On Making the Decision To Write

I've been writing as long as I can remember. Journals, poems, little snippets of stories here and there. College, then my masters.  In college I thought I'd major in creative writing, until I really got into the writing and I realized being workshopped, reading aloud, those things did not fit well with my introverted personality. I switched to English Lit and added a double in Film Studies because I was bored and I needed more stories. I have always loved a good story. 

When I graduated I knew I wanted to write. I submitted an application to write descriptions for an online toy company, one of the first, and that was the first time I started writing content. Content, whatever that is. It's just stuff really, without the strategy. But I'll save that for another time. I went to get my M.A. in Communication because it was writing, but maybe with a job attached? Or that's what I thought anyway. Over the years I've been a blogger, a marketer, a PR gal, written content, strategy, branding, all of it. And I continue to do that work and I love it. But what's been eating at me, all these years, is the nagging feeling that I have a story to tell. I want to write fiction. I want to create something new and let it out into the world. 

When, really, is there ever the right time to write a book? Or to make the switch, from your day job, or your job as a parent, to say "I'm going to do this."

For me, now is that time. It feels indulgent, to write a book. To focus on art. It isn't paid. And I could fail spectacularly at it. In fact, I probably will.

Slowly, I've been telling people I know I'm writing a book. And every time I say it I get a little thrill, but I also get a little terrified. I say "ask me about it again in six years." Or I say "it's about modern American life," which is vague enough to sort of stop people from asking any further.

But I'm putting it out there in the universe now. Let it be known, friends, that I am writing a book. Ask me about it. Ask me about the classes I've been taking down at Lighthouse Writer's Workshop. Ask me how my writing is going, and where I've been doing it, and how I'm feeling about it. It's possible I'll tell you I'm struggling, or it's going well, or I'll change the subject entirely. But the decision has been made.

And now I get to work. 

What Makes You Think You're a Writer?

There are writers, and then there are writers.

You know, the real kind. The kind that write incredible novels, or screenplays, or tomes on the future of technology. 

I write a mommy blog. I write website copy for my clients. I write press releases, and white papers and bylines and sometimes I even write thought pieces on expectations of women in motherhood.

But rarely, very rarely, do I refer to myself as a writer. 

Instead, I say I'm a communications consultant. Or that I do PR. Sometimes I say I'm a mommy blogger, but only in the right company, because you know, people are assholes about mommy bloggers. 

But if I look at everything I do, and everything I love and care about, it comes back to my love of the written word. I am a WRITER. Why am I so afraid to say it then?

Is it because I don't, like Ernest Hemingway did, sit down every day with a pencil and write one true sentence? 

Is it because I don't, like Stephen King does, sit down every day and bust out 10 pages? 

Is it because I don't, like Virginia Woolf did, spend two hours every morning writing? 

Is it because some days, lots of days, I don't even write? 

No. I write every single day. It's just that lots of days, what I write is, well, it's boring. You might say dry. I enjoy what I do as much as the next technology geek, but sometimes you have to admit, the average Joe isn't exactly yearning to read about mobile phone app usage. Or my grocery list. Or the cover letter I helped my sister write.

So is it what you write about then that makes you a writer? Am I comparing myself to lots of dead white men (some alive, ok) who are granted, wonderful writers, but don't occupy the same space in the world that I do? Or fiction greats to whom I couldn't ever possibly compare?

Is it because I don't have the confidence to say I'm a writer?

I am a woman. I am a professional, and a mom, and I watch The Good Wife on TV. I spend my days obsessing over work, whether my kids are happy, and trying to squeeze in time to walk the dog. I sit on conference calls and shop online all while eating lunch and thinking about what I should cook for dinner. 

I do all of these things, and all the while I write.

I may not be Virginia Woolf, or even Jennifer Weiner. But here I am writing, today at least. 

That's what makes me think I'm a writer.