"But That Won't Get You Anywhere"

I write fanfiction. I like to write fanfiction. I have notebooks full of it, and computer folders even more so. I've been told it's quite good, for fanfiction. That I have good technique, and that it's like reading a published book. I'm my own worst critic, so I can't say for sure, but having been told so so many times I guess there's probably some truth to it.

Seven years ago, I took a creative writing class. Besides the fact that I had trouble understanding some of the assignments (we would often read a piece of fiction and then be told to write "in the same style" without a serious explanation of what that style was), one of the biggest disagreements I had with the instructor was that I used fanfiction for most of my assignments. I followed the directions as best as I understood them, but I put them into fanfiction. The instructor was critical. She seemed to think this was a phase, and not a helpful one for me. She seemed to think I would only be able to advance in my writing when I stopped writing fanfiction.

Five months ago, I was handed half a script. I had a cast already ready, a date set for the performance. We'll write it along the way, he said. It was an interesting challenge, a decent story, and a chance to direct that I would never have passed up. But a few weeks passed, and it wasn't coming together anywhere near fast enough. So I sat down, and over the course of a day and a half I re-wrote the entire script. Fixing the scenes that were already there, filling in the blanks that were left to be finished, writing entirely new scenes to elaborate on points that weren't delved into deeply enough. And somewhere along the way it occurred to me: the skills I use to write fanfiction were the exact same skills I used to write this play. Every warning I'd been given all those years ago had turned out to be completely wrong. Those skills had served me in a very real way.

I look at my life as an autistic person, and in some ways, this isn't an unusual scenario. So many people in my life had ideas about what I should be doing, in order to be successful. Often they boiled down to the idea that I had to change what I was doing in order to succeed. And looking back on those suggestions, I can't think of a single one that contributed to my success, or a single one I left unfollowed that had the dire consequences I was told about.

When parents of autistic children ask how to support their children, I tell them to take the skills the children already have and nurture them into something they can do with their lives. Many things and behaviors that seem useless can be turned into something that is useful, if the right outlet is found.

They told me fanfiction wouldn't get me anywhere, but last month, five audiences, several hundred people, had a different perspective.