My 7 year old daughter asked me the other day if I had imaginary friends. I told her, after some thought, that I had a lot of them that I wrote about in my stories (I didn't tell her that some of them were less than friendly). Then she asked me if I talk to them (like she does with hers). I told her that I listened to them talk to each other through my writing. Not good enough. But why don't you talk to them? she asked. I told her that when I grew up I lost the desire to talk to them directly anymore. She seemed appalled, picturing a sterile future where imaginary friends are on a mum basis, I guess.
That got me thinking about the nature of imagination and how it changes as we grow. I certainly had imaginary friends and imagined myself in all kinds of situations as a kid. Then puberty hit and the imaginings got dark and they sort of haunted me. It's only when I started writing some epic style poetry that the fun came back into it. But what is it that as reasonably sane adults we can no longer talk directly to our characters? We just have to sort of eavesdrop on the sly. How does creativity change when it matures and what goes out of it?
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My son had about 462 imaginary 'friends'--dogs, to be precise. He knew every single one's name, breed, and back story. One was particularly freaky: Don the Dog. A black lab who had been hit by a green pick up truck. Owen told that story at least three independent times...out of the blue and he always, always insists on wearing a seatbelt. Safe, yes. Freaky too.
Yeah, my daughter presently is running a boarding school and gets mad at me if I don't refer to the house as such. It can be freaky and I think the trick is not to freak out and kill their imaginations. My daughter has told me stuff about where she was before she was born. I just go with it.
Fellini once was quoted with the assertion that one must never lose their ability to play like a child. Just going with it sometimes is the best thing you can do. Just look at the roundstory.
There is only one character who I talk to at all, otherwise the rest stay silent unless they feel the story is going the wrong direction.
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