There is absolutely no argument that a writer's life experiences weave their way into their work. In my work True North, there are many personal strands woven in, imperceptible to the reader but cathartic to me. Things that aren't about me once they enter the story, they are part of the character.
True North is heavily salted with song lyrics from a breadth of music genres and time periods. Sometimes the effect is a chuckle, and sometimes a tug on the ol' heartstrings. Sometimes they're a light brush of nostalgia, and others reach into dark places.
My shadow's the only one that walks beside me
My shallow heart's the only thing that's beating
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me
Excerpt from True North:
"Someone's happy to see you," I comment when Dakota gets out and the black dog worries at his knee. Its over-sized ears and crouched stance tell me it's a shepherd and its young.
"This is my generically named dog Shadow." Dakota smiles a little, burying his fingers in the dog's ebony coat. "My Shadow's the only one who walks beside me."
"Green Day."
"You're getting better at that." Dakota chuckles and scrubs the dog's ruff.
Dakota, like many of us, has walked a lonely road. Have we not felt that, at some point in our lives, we've walked alone? Or that one lane of our life's highway we are always traveling alone? And sometimes we wish someone would find us. Sometimes we want to walk in misery, and sometimes we wish someone could save our shallow hearts.
But it's home to me, and I walk alone
I walk this empty street
On the Boulevard of Broken Dreams
Where the city sleeps
For me, this one reaches into dark places.And I'm the only one, and I walk alone
Sometimes we can't leave that road. We have to continue walking, at whatever pace we have, to a destination we may not even see. The only way to share that path is if someone, anyone, will step onto our path. And all too often, that street full of broken dreams is full of broken glass that forces us to walk through the wreckage and step on the shards. How can anyone want to join us on a path where the only dreams to see are broken?
I picked this song for the beauty of a typical dog name, but Dakota is a deep creative creature, so the reader knows there is more beneath the surface of that simplicity. That single lyric speaks to so much internal pain. Ian's recognition of that lyric is a recognition that Dakota's road of broken dreams exists.
Obviously, there are no song lyrics included that are from songs I wouldn't listen to. Selfish of me. This song came into my life at a time that my own dreams were broken in a way that no one close to me could understand. This was the first challenge in my life where I realized there was no way to overcome it. This was a realization that you can't fix everything, and all the grit and determination in the world can not fix everything.
Whether it's my personality, my own demons, or the cursed chemistry in my brain, I couldn't reach outside my world to find someone to understand. I walked my boulevard of broken dreams all alone.
I'm walking down the line
That divides me somewhere in my mind
On the borderline
Of the edge and where I walk alone
Read between the lines
What's fucked up, and everything's all right
Check my vital signs
To know I'm still alive, and I walk alone