I suspect most writers have ideas that have stayed with them for long periods of time, nagging for a chance to be written.  Maybe something based on a family story or a unique experience that really should be developed.  Or, so often, something that a writer read that has pinged like a billiard ball into something in their own mind that now is set into motion.  They’re not always good ideas, or welcome, or remotely marketable. But as I try to explain to my husband, there are some things that have to come out of me as a writer before other, perhaps more viable, ideas can come through me.

I’ve got some doozies, these ideas waiting around to be written. First, there’s the idea about some type of germ, bacteria thing that kills all the black people of the world – or else, maybe Jews - exclusively.  Anyone with a certain genetic background. No one knows if it’s terrorism, or a genetic anomaly, some weird disorder put into action by global warming, perhaps, or a flu strain. An ethnic epidemic, in other words. And, of course, with this genetic component, people are “outed”for a tiny drop of black/Jewish/Indian blood that they never knew they had.After the initial reaction of terror, sorrow and rejoicing in the world, the longer term effects are seen to be both extremely widespread and surprising.This is social science fiction, I guess, something I’m not in the least prepared to write, and hopefully will not ever get any farther.

Another idea is where women as a group, and mothers in particular, choose not to be caretakers anymore for their children or elders.They are drawn to some kind of spiritual community where they must renounce the world. There is a prophet of some kind, a woman of course, who says that praying, fasting and meditating will cure the world. The story follows several women and their families, to see how they adjust. It’s meant to look at what happens to the world when the unpaid self-sacrifice of women is no longer available – the “glue” that holds societies together.

This one’s a downer – from a story I read in the Globe about these six young native boys - children - in eastern Canada who attempted to kill themselves by sniffing gas. They were found in an unheated shack in subzero weather by a policeman who filmed them as they were removed to safety, totally stoned and screaming that they wanted to die. This was 1992, the year my older son was born; I’ve been haunted by that story, wondering what could drive young boys to take that action.  Children are programmed to live, to survive, the same instinct as cubs, puppies. There are clues– the boys existed in an impoverished area with adults who had lost cultural bearings and turned to addiction, a place where hope and meaning had been lost.Somehow, it hit me that I must remember it; must attempt to broadcast this story for the sake of all children who must try to find or rebuild new meaning,when the old meaning has been lost.  A story? A play? A poem? How could I attempt something so strange, so remote?

Here’s what’s next in the queue, ready to go after Spanish Soap Operas is done.  Suffice it to say, it sort of turns “Friends” on its head: four friends in a city, two men, two women, each with issues: one, an anorexic actress/model; a gay man who won’t have sex, or relationships, from fear of AIDS; a “secret Jew” author, who writes about conversations he overhears when people don’t realize that he’s Jewish. And lastly, our girl who has found the perfect mate to console her after a childhood of disappointments: a man who matches her perfectly in every way, her soul mate, except that he doesn’t want to know her and treats her like a stalker. Happy group, you say? Can’t wait to read?

These ideas have been at the bottom of the barrel for such along time, I forget they’re there until they pop up again. Thing is, I’ve been working my way through the all the other stories, novellas and full-length novels to a point where they are at least out on the page, if not out in the world. If no other inspiration comes along, I’m afraid I’ve got to hold my nose and take the plunge into these darker waters. So much bleaker than you would think, or I would think. I’m putting them out here so that perhaps other writers will steal them, and then the pressure is off me, or else, they will just shrivel up in broad daylight and disappear. And yet, somehow I think they’re not going away.