Maybe Everything is Just Like Dawson's Creek

I got the complete Dawson's Creek DVD boxed set for Christmas, early in December. So for the past month and a half, Hubs and I have been immersing ourselves in the world of Capeside, MA a couple hours a night, roughly 4-5 nights a week.

I remembered the shows from the first two seasons, watching them on their original air date and experiencing the pain in their lives as it matched with the things going on in mine. I remembered relating, I could almost feel the loneliness of being in high school and having so many people around, but that I had to look forward to a television show on Thursdays, that really understood what I was going through right then. Remembering how real and luscious those feelings were. Navagating through friendships, love intrigue, breakups, frenemies (of course, I don't think they'd invented that handy term yet back in the late nineties Dawson's Creek days). Fantastically great high points and the worst disappointments and sadnesses. And friends that alternately seem like they will always be there for you and the next day like they will never talk to you again.

Of course this is why so many adults are so fascinated by the young adult craze. I can't even image there are actually teenagers reading the young adult fiction out there; in my mind, I picture it all as middle-aged women who just want to feel those exciting feelings again.

I got caught up in the neo-young adult craze when every other warm-blooded adult did, when Twilight came out. I never imagined that it would be what I wanted to write.

Then I started watching Dawson's Creek. And then there were two seemingly unrelated scenes that wrote themselves out in my head, and I figured out how they intertwined, and have been planning out all the rest.

It all seems to fit. It seems fun. I have enjoyed writing what I've written so far, and I like the ideas I have about where it's going. It just happens to have turned into a YA.

Then it occurred to me. It reminds me of Dawson's Creek. There are similarities that are pretty clear, but the story line is so different. I'd hate to think that my brain subconsciously wrapped its little tendrils around Dawson's story to fill in parts of my Shiny New Idea. But all the elements also make sense with the world I'm creating. I will have to see as the story unfolds more out of my head, but I'm hoping that my fun little world wasn't built straight from Dawson's.

Or maybe everything really is just like Dawson's Creek.