Stranger Than Fiction

I saw this movie on dvd for the first time. I definitely liked this movie. But it also brought to mind an article I wrote a few years ago. The article was about when I was writing an important scene in The Teddy Bear Conspiracy where I had to kill off a major character who had kind of taken over as its own entity in the writing of the story. For those write, this is understood as a sensation where a character literally takes over the writing for you, so much that you feel that you are just jotting down what that character is doing or saying rather than being the writer yourself. This was the same thing that happened to me when I was writing about a character named Tina. I had done everything I could to avoid killing this character, but it was so necessary for the story, that I had no choice but to kill her off. And then I did. It was a few minutes after writing that tragic scene that there was a knock on my door from downstairs (my writing office/bedroom was on the second floor of the house back then). I went to answer the door and saw some woman I didn't recognize through the aperature in the door. I asked who it was. She said, "Tina". Well, I kind of went numb right then and there. I asked her to repeat, but she said "Tina." Slowly, I opened the door and this woman stood there and said, "I've been trying to get ahold of you for awhile." Well, right before I freaked out, she explained that she was the previous occupant of my house, and she wanted to know if any mail had come for her that hadn't forwarded through the mail.

It was a big laugh later, and an article as well, but I was certainly reminded of this situation when watching this very good movie.

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