by Kimberly A. Cook
Bagged the bird! For those of you who thought I’d lost my mind last week, my poultry paparazzi patrol paid off. Did a quick recon before leaving for my fiction critique group last Saturday to see if the violin playing chicken was in attendance. No fowl. Dang it.
Got in the car and headed for my meeting. Ready to make a left turn and looking right, chicken ahoy! I ignored my left turn signal, and the car behind me, and turned right to get a quick chicken pic. Using my vast stealth abilities from the military, I parked a block away and then went chicken stalking. Got two pics. Here is the best one.
Now this fowl encounter has become a quest. I want to know the chicken’s back story. My journalistic roots are tingling. When did the chicken take violin lessons? Why here? Why now? Why the outfit? Does the chicken have a website? Do all chickens wear Birkenstocks? Or flip-flops? (I’d say thongs, but I don’t want to confuse people and I really don’t want to go there with this chicken.)
Saturday is the big Rose Festival Grand Floral Parade so we all know what that means, rain. Not sure the chicken will show if it doesn’t like to get wet. But I’m intent on getting an interview.
When writing fiction, the author always needs to know the back story of each character. Where do they come from? What happened to them to make them do what they do now? What is their biggest goal? Worst fear? In my fiction books I’m writing, there are quirky animals too. Of course. And like their human counterparts, they all have back stories which explain their motivations.
In “real” life and fiction, everybody’s story is important. We all matter. Our stories matter. What better life long pursuit than to fight for our own happy endings?
How do we do that? We find out each other’s back story. Don’t judge a book by its cover or a chicken by its violin.
Every chicken has a back story!
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