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On Writing
Whatever You Really Want To Do…Do It Now!
As soon as I learned to hold a pencil properly, I began writing stories. I was serious about it. In the fourth grade, I even organized my first writing group — everyone was required to write horse stories. I wrote through junior high and high school, wrote for the paper and the yearbook, and in my senior year, I wrote my first work of fiction, by hand. The only person who read it said it was derivative and formulaic. Hey, I was seventeen!
I chronicled my journeys in my twenties, wrote the beginnings of short stories, and even wrote poetry. But did I ever seriously consider the possibility that I could become a writer? No — that was pie-in-the-sky thinking. I studied science, then segued into nursing, where I wrote incredibly detailed care plans.
Two decades later, I wrote a self-published health guide, and then two fairly successful health books, which the “RN” after my name no doubt helped sell. Over the next decade, I wrote a ton of poetry, a never-to-be-seen chronicle of the ending of my marriage, and a handful of short stories, just for fun. You see, in the absence of my naysayer-in-chief, the creative voice inside me was growing…
Finally divorced, but still fairly unhappy with my life’s trajectory, I finally “allowed” myself to study creative writing. I actually signed up…
