The (2nd) Tall Tale Year

In 2015, I started an ambitious writing project – write one story a day, every day, all year. I did not succeed, for a variety of reasons, chief among them hubris. In short, there was never any way I would be able to write a story a day. To think I would have the time & energy for that was a pipe dream. It was folly. For a more detailed account of the project, please read my original intentions below.

In 2018, I’m going to try again at a more reasonable pace. A story a week. Ish. Sometimes I’ll do more than one a week. Maybe I’ll miss a week. Some will be based on just one photo. Some will be based on several. Less rules for the project this year. Except… these stories won’t be as disconnected as those in 2015.

So here goes on 2018, The (second) Tall Tale Year.

 

Intentions – Jan 1, 2015

National Geographic has an excellent photography section on their website. Populated with gorgeous photos from long-time professionals and amateurs alike, it’s one of the very best kinds of internet rabbit holes. I can, and have, spent hours in that one-more-click zone, unable to pull myself from all the varied and beautiful images the site’s editors deemed worthy of calling out. For any fans of photography, I can’t recommend highly enough spending some time digging through the deep archive at the site.

http://photography.nationalgeographic.com/photography/

A few years ago, when I first began to frequent the site, I fell in love with the Photo of the Day page. Every day, a new photo is posted. And every day, the photo is wonderful. The subjects vary widely but the quality never does. Over the years, I’ve been inspired more than once by the day’s photograph to jot down story ideas, themes for a future piece, or notes for whatever piece of writing I had in front of me at the time. And now I’m going one step further.

This year, my goal is to write a story inspired by each photo of the day. 365 photos, 365 short stories. My hope is that I can take something already beautiful and turn it, just a little, to be seen in a different light. Every story will have some kind of fantastical element, some liberal interpretation of the visual information presented in the photo.

Tall tales are, at their simplest, stories with some sort of fantastical element. In American literature, they’re often extrapolations of true stories (think Johnny Appleseed). They are the imagination run wild, using something tangible and true to craft a story of something weird or wonderful, magical or haunting. They are the perfect sort of story to use for my project over the coming year.

So this is my intention. A story a day, every day, all year. I hope you enjoy them all, or some of them, or none but are curious enough to read a few anyway. Later today I’ll post the first story, and we’ll be off to the races in 2015 – The Tall Tale Year.