Writing, for me, is like running a half-marathon - which I've completed two of them. Quite frankly, they suck. I train for months, with the ever so precious reward of "getting to" run 13.1 miles. But here's the weird thing: I live for them.
My mother always advised me to "find something I love to do, and learn how to make a living out of it." As a child, I never fully absorbed the great wisdom that she relentlessly bestowed upon my brothers and I, but now I do. Now, I wish I would have gotten my head out of my ass, or more accurately, hers, and listened. But things are funny that way, sometimes you have to spend time in the dark before you can emerge in the sunlight. If I wasn't timid and shy as a child, then I probably wouldn't have been drawn to writing in the first place. I knew I had plenty of stories to tell, I just didn't know how to express them. And that right there audience is the precise reason I want to write: to tell my story, and possibly fictional ones, but to being with, mine.
I'm not narcissistic enough to believe that my life is more interesting or "readable", than any other person taking up oxygen. But I am narcissistic enough to think that people could learn something from what I've experienced. Isn't that what life's about: teaching others? After all, Flannery O'Connor said, "that anyone who survived childhood has enough material to write for the rest of his or her life." If, by any way possible, I am able to bestow positivity by showcasing the fucked up series of events, that I call life, I am going to. Plain and simple.
So, from absorbing my mother's wisdom, to hopefully, pure determination, I plan on freaking writing. Like a half-marathon, I will put in tons of work, and hopefully all the pain will be worth it... What's the worst thing that could happen? I learn about myself better... That bet is a favorable one...
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