#also i am SUPER behind on replying to comments but i can't overstate how much i appreciate them!!!!!

[muirmarie]

as someone with aphantasia (aka i can't visualize things in my head), there is literally no higher compliment than when ppl tell me they can picture something i wrote in their head??? like.

[silly writing rambles under the cut]

i'm never going to describe a room or clothing or what people look like or etc in depth, because my brain simply Does Not Work That Way, but back in writing classes in college - when i was getting Dinged on this - I figured out how to kind of hook a description around a few key elements (and I didn't realize this at the time, but I think they're usually the few things my brain boxes into its memories, so when I pull out the little box of a place or a friend, it's the way i store my description in zeroes and ones?), and because I'm not going into depth about the visual description, I kind of learned how to tie visual descriptors into emotions instead, at least in my head? like i'm not picturing how someone is moving in a scene, but i'm feeling how they would react on an emotional level? how they move or pace or fold in on themselves or etc? because that's an EMOTIONAL descriptor rather than a visual descriptor for me?

but if I do it well enough it seems to work for other ppl, too, even though they're visualizing things instead of whatever smoke and mirror tricks i'm pulling lmao? like i have very specific ways i try to ground a scene - and ground people in the scene - but it's still unbelievably gratifying when it actually works.

when i first started trying to really ~find my voice~ a good fifteen years ago, i knew that descriptions were by far my weakest area, and i tried to overcorrect by adding a LOT of descriptions, and it not only felt forced (to me, but also i'm sure to everyone else lmao), it was incredibly difficult for me to keep track! and it really would weigh the story down in a Not Great way?

so idk it's one of those things where i really had to find the right way to do it for me, and for my style of writing, and while obviously i am always learning and hopefully improving, i do know what overall works for my ~style, and it's so so so so so gratifying when i can build something that other people can see, even if i can't?

idk it's just. truly an absolute delight haha <3