My Thoughts as the Author - Wi-no-na · 6:53pm May 13th, 2021
This story came out this year, I know. Although it was finally finished this year, it was first drafted somewhere between 2016-2017. That makes it one of my longest unfinished stories, next to I'm Still Here. Even that story took far longer than it should have to be finished, mostly because I wasn't sure how to extend it to the finish line I had in mind for it.
Wi-no-na was inspired by a story about a dog from real life that was abandoned by its owners. It lost some trust along the way due to the pain of abandonment and it watched its new owner sleep in bed all night over fear it'd wake up and they wouldn't be there. It was such a small story and a short video - the one I watched originally was linked in the story description by a viewer, so have a look if you want - and it sounded like a good origin story template for where Winona came from before she joined the Apple family.
It stayed unfinished for so long because I wasn't sure what to do with it and I very honestly didn't think it would do that well in terms of viewership. It's not exactly an original idea, which automatically means to me that it would be pointless writing it because who wants to see an idea that's already been done and is predictable in how it will end? There wouldn't be any build up if you knew what was going to happen anyway. Strategically speaking, I'm don't care much about being popular, since I only care about writing something of high quality and putting a story that means something out there. I don't do this for the glory. Only the fulfilment. Granted, I don't feel that as much as I used to, but having a story make an impact on a person for whatever reason makes it worthwhile to me, and that's all that matters in my opinion.
To be fair to the story, I do think it's of good quality and I am pleased with how it turned out in the end. I don't say that for a lot of my stories since I'm very hard on myself for a lot of reasons when it comes to my own work in every field, but this one earns that right. I'm glad it's finished after years of being put off.
Character-wise, I don't write for the Apple family a lot. The ones I have the most experience with are Apple Bloom and Applejack, nobody else. They are fairly easy to write for if you get the accent correct, but we all have different ears and listening perception, so it varies between authors. I wanted to make their reaction to hearing why Winona was acting the way she was following Fluttershy's one-on-one talk with her as genuine as possible, as in, how do you think they'd react if there was an MLP episode based upon this story? Do you think the Apple family would react the exact same way or at least similar to how I wrote them? As the youngest one in the family, Apple Bloom, also as the child, would have the strongest and saddest reaction. A dog to a child is a best friend. Hearing this news would frankly break her heart, cause it to bleed.
So yeah, trying to make everything as accurately portrayable as I could was mostly my biggest issue aside from the storytelling in general. I can't stand to get something wrong or to make it inaccurate, so at least I think I dodged that one. There's not really that much more I can say about this story other than what's been mentioned above already.
As I also mentioned above in the start, I didn't expect this story to get much attention seeing as I didn't originally think an animal abandonment story would be very original, appealing or mean that much for what it is. This is 2021 now, and it began in 2017 when a lot of these ideas had already been mulled over. To find that the story has made the featured box and stayed there for a few days just after a little over an hour had passed since publication was both surprising and amazing to see!
As it goes, it's got only a handful more likes to go before the green bar in the like-dislike ratio hits 100 upvotes. Like...when I say that was unexpected, I mean it was unexpected. An old-style story making it that far to me is truly a great feeling as an author who thinks he doesn't have much of an edge in the fanfiction writing game anymore! So there's that level of positivity from this at least! 
I have stopped writing fully lately, having hung up my writing hat and my pen and keyboard late last year. I don't have any interest in writing anymore, but I do still want a place in this fandom. I've been here for almost a decade, so leaving would be a kick in the nuts. I am still present, only not as a writer and more of an entity. I still do fanfiction readings, so that's the most of a voice I still have here. That is literally all there is to it from my perspective.
I don't expect anybody to find this post particularly interesting, but I wanted to offer my thoughts on this story. I think about it quite a lot during the days that have passed since I wrote and published it. I only wanted it to give an insight into what I think of it as the one who wrote it to begin with. Not the most interesting topic if we're being honest here, but I wanted to share my thoughts to see what you all think of them, whether or not you agree with me.
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Peace,
- FireRain 💛
