Hypercompendia

It’s true, I’ve fallen in love with one of my characters and likely given her so much attention because of it.  A Bottle of Beer’s Yolanda is a survivor.  As I read her story and realize what she has experienced, I am sorry that there is but this one last evening left to have learned about her.  We know she shares a tradition of submission to men with generations of women, yet she has found it within herself to fight back in a most terrible way when it came to her children.  What that brings to mind is a mother bear and her cubs–one of the most used metaphors for the protective maternal instinct.  It is not surprising to me then that the bear has turned up twice in this story, though not in this context at all.

What hypertext has me doing with story is carrying the burden of story that has all the elements of voice, style, tone, arc, pace, structure, etc., but allows the inclusion of what has been learned through experience yet not closely aligned within the story as a contributory plot.  It is an "oh yeah, and I remember once…" that is behind the words that get into the main highway of information that fit in someone else’s experience as a similar incident or lesson in life. 

I like the tone of Yolanda’s story, I like the humanness of it.  Her experience is frightful and yet she has overcome to be able to relax on her front porch in the sunset time, just stringing chile peppers.  It’s everyman’s story with different devils.  It’s the calm that follows the storms.  She is still ready to fight if she has to, but somehow knows that her battle has been won and she can walk off the field with grace and dignity into peace.

These are the methods: the hypertext format of thinking.  There are more characters that need such revelation for their simple efforts to live a good and honest life, yet have seen more than a simple linear narrative can do justice.  Storyspace is calling.