Happiness - and how it inspired some of my early writing

Warm greetings to you all from yet another wintry Perth morning.

I have to say, I'm very much enjoying the process of thinking about and submitting offerings to my new hobby space.

This morning I'd like to share a happy writing experience I encountered when I first found myself with the time to spend on being more creative with my writing - as opposed to the rigid constraints of writing for work.

Around the time I was freed from the work shackles, one of my daughters happened to have given me a book as a birthday present. The book was entitled "Happiness" and featured many and varied photos from around the world, all of which provoked a happy smile and warm glow. The images in the book included photographs of people , animals and funny situations - each of which were easily able to prove a picture is worth at least a thousand words.

That book sat on my desk for many weeks as I pondered and experimented with various genres, topics and writing styles. Eventually, the cover of the book inspired me to just start writing.. and so I did.

For copyright reasons, its probably not appropriate for me to post a copy of the particular cover photo... which was of a young boy playing in the water by the seaside.

In any case, that picture prompted the start of what was to eventually become a complex and twisting tale of 436 pages. The book itself initially tells the turbulent story of 20th century Hungary through the eyes of a third party. It then moves to the days preceding the start of the 21st century, it examining the interactions of two men who had been childhood friends and whom fate had brought back together to share the final days before one of the men submits himself to euthanasia. The real point I'm making though, is that the funny little picture on the book cover was the trigger I needed to get the ball rolling .

I'd like to share with you the first chapter of that book.

#H2 An Imagined Tale

“A young boy with wet, tousled hair runs wildly as he plays along the edge of a long sandy beach. Bubbling sheets of sudsy water glide and slither up the beach’s shallow incline, spending last reserves of energy as they terminate with an explosive flourish against his glistening legs. With each crashing wave, odd and surreal shaped globules of water rise to fill the sunny air around him. They surround the boy in an envelope of silvery beads as his playful screams and laughter mingle with the sounds of the agitating ocean. Larger waves careen and shatter onto a sand bank further out from the shore. They provide a percussive background rhythm, teasing the child into dancing a beachside jig of almost primal ecstasy. The young lad revels in the joy of each delicious moment, totally absorbed as he embraces the carefree spirit of his childhood.”

Flowery and stilted though they may be, the few short sentences above will probably lead most people to conjure some form of image - a unique mental portrait featuring a child cavorting and playing in a seaside setting.

I recently challenged myself to read through the passage with that specific purpose in mind- an innocent test to see if I had what it takes to create some kind of creative visualisation. I can confirm that a strong image certainly formed very quickly, although I have to confess I did cheat slightly because I spent several moments looking at the picture on the front cover of this book before undertaking the exercise. It seemed to be time well spent as a crystal clear mental image appeared without much effort at all, projected in glorious Technicolor onto my mind’s eye. The image was faithfully reproduced according to what the words required and was also rounded out with elements drawn from my own personal exposures to beachside environments.

Perhaps unwisely, I allowed my mind to dwell on and admire my newly created mental seascape for a little longer than necessary. I remain unsure whether this was a good idea, because something quite bizarre started to happen following that contemplation. To be more precise, it felt as if I’d been swept up into some kind of wild goose chase through the labyrinth of my mind.

As I focussed on my newly fabricated beachside imagery, I became aware that certain elements were starting to shift and blur. The overall image was edging progressively and relentlessly towards a more intricate entity with each blink of my eyes. I realised this trickery was only my neural chemistry, or whatever the molecular machinery it is that constitutes the human imagination, at work. What surprised me was the ruthless extent of the adaptations being laid out before me. The cranial manoeuvres were only subtle at first, but once they gathered momentum, my mind’s eye could only watch on helplessly as the simple seaside snippet was tinkered with by some internal puppet master.

All kind of renegade ideas and details, plucked from apparent obscurity, started to colour and tamper with my vision. The newly injected material all filtering optimistically through the fabric of the original setting, happily adding complexity and embroidering extravagant onion-like layers over and above the modest scene I started with.
The simplicity of a child playing jauntily by the water’s edge had undergone a complete mental makeover, morphing itself into something entirely different. This is where the wild goose chase I mentioned earlier began to kick in. So much complexity had entered my vivid day dream that it’s now going to require many, many more words to describe and explain what it had become - a long and meandering tale.

The tale was no longer merely about a lone young boy dancing on an isolated beach either. Complex concepts such as time and location had somehow managed to schmooze their way into the scheme of things, making themselves right at home. These elements were also accompanied onto the stage by a cast of characters and a variety of twisting plotlines, each contributing their own distinctive flavours to the cerebral re-paint.

I can tell you right up front that the starting point my mind chose to commence its transformation was precisely two thirty in the afternoon of 16 November 1960.

With regards characterisation, the boy making whoopee on the shoreline is identified as one Nigel Kent, then aged just seven years old. Nigel is completely oblivious, as he dances his fictitious shore-side jitterbug of yesteryear, that he’d become a figment of my imagination and a significant character in an evolving tale.

I can also reveal to you the important detail of Nigel’s imagined location. The seaside fun he was so happily involved in took place on Scarborough Beach. That particular chunk of coastal real estate, sprung unwittingly to the forefront of my daydream, is located on the oceanic edge of Perth, the isolated capital city of Western Australia.

Scarborough is just one of many beaches which make up the city’s western fringe and is as fine an expanse of white satin sand as you might find anywhere on the planet. Caressed by the aqua hued waters of the Indian Ocean, Scarborough and all of Perth’s other beaches are places of restless and natural beauty. They are also dramatic concluding points for an endless procession of wind and tide driven waves that tumble endlessly onto the shores after long and arduous journeys across the watery void.

I should also point out that I was aware of the smell coming of frying onions wafting atmospherically into the story, apparently from nearby beachside burger bars. Their sweet yet pungent aroma mixes pleasantly with a heady perfume emanating from pungent oils being luxuriantly released by sun warmed dune foliage. The combination provided an evocative olfactory touch, which I have to admit, did positively embellish my nostalgic musing.