Yawns at Dawn

When my daughters were very young, while getting ready in the morning we'd play a game. We'd still be waking, so inevitably, one of us would yawn, and another would prompt them-

"The yawn fairy got you! What does she look like today?" (I just realized our fairies were always female, lol - just like us)

Exercising our imaginations was a good way to wake up, and eventually we each would have described in detail our yawn fairy for the day; for example:

My yawn fairy has wavy red hair with golden highlights falling down to her waist, and bright leaf-green eyes. Her dress is short and sleeveless, and made of light flowing fabric of gold and green. She wears golden slippers with laces that criss-cross up her calves to just below her knees, and a circlet of daisies on her head. Her wings are transparent sliver with red spiral patterns at the tips, and there are sliver sparkles on her cheeks.

We tried to outdo one another in our details - I'm smiling as I remember! We were wide awake by the time we were finished, and ready to start the day.

Sigh. I really miss those yawn fairy days!

My oldest creation was a girl, named Arisa. I gave her everything I wanted for myself. I made her a Mary Sue, making her into a perfect version of myself because the first version of me wasn’t enough. She had everything. The sass, the intelligence, the physical ability, the confidence... just everything. She was perfect.

Then a year or so later, I read my book and found nothing but distaste for her. She was bland, vain, rude and small minded. I found that I had made the entire book around her being so amazing when in reality she wasn’t. I tired to find myself her again, but I couldn’t see anything...

Then Daiji(Daija) appeared.He wasn’t perfect. He was a little taller than average. Kind of silly. A little insecure and lazy. He hid behind fake smiles and bright laughs. He tried to fit in and make other people happy, even at his distress. He didn’t have everything. I didn’t know it when I wrote him, but I wrote him as the orignal me.

I found myself loving Daiji more than Arisa. I asked myself, “Why would that be?” That I made a side character, which was centered around being comedic relief, better then the protagonist? How did I make these personalities so different from what I intended them to be? Arisa was supposed to be full of potential and a great queen but all I saw was a shallow shell of a monster. Daiji was supposed to be a lazy but loyal man, yet all I saw was unlocked potential and means to be the greatest king of all.

I made Arisa be something I wasn’t because I thought she was superior. All I achieved in the end was a defeated version of myself that I would eventually become if I didn’t stop wanting to be someone else. I realised that I was being too harsh on myself and as a result too harsh on Daiji. I bullied Daiji like I bulled myself into thinking that my faults were my weakness and my problems when in reality they gave me the means to be great.

And just like that, I flipped the tables. I stopped writing about her and started writing about him.