Writing Fiction Is Playing Pretend as an Adult
Why didn’t this occur to me sooner?
Did you play pretend as a child? I did.
More often than not, I played alone in my yard than with other children. I have very few memories of my childhood, mostly vague recollections of friends, acquaintances, and companions. Yet I remember more of the play I undertook as a child.
The big picture window in the living room of the home I lived in until I was maybe 6 years old was the viewscreen of my starship. From there, I went on missions, flew my spacecraft to many adventures, and pretended I was a brave and daring space captain.
The swingset of the home I lived in from about age 6 to age 14 or 15 was my starfighter. I flew against TIE Fighters, Cylons, and various other imagined enemy combatants. In my pretend play, I made Luke Skywalker and Starbuck look like amateurs. Oh, the adventures I went on. I don’t remember any, but they most definitely happened.
Star Wars has always been my jam. I had a broad collection of action figures, vehicles, playsets, and so on. Actually, I still have most of them in boxes (that I should like to sell, really). Long, long before the sequels, I played out adventures for Luke, Han, Leia, Chewie, and the droids on all kinds of wild adventures.
