Beautiful People -about me as a writer (or not so writer)

Cait, the Paperfury and Sky from Further up and Further in host a meme that's usually about telling things about the characters of the stories you're writing and this week about yourself as a writer. Well, as far as I can call myself a writer.
I totally like this meme's idea. I don't know why I haven't taken part earlier. So here we go (in pure English, because every time I do it in English I'm too lazy to translate again)

How many years have you been writing?

I write since I'm ten. So that's almost eleven years. Reading this a day after I think I must have been very tired, because it's only five years. Really, where was my brain then? I'm only fifteen, not 21 :D

When did you officially consider yourself a "writer"?

Uhm, actually I'm calling this blog "dreamjob: writer" because I still don't completely do. I think I'll call myself a real writer, when I've published my first book. But if you just mean somebody who writes, well, yes, maybe I am a writer. So... maybe I need to overthink my idea of writing.

Why did you start writing?

Because of a writingt contest. I was ten years old and there was a Cornelia Funke writing contest in the German issue of the National Geographic Kids magazine. And I took part. I don't know what I've written back then and I don't even have the handwritten paper I've sent there anymore, but I remember it a very bad story. Very bad. That time I decided, that if I couldn't become an adventurer or fairy, I'd become a writer. The next years I wrote one bad-written little story after the other. I had good grades in essays at school and I knew that I could write, but I never even made a plan before I started writing. I just did, but the worlds, characters where always to smooth and too perfect to write any story with them. It was like writing a story about paradise before Adam and Eve where banned. And I didn't get, that problems had to happen and things needed to be worse for my characters, to make a plot possible. But, er... wait a minute. I didn't even have proper plots. Or plots with too many holes

What’s your favorite part of writing?

I love editing. I really dream of one day editing my first draft and making it perfect, of nibbling through every single chapter of my draft. Again and again. Which leads me to my next question

What’s your biggest writing struggle?

The problem is, I'm not patient enough, to finish a draft and start editing inbetween, because I think all the time, that this or that has to be corrected, and that should be slightly different, and so I don't go on writing at the bottom but somewhere in the middle, and I have never finished a draft yet. Shame on me. I should really take part at NaNoWriMo this year.

Do you write best at night or day?

That's an interesting question. Is the time a difference? I think the place and the situation are much more important for this than the time. So, when I'm concentrated somewhere with a notebook outside, in a café, in the school cantina or in the library, I can write very well. My desk and my notebook are actually a big problem, because there I easily get distracted by... blogs. You know... School lessons are not a good time to write. I've tried, but it doesn't work well and isn't good for my school grade either. Except in German (Equivalent to what English is for you guys) because of our teacher who is really slow.

What does your writing space look like?

My writing space? It's everywhere. I write in any place better that at home at my desk where my laptop is. I usually take my paper notebook everywhere to scribble and later on type everything on the computer at home, because I'm not good at writing, when I've got access to blogs.

This is my desk on the left, where I usually write. Not. And on the right my notebooks where I do write. Sometimes. At the top you can see one of my notes abused as a bookmark :D

How long does it typically take you to write a complete draft?

I don't know. I've never finished a draft *blushes, looks to the ground feeling bad*

How many projects do you work on at once?

At the moment I'm writing a short story for a bloh project (trying to keep it short), plotting a retelling of Snow White (or rather spending time getting my handwritten notes into a digital document), writing the chronicles of ingrain wallpaper (No, I'm not painting the wall, I'm really writing a story set on a wallpaper) and I want to start writing the Snow White retelling some day.

Do you prefer writing happy endings, sad ones, or somewhere in between?

I haven't written any endings. I've only plotted them yet. But I think, for me, it is a minor matter whether it's a good or bad ending. The issue is making something happen inbetween. So I don't know what I prefer. Though I think most of my endings are somewhere inbetween.

List a few authors who’ve influenced your writing journey.

Cornelia Funke made me start writing at all. It was the winner of that writing contest I've written about, who taught me, that a magical world needs problems too to make stories happen there. Writing utopia makes you an idealist, but not a writer. Michael Ende and Walter Moers first taught me, that you can tell a story with little plot, if you just make things happen for a reason and that's everything. Christophe Paolini made me dream of writing a book when I'm fifteen. Well, I'm becoming sixteen in february, so... no. But I think it was the wrong intention, wanting to do it, because he did it.

Do you let people read your writing? Why or why not?

I will to let people read my work, but let me first finish my draft. :D

What’s your ultimate writing goal or dream?

Finishing a draft. Yes, I do feel ashamed. I keep starting all kinds of other stories, even though it's always this one story that has my hear. Maybe also the lack of finished drafts is the reason why I still don't perfectly consider myself as a writer

If you didn’t write, what would you want to do?

Librarian. Journalist. Webdesigner. Programmer. Biologist. Archaeologist. Chemistrian

Do you have a book you’d like to write one day but don’t feel you’re ready to attempt it yet?

I don't know how to call the genre it's set in. Wait, let me call it "Rural Fantasy" because, it's set in my home town, which neither makes my story Urban Fantasy nor High Fantasy. Well, a fantasy story set in a small town. You know. It's one of my stories from a boys perspektive and the only first person narrative story where I don't feel the need of adding second narrator. It's about a magic witch world, where boys and men count less and how he discovers the lie the unfair system he lives in is based on. Also I want to write it very magical, with a lot of hidden magic, that normale people don't see and magical folk do see. I've made a lot of attempts to write it already, but I've realized, that I need time to figure everything about this story out.

Which story has your heart and won’t let go?

The one I've just mentioned

To sum up, this helped me more about writing than I've expected.  Because having this meme in the back of my mind made me writing more this week :-)

your Mulan, who is now going to leave the browser and will write on.