My first dream in life was to be a writer. If you know me, you know this.
I used to write stories for fun, back when I was still using the notebook paper with the dotted lines in the middle. When i wasn’t writing, I was reading. Not just for entertainment, but to learn how the authors developed their characters, to study the storyline and plot formation, and to expand my vocabulary.
When I was 7 I started to write my first novel. In hindsight this is hilarious because I was a child, but it was real to me. I was writing about a girl transitioning into womanhood. A girl who was torn between a life she had and a life she dreamed of. She lived on a farm, owned and run by her family, a farm that she was expected to help with, to work at, and to continue with as it was the family business. She knew her duties and she was good at them. But she had other dreams, of the city, of living in a place swarmed with different people from different walks of life, of endless possibilities, of experience and expansion, of being whoever she chose to be, rather than who she was told to be.
One day, not too long after I’d moved from Pennsylvania to Massachusetts, I printed out the 38 pages I’d typed up so I could review it as a whole and edit some. I edited a lot. I struck out lines and words, I marked the pages up until it looked like it must all be wrong, and I decided it just wasn’t good enough. I shredded it. I deleted it. I stopped writing for a very long time, unless it was for school.
I continued to read though. A lot. And I was just as much of a critic to those writers as I was to myself (still am, I won’t lie). And when I found something moving, or beautiful, or genius (there was more of this than not), then I was so blown away, so dumbstruck that I had to take a break from reading before moving to the next book, simply out of respect, like waiting to hop into a new relationship after a break up. However, these books continued to deter my writing, because how could I ever measure up to that?
I started writing stories again when 1. I had lived a little more life, and 2. I gained some confidence in myself (college).
But putting them on paper is one thing, sharing them is another. I’ll show you why. Take these excerpts:
—(Just winging it here) “His hand brushed mine as we walked down the dirt road. We didn’t speak or exchange looks, but I could feel him next to me, his steps matching my every breath, my every heart beat.”
— (From “Sunday Cycling”) “I watch the waves crash against the concrete steps that line the lake, but some days the water is perfectly still with no current at all. My breath slows and deepens as I watch the clouds form shapes above me. I am so heavy on the ground, it feels like I’m sinking into the dirt. I am so connected to the world around me that I can feel the tree branches swaying in the wind.”
As writers we try to paint a picture for the reader so they can feel like they’re there, or relate to the emotions in the story. We learned this in english class— create imagery, be detailed, etc etc. But for me, I was simply sharing my experiences. I was sharing the world through my eyes, how I see things, how my body feels, where my mind goes in those moments. You see my values and my humor, my joy and my pain. If it’s fiction, then I am creating a world through my perception of life (of what it is, or of what I want it to be). And THAT is like being naked onstage. It’s raw, it’s vulnerable, it’s intimate, and it’s fucking terrifying to put on display for the world to see.
I clearly am not in that space anymore, since this blog shares way too much information about my personal life, and I have literally been almost naked on stage for the world to see (bikini comp). Anyways… If I never truly tried to be writer, if I never put all of my eggs in that basket, then I could never fail, right? But ain’t that the saddest way to live your life? ( I hate the word “ain’t”).
So I am done getting in my own way, I am done with fear, I am here to be seen, understood, misunderstood, called crazy, ambushed with tomatoes to the face, whatever you wish, I really don’t care.
