Gamarjoba!

Original Wordpress post date: 7.24.10

The majority of my research has centered around Georgia: culture, mannerisms, language--anything I think I might need, and a whole lot that I can use that I wasn't even looking for. Thank God for youtube, too. I never would have been able to see Georgians being Georgians without it. It's naturally pretty hard to write about a country you've never been to.  I also chose to address the Russia-Georgia war in August of 2008--a topic people still debate about. I'm going to try to stay out of the politics, though, and just focus on the people affected by it. I tried to go to a different storyline when I thought that might be too tough, but it seems my heart is just set on it.

The first thing you should know is that this is a very emotional story. I really care about these characters, more than I ever have with any other story, even some from my favorite books. It's because they're based on real people, real brothers and sisters of mine. I don't want to keep everything in secrecy, but I simply can't tell anyone the true story--yet I'm trying to be honest, so just bear with me, and maybe someday you'll know what's really going on in my head.

Maybe I can take a chance and explain a little bit to you. When I express Nikki's feelings of pain and heartache during some of the scenes in the winter, it's based on how I felt this past winter, hurt and broken. When she looks up at the sky in wonder, it's because I'm doing that all the time as well. When David tells her to live her life to the fullest, maybe it's because I need someone to tell me that. Since David is based on a real person who really lived, and really died, it's a difficult story to write. Without getting too specific, my own feelings about him and death and life and pretty much everything else is all over this story. It oozes misery and joy at the same time, perhaps because I'm a moody person who can be dancing in the rain one day and crying in the dark the next. The truth is that the universe is made up of opposites: good and evil, happiness and sadness, life and death...the list is endless. So I hope that this story is made up of both, because as everyone knows, life is not always a bed of roses.