On Writing

I have always loved to write.  Back in the day, I used to write letters to penpals and friends that had moved away.  I would write pages and pages and then get back…a paragraph.  It didn’t matter.  Undeterred, the next time it was my turn I’d do it all again.  I just loved putting the words on the paper.  Telling my friends all about my day to day life and conjuring pictures in their minds.  Staying connected.

Blogging before there was blogging. 

Well, I was blogging.  They were tweeting.

I took a slew of English courses in college (it should have been my major but…well…whatever) and decided that I should take both a journalism class and a creative writing class.

To say I royally sucked ass in both classes would be kind.  I was that bad.

The journalism class had too many rules.  Too many “don’ts”.  It didn’t give me enough room to really say what I wanted to say.  Duh Sherry – that’s what journalism IS you idiot!  I really did know that but it took that once class to let me know that the reporters at the Washington Post had nothing to worry about.  Their jobs were safe.  So were those on the Editor’s desk.

The creative writing class was even worse.  I discovered that I have no imagination.  None, zero, nada, zilch.  I’m way too practical and pragmatic to think up stories and plotlines.  I’m not even kidding.  You know how you look up a the puffy white clouds and call out what you see?

My kids, “Look mommy!  I see a duck!”  “I see a horse!”  “I see a table!”

Me, “Um…I see a…um…a…cotton ball?”

Yep…that bad.  It’s actually a running joke in our house.  “Hey mom look!  There’s a Q-tip!”  Yeah…my kids are hi-LAR-ious!

I go back and read my short stories and poems from that class and cringe.  I actually feel sorry for the teacher.  Poor woman had to read that crap and then give it a grade without crushing my spirit.  I’m glad she didn’t crush my spirit – I was doing enough of that all by myself.

Still I love to write.  This blog has been a way for me to take the written word, crunch it, craft it and play with it until I put it on the page and then, hopefully, it touches someone else.  It’s perfect for me.  There are no rules (except my self imposed ones) and since I write about things that happen in my world, I don’t have to make any shit up…thank God.

Not being able to make shit up means I don’t dream well either.  Not the snoozing kind of dreaming, I’m extremely proficient at that, but the kind were you wonder what and who you’ll be when you grow up.  You know that question people ask, “If you could be anything you wanted to be and there were absolutely no barriers, what would you do?”  Or, “What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?”  Yeah, I usually end up stumped.  Uh…duh….I don’t know.

Except when it comes to writing.  That part is easy.  If there were no barriers (including a lack of talent), I would write for a living.  Not novels – again…I’d need an imagination for that – but blogs or non-fiction or articles or cookbooks or diet and fitness books or self-help/sobriety kind of books or all of the above.  THAT is my dream.  To make a living sitting at a computer, researching, writing, editing, re-writing and submitting…full time.

I think that’s why I got so excited about the Florida Rehab article.  Someone thought my work was good enough to be used on another website.  I’ve written another for another site on which I’m waiting to get approval.  It’s a long shot but I’m taking it.

One day, when I grow up, I think I’ll be a writer.

Namaste