Mysteries surround us in the actual real world, especially if you want to find them and are willing to believe in them. It's sort of like Peter Pan, where if you believe in fairies they will live. Clap, clap, clap. Sure, I'll believe. Why not? It certainly doesn't harm anything to keep an open mind about such things. What I find really interesting is examining the ideas and concepts that the true believers bring out. It reminds me of oral ghost stories, or tall tales.
When mysteries are big enough, grand enough, or bombastic enough, they take on a life of their own and keep going even when they shouldn't. That's why I'd bet everyone recognizes immediately the picture I've shown. Sure, it's the Loch Ness Monster. The myth is so huge now that the whole world knows it. Stories are like that.
I'm sure every writer desires to craft a world that people enjoy so much that the fiction creates new life beyond itself. In a modern sense we all watched it happen with the Harry Potter stories. Despite my studies of the phenomenon I really am no closer to understanding the why's or how's. I'd love to know a recipe of how to create a worldwide myth. Maybe it's on YouTube, or a TED talk. Probably it's a case of great timing combined with a great story and twisted together with the whimsy of fate. Who knows?
I wonder if we'll ever get a definitive answer regarding the myths of Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster? One can hope.
- M
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