An Obsession With Keys

I have developed an obsession with keys just tonight. This story has been fun to write. Challenging, but fun. I spent a week doing a very flushed out outline for the book only to discover that I'm using the map as more of a guideline than an actual map. It's like hiking - I know the starting point, I know the finish point and there's a very clear trail to get there, but sometimes its more fun to wander off the trail and see what's just on the other side of that little hill. There are meadows to be discovered, small creeks that feed into larger ones. I would miss all those beautiful little sights if I didn't venture off the well marked path every so often. This week, I've been venturing off it quite a bit. I always come back, though. At the moment, I've wandered off the trail and discovered - keys! Not just any keys, mind you. These are OLD keys. Like older than our parents keys! Maybe even older than our grandparents! And there is a whole ring of them - rusted, iron keys that clank when they knock against each other and they must fit somewhere. My character just has to figure out where! I don't even know what she's going to find yet. It may be something that leads her right back to the trail and she discards the keys for someone else to find in another story altogether. At the moment, though, the keys are hers. They may lead her to untold treasures. Or perhaps it's just the cool way her parents have hidden her birthday presents this year and she will have to go digging through the attic to find which old chests the keys fit so that she can open them to discover all sorts of nifty things. I was surfing the internet for old fashioned keys and there are some really cool ones out there. No answers as to what they fit but no shortages of keys like the ones above.

Maybe they will unlock my brain so all sorts of neat ideas fall out, spilling onto the page. I can then sift through them for all sorts of little treasures that my readers will enjoy! I'm going to go try them. Wish me luck!