superheroes

“Hello,

This one’s a little off the cuff, because I find those are the posts I love most and my friend Becca (gorgeous blog, I thoroughly recommend getting lost in it) always writes amazing posts when she’s inspired and something really drives her to write so I’m going with that.

Hear me out – I’m rolling with it (I will also acknowledge the lack of blog posts, but not today).

I love superhero movies – I’m not talking I like watching Marvel films, I mean I’m so invested in superhero films and I find it very difficult to critique superhero movies because I’m just so invested in them. I don’t know if that quite conveys what I mean, but my heart is in all of those movies and shows.

On Wednesday night, my boyfriend and I completely caught up on DC’s ‘The Flash’ and I can’t put into words how this show has buried itself in my heart and soul. We started watching the show about a year ago but got a bit lost and busy in the middle of season 3, so we recently started rewatching it and catching up on what we missed. And this week we watched Season 4, Episode 5, ‘Girls Night Out’ and I felt something.

One, the episode was really funny but, predominantly, two – catching up meant something; I feel equally content and lost.

Content because we caught up and it’s nice to not have to avoid spoilers anymore and lost because rather than watching a couple of episodes a night I now only get to watch one new episode a week.

When I say my heart is in all of these superhero films I just don’t know how else to explain it but they really are everything and they way I can express that is by writing – by writing and losing myself in these brand new stories.

The more I write of this the more pathetic it sounds.

I think part of it is because I spend so long in my head anyway – I love writing and crafting stories and that has always been my escapism and I can mentally put myself in these films and I’m gone (I’m trying not to sound like a total lunatic here).

I could talk all day (and probably have) about how I hate the stigma around FanFiction for being all 12 year olds writing about their favourite band members having sex with them and books like ’50 Shades of Grey’ becoming the phenomenon that they are, but writing FanFiction gives me a way to put myself into these situations.

And I know it’s probably not the healthiest coping mechanism, to take myself away in the words I write but Flash has been my escape for the last few weeks while my brain has been everywhere with uni. I’ve been lower in these last two months than I’ve ever been before and watching Flash has been my way out – I’m living my life through Barry Allen.

[ Side note – I’m nervous about watching Justice League because I love Ezra Miller but I /love/ Grant Gustin and I don’t want movie Flash to be better than TV Flash but also I don’t want movie Flash to be disappointing. ]

I think what makes this all more poignant is that I’m now taking part in NaNoWriMo (a month long challenge to write 50,000 words in 30 days) as a way to get my passion for writing back. I used to sit every single night in the living room with my family watching TV and writing – whether it be FanFiction just because I wanted to write it or original fiction, I would write and write and write.

And I don’t. Since coming to uni I just haven’t. In part that’s because I’ve been spending more time with my friends and housemates and I don’t have the evening time I used to have but I miss writing and I want to get that back. I’m not trying to write a novel, or even 50,000 words for that matter, I only started on Day 12 – I’m just trying to write again. And that includes my blog to be honest.

Real life hasn’t been working so well in my brain right now, but having this outlet where I can write myself as a superhero – someone who isn’t held back by assignments or my sad brain (or a lack of superpowers) and I can be someone who’s the only one who can stop the bad guy.

But to be honest, that applies to real life too.

Sophie xx”

I wrote this whole post in one night. For some reason, making the feature picture and actually posting it meant that it was over a week later. I don’t know how to explain my brain right now but I feel like that was relevant.

Thank you for reading

She was playing – she had her favourite dolls and Lego and she’d built a house for them all to live in. She was playing mummy’s and daddy’s and using all the words and phrases she’d heard her parents saying; ‘I love you more than the sun loves the moon’, ‘Let’s dance like we did when we were young’ and ‘I told you to put the bloody dishwasher on’.

Her mummy and daddy liked to go on holidays a lot. They told her that one day she would be able to come with them but for now she gets to spend lots of holidays with her grandparents.

So her dolls went on holiday too – they flew away from the house they loved and flew all around the house until they landed in her mummy and daddy’s bed. They were talking about how they want to have a little brother or sister for her to play with.

When building a pillow fort for her dolls to have a sleepover in that she found a little device – she pressed a button and a light blue screen popped up with different squares and words and more colours. She dropped her dolls and started clicking, until all of a sudden daddy rushed in.

“Hey there baby girl, what are you doing with that? That’s not one of your toys is it.” He laughed, scooping her into his arms and taking the device away.

“I didn’t mean to daddy I was just looking.” She was scared – she never wanted to upset her daddy; he was her hero.

“What are you doing up here anyways? It’s nearly bedtime, what story do you want tonight?” He asked, lifting her onto his hip and picking up her dolls as he carried her back to her bedroom.

“I want one of your stories, they’re the best.” She rest her head on his shoulder and cuddled into him.

He tucked her under the covers with her dolls in her arms, sitting on the edge of her bed and taking a deep breath before he started his story.

“Sometimes, when mummy and daddy go on holiday, bad people do bad things. We have to do what we can to save people! Mummy is very, very clever – she can move things with her mind and read peoples thoughts and daddy can fly and build robots and devices like this one,” He held up the little machine she’d found. “Last time we went on holiday, there was a man who wanted to make people part of his army with a bracelet that put them under his control. Mummy and daddy worked together so make sure he couldn’t take any more people and made sure that everyone made it home to their families.” He told the story, watching her eyes flutter slowly shut.

“Daddy, are you and mummy superheroes?” She asked, very nearly asleep.

“For you, always.” He whispered, leaning down to kiss her forehead and then switching out her bedside light.

He closed her door as quietly as he could to his wife, standing with a raise eyebrow in the hallway. “If you keep telling her those stories we’re going to have to tell her sooner rather than later.”

“It’ll be fine, one day she’ll know.” He smirked, throwing an arm around her shoulders and kissing her temple. “One day.”

Hello!

I just watched Ant Man for the first time and I was in the mood to write something whimsical and superhero related – I really do love superheroes.

Just something silly and fun a bit late on a Monday evening, hope you’re having a good day!

Thank you for reading,

Sophie xx

sophie counts clouds

we’re all (super) heroes

“One day, she’ll know” | creative writing