I opened my blog and discovered with shock the last date in November. And the pics of Jackson are from a lifetime ago - now he runs around and climbs up the shelves. The truth is, I think about writing every day. I want to be a writer. I think I am a writer. How can that be when I'm not writing? Facebook drives me crazy because every time I post something I feel the need to explain myself and write a long description - but that defeats the whole purpose of Facebook.
So I'm asking myself how I am a writer if I'm not writing. I want to publish something. I've had countless people tell me throughout time that I am a skilled writer. Someone even said once that I missed my calling as a writer. Missed it? I'm not old. You're never too old for anything. I think my mind lives and breathes writing. I'm a little rusty - in fact I'm just spitting stuff out right now as it pops in and out of my head and it's really disorganized. I hate that. I think that prevents me from writing. I have a little obsessiveness and feel the need for it to be perfect from the start. I want it clean and pretty. I want my words to flow with wisdom and affect the reader in ways I can't begin to imagine.
Throughout my day I think as if I'm writing. I think of titles and topics and subcategories and who my audience is or can be. I consider the introductions and the chapters and funny tales and the time I'll spend writing. And then for some reason, I don't write. Like I said, I think it's a perfectionism thing. I feel like I have to have a plan and a publisher and the topic and the done deal before I start. People tell me, "no, no - you just need to write . . and write and write - it'll happen for you." Sorta the 'if you build it, they will come' theory. So this is my giving in. I'm writing and it's not perfect and it drives me nuts. It's like the free writes I learned in 8th grade when we had a time limit and kept our pencils constantly on the paper or we had to fill the page.
I'm not sure if I want to write about running and my latest marathon training or what my plans are for dinner this week or my adventures with my kids in the rain. I think it's wrapped up in all of that somewhere, but that's all I can figure for now. It'll have to evolve when I'm ready - tomorrow or next year. It'll figure out it's topics and it's readers. It'll develop it's own voice and place in this crazy cyber world. It'll seek out it's dreams of columns or articles in some published format. It'll find friends and groups and lectures. But for now, the writing just is.
3 comments:
It can't be til it is, and now it is :-)
I'm wondering where it will lead.
As someone who used to write books for other people who got to call themselves writers when they weren't, I think there's something to the practice theory. Brain dumps are a good thing, even if only you are able to sift through the pile and make sense of it upon the initial reading.
read on writing by king, self-editing for fiction writers (matters even if you're writing n.f.), and start writing.
write. write now. edit later.
go go go. and no friskiness with e until the book is done.
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