Hello and welcome to the website. So glad you could make it. I guess it’s blogs like this that give you a little insight into who a person is and what makes them tick. Why read one of these things unless you get something out of it? Let’s start with the basics.
My name is Jonathan Wilson. I grew up in NW Indiana about twenty minutes from the south side of Chicago. Some of us as kids lovingly referred to our region as “the armpit of the Midwest.” If you also grew up in Hammond, you know what I’m talking about. Unlike most, I grew up as a Jehovah’s Witness. Not exactly one of the cool kids, I sometimes got picked on. If you know much about the JW culture, you know we didn’t have most of the typical experiences you get in elementary, middle, and high school. Now I live in Ontario with a family of my own.
More to the point, now I’m an aspiring writer. Don’t ask me what makes someone cross the finish line into the territory of “Being a writer,” other than just writing regularly. I suppose it’s like running a race—to expand on “crossing the finish line”—you just do it until you get there. I’ve been writing off and on for probably fifteen years now. Like many people, especially anyone who is neurodivergent (my TikTok algorithm seems to know me well), I like to start a new project and then it gets left on the side of the road to make room for the newest shiny thing. I have a keyboard and I can play maybe four songs on it. The guitar had its phase as well. Once I took up airsoft for a hot minute and even tried making costumes with foam. The foam didn’t go very far, but my brother-in-law was able to reap the rewards when I gave him my unused stock. You’re welcome, John.
You may be thinking, “Is this guy going to keep up this writing thing?” It would be a fair point, except for one thing: I’ve always been creative and I’ve always come back to certain avenues of self-expression. Those avenues are the image and the word. Ever since my second-grade English teacher gave me heck for doodling on my spelling tests, I’ve been drawing pictures. Now I tend to do that with modern technology and with words. I used to be pretty good with a pencil. Drawing portraits was my favourite to do. (I may see if the webmaster will put a gallery up somewhere.) Unfortunately, years of nerve issues with my neck have made it very difficult to draw for any length of time. When you need fine motor skills and your hands go all numb and tingly after five minutes… well, you get the idea.
This blog isn’t really about pencil art. You came here for the why and the how of my stories after all. Let’s start with the “Why” of my writing. I LOVE a good story! If it isn’t a good story, I lose interest. Don’t we all? When you only have so many hours in the day, you need to spend those hours enjoying what you read or listen to. Speaking of which, I prefer to listen to stories, especially if they are full cast or have music and sound effects included.
I’m inspired by just about anything I see in day-to-day life. Sometimes it’s a song that hits just right, or a random sentence someone says that sticks in my head like a splinter until I write it down. I never know where the next idea will come from. That’s half the fun.
And just to clear something up—I don’t do the whole “sit down at the desk with a cup of coffee and a fancy fountain pen” thing. My handwriting looks like it was written by a doctor in a moving car, so paper isn’t exactly my medium of choice. Most of my writing happens on my phone, usually in the Notes app or a Google Doc when inspiration strikes. It’s not glamorous, but it works. I can be anywhere—standing in line at a grocery store, sitting in the car waiting for my kid to finish practice—and boom, I’ve got a new paragraph or a line of dialogue.
Sometimes I use prompts just to see what spills out. That’s one of my favorite things about writing—you never really know where the story’s going to take you until it’s already got you by the collar and you’re along for the ride.
Now, about this little corner of the internet. My YouTube channel is still in its early stages, but I see it as something that can grow into more than just my own projects. That’s why I rebranded it as Tale Teller Media. The idea isn’t just to tell my stories—it’s to build a creative community.
If you’re a writer, narrator, or voice actor, I want you here. Seriously. Send me your story, and you might see it come to life in video or audio form. If you’ve got a good voice and a decent mic, reach out. We’ll find a role that fits you. And if you’ve got a story burning in your mind that you’d love to see turned into a cinematic short or a narrated audio piece, let’s make it happen.
Tale Teller Media isn’t just about entertainment—it’s about collaboration. It’s about bringing words, voices, and imagination together to make something memorable.
So thanks for stopping by, for reading this far, and for maybe seeing a little of yourself somewhere between these lines. Stick around—there’s a lot more to come.