Paper Trails

I have a stack of spiral notebooks in my closet full of soap opera length stories that document the fabulous and the mundane aspects of the lives of my numerous fictional characters. The other night, I dug one out to find a scene written twenty-five years ago for my current novel project, Giles Avery.

Now, I know that sounds strange, the 'twenty-five years ago' bit, but all my ideas for novels were dreamed up before I was in my mid-twenties and I can't say that I've had any more since then. If I didn't write down every silly idea I had from kindergarten to college graduation, where would I be now?

The benefit of the computer age is that in case of a fire it is much easier to grab a flash drive and run than try to carry out 12 cubic feet of notebooks. Still, I wonder if in another twenty-five years I'll be able to look back at the words I'm saving to my flash drive now. I very much doubt it.

Amy