hammock with an inquisitive and imaginative child and see what emerges. And darned if I don’t feel a ghost story creeping up behind me.
