Where's Your Inspiration?

As I was trying to think of what to blog about today I ran over to Nathan Bransford's blog to read his latest. It really struck me as an interesting topic. How do you come up with your ideas for writing?
I have to admit that my ideas come in various forms.

My first book, Awakening of a Guardian, was originally a short story I wrote for fun in middle school. Over time, I thought of many ways to expand the idea into a full novel. Of course, from there the ideas flowed into plans for a whole series based on my main character's adventures through her new found life as a Guardian to the Geveran people. The Council is just the story expanded into a sequel, and the plan is to keep growing it from there until I have at least four or five books.

Train Wrecks was an idea that came to me while driving down the road taking my teenage daughter to a therapy appointment. The story is loosely based on some of my experiences with depression and suicidal thoughts as a teenager, and then takes off from there into the full story of my main character Cat's experiences. At the time when the idea came to me, my family was in the midst of a lot of stress, and my daughter had just recently been hospitalized for severe depressive disorder and diagnosed as bi-polar like me. I didn't immediately plan to write the story since I felt it would be too difficult to work through the emotions of the story, but it didn't take me long to decide that there are teens out there that could be helped by such a real and painful story as Cat's.

The yet unwritten book of Jimmy Jameson and Mr. Van Pyre, Science Teacher was the idea I never meant to have. I've always considered myself to be solely a Young Adult author since the stories I've always written have been geared toward that age group. However, the idea popped into my head one night as I was taking a shower and took hold in my mind. It occurred to me that this would be a great book that my younger children could enjoy. I already write works that my teenager can delve into, but my other two children were feeling left out of things. Perhaps subconsciously I had been thinking of ideas for a book that they would like too. I don't really know how or why the idea came to me, but it did. Eventually, I will write the book and have a Middle Grade novel to my name as well as my favored Young Adult novels.

I have other ideas for books, but none of them have a particular story as to how they came about. Sometimes a song triggers an storyline, other times it's a dream, most often it's just a random thought that crosses my mind. Whatever the inspiration to write the story is, I think I need to start keeping a writing journal of ideas so that they don't get lost along the way before they can be developed.

I would love to know if any of my readers do any writing and if so, what do you write, and where does your inspiration for ideas come from?

The music of the moment today is off my iTunes "Writing" playlist. The song is "Chasing Cars" by Snow Patrol. This isn't a song I attach to any of my works in progress right now, but there is a story behind my personal attachment to this song. I heard this song on the radio and got totally hooked on it, leading me to purchase the CD titled "Eyes Open". This was in 2006. Soon after I had bought the new CD I had to cope with the death of my favorite grandfather. It was a tremendous loss to me that I cannot clearly express in words.

The story behind the song for me is that my mom told me my grandfather got so cold that night that the nurse suggested my grandmother curl up in bed with him to help keep him warm with her body heat. Late that night he passed away and I received the call telling me all of this. The following morning I drove up to my grandmother's house to be with her, my mom, and my aunt who had all been at the hospital with him when he passed. All the way up I listened to this song on repeat in my car because the words resonated with me and the thought of my grandmother curled up in bed with the love of her life, knowing she was about to lose him. I cried all the way up there, sobbing so hard I could barely see to drive. I probably should not have been on the road at the time in the state of mind I was in.

I'll leave you today with the lyrics to this song and you can read for yourself why this song hit me so hard.

"Chasing Cars"

We'll do it all
Everything
On our own

We don't need
Anything
Or anyone

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

I don't quite know
How to say
How I feel

Those three words
Are said too much
They're not enough

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden that's bursting into life

Let's waste time
Chasing cars
Around our heads

I need your grace
To remind me
To find my own

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden that's bursting into life

All that I am
All that I ever was
Is here in your perfect eyes, they're all I can see

I don't know where
Confused about how as well
Just know that these things will never change for us at all

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?