Ten day challenge day 9: the story behind the story

I didn’t plan day #9 like this, but it worked out just fine. Today’s prompt:

Post either a setting or character profile from your latest fiction project, a chapter summary of your non-fiction book, or a discussion of the theme or object inspiring a poem, article, or other writing project.

So … I’m still a little amazed that Kazka Press accepted The Girl with the Piccolo. It’s … uh … whimsical? I don’t know. Anyway, they did, and there it is. I started down the path of this story with a prompt from The Writer’s Regimen, which was, in part:

Try creating a character whose occupation is one that you are not familiar with and do some research as to what knowledge and skills he or she would need to fill that position.

Why I tried searching on jobs that involved noise, I’m not certain, but I came across listings for jobs in the United Kingdom for noise officers. I remember thinking, sure, we have people who clean up trash, purify water, and so on. What if you had to clean up noise?

Probably because I’m former military, officer = army, and my mind went off in that direction. The rest of it? You got me. I do know this. The following phrase popped into my head at one point:

Everyone always underestimates the girl with the piccolo.

There you go. That was enough character/conflict for me to take the idea and run with it for about 1,000 words. The story begins with:

No one thinks about the empty note casings after the nightly revelry. Someone has to pick them up, right? That I spent four grueling years at the Acoustic Academy at Stormy Point for the privilege is something I try not to think about.

You can read the rest here.