Sunday, January 03, 2010

It always comes back to -

Perspective, of course.

While most people were relaxing over the holidays, I worked. It's the busiest season for retail - and this year was one of the busiest. I've never been run off my feet the way I was the last two weeks. I don't know about your economy but ours is booming. People are spending again.

All that spending gave me the impression that the recession is on its way out. It could be a false impression which brings me to my point. It's all a matter of perspective, gained on personal experience.

I needed that reminder about perspective.

Last week I read a jacket cover that was the synopsis for one of my books. The one-of-a-kind-no-one-has-ever-thought-of-this-angle book. Apparently I was wrong. And that was hard to take. Why finish up and submit something that isn't unique after-all?

I'll tell you why. Because my voice and my way of telling a story is like no one else's in the world. My perspective, if not my idea, is unique. It's based on my life experiences, my world-view and the angle at which I figuratively and literally stand upon this earth.

That sense of perspective is why some writers and stories resonate with some people and not others. Some of us are drawn to perspectives wildly divergent from our own while others prefer the more familiar. Regardless of perspective we all have a unique one.

Put ten people at the scene of an accident and they will all vary slightly in their witness accounts. We are programmed to see what we expect to see for one thing. But if two people are standing in roughly the same spot, their range of vision is still not exactly the same. Those millimeters apart can mean a world of difference.

I'm going to submit the one-of-a-kind-no-one-has-ever-thought-of-this-angle book. There are thousands of successful versions of Romeo and Juliet. While I'm not suggesting my story is on par with Shakespeare, I do think it deserves the same chance to be heard.

5 comments:

  1. Yay! You're back! I was going to send out a search-and-rescue shepherd. Of course, all she'd do once she found you would be to lick your face and mooch for belly rubs.

    dogalo - the boat used by dogs when vacationing at the lake (the pedalo has never really caught on among the canine community)

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  2. Anonymous7:02 AM

    你不能和一個握緊的拳頭握手..................................................

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  3. According to google translate the above means "You can't shake hands with a clenched fist"

    So true

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  4. Very interesting comments. Very interesting perspective. Some day soon I will get back to giving mine.

    quitions: things being asked by quitters.

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  5. I read somewhere once that all stories have already been told, it's the way the are told that's new and one-of-a-kind.

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