One Year

One year ago, exactly – November 20, 2017 – I decided to get real with this writing thing.  To bite the bullet.  To take the plunge.  To stop being scared.  To jump in with both feet.  To be all in.  To just bloody commit  – come what may.

I had, a few months earlier, somehow figured out how to create a website.  I had no idea how to do anything.  Google and YouTube, and occasionally my kids, helped me navigate my way through the various technical challenges.  Truthfully, I was reluctant to have my kids involved.  I wanted to sink or swim on my own.  I needed to feel like this was all mine.  And mostly I have figured it all out on my own.  Oh, except that time, at the eleventh hour, in the very final step of creating my website, I made some sort of horrific mistake – like putting a colon instead of a semi-colon in a segment of code – and lost the WHOLE thing.  All of it.  Entirely. Gone.  It simply didn’t exist anymore. Daughter and boyfriend dropped everything and came to the rescue (side note – they had to use Google and YouTube to resurrect all that was lost).

So there I sat with a website.  I was pretty proud of it.  It looked good to me.  Had parts that moved even.  There were different pages. Tabs. Drop down menus.  How cool.   Oh – and I put a photo of myself up there too.  This was major and must surely prove how totally “all in” I was.  I started writing some blogs.  Just little anecdotes really.  Nothing major.  Re-telling some stories of motherhood and a few mid-life reflections.  An occasional piece about what it was like to try this writing thing.  I almost fooled myself. I knew no one was seeing this.  It was brilliant.  Just enough to be able to tell myself I was being a writer, but not at all risky…since no one knew this writing existed.  How perfect.

I spent a few months in this state. Knocking off a blog every week or so.  Not really getting better.  Just getting more used to being okay with having my writing out in the world.  I knew I was fooling myself though. I knew I was playing small.  It was so safe.  There is no real expectation that bloggers have any particular talent in the writing department.  Mainly they just have stuff to say – and more commonly, sell – so I knew I couldn’t get into too much trouble.  And besides, with the click of a mouse, I could simply delete anything I wrote if I changed my mind.

I don’t know what changed, or why, but by mid-November I was restless.  Did I suddenly want people to see what I was writing?  Did I suddenly think maybe my writing wasn’t half bad?  I don’t know.  A few people had given flattering comments on my blogs and maybe it went to my head.  In any event, I needed to figure out a way to get people to see my website.  I had to direct traffic there somehow.  I had some experience with Twitter and Facebook but knew that Instagram was a bit more relevant and active.  Instagram was all about photos though.  I had no idea how I could get my blogs seen by posting things on Instagram.  What would I post?  All I could think to do was to write small bits and pieces, figure out how to put them onto small post-sized square tiles, and post.  I thought maybe if people liked my posts they would go visit my website and possibly read my blogs.  I soon realized that these bits and pieces I was posting were actually poems.  So suddenly I was in this whole world of Insta-poets.  Bizarre.  I don’t own a poetry book.  I’ve never been particularly interested in poetry.  But whatever it was that I was writing, I was having a ball.  And some of it seemed pretty decent.  I forgot about blogging.

And here’s how the past year played out:

• I continued to write blogs, but not as frequently
• I post anywhere from 1 to 4 poems a day, often using writing prompts or participating in little poetry challenges made by other Instapoets
• I have around 1650 followers, give or take – and most things I post are liked by at least 30 to 50 people and usually commented upon – so somewhere in the world my writing is being read and related to in some way.  This matters to me.  It makes me feel like it’s not entirely pointless or selfish.
• I wrote a book – On Words: Reassurance for the Emerging Writer  – a book of poems about the writing life – published May 2017
• I wrote another book – On Optimism: Making the Most of It – a book of poems about…well…optimism, duh! – published August 2017
• I have about 100 other book/project ideas – some poetry, most not – with more ideas arriving daily (This is the most amazing part of this whole endeavor!)
• I currently am working on four In-Progress projects
• I have had my poems featured and shared on other Instagram Poetry accounts many, many times
• I have made countless new connections with very kind, supportive, funny, talented, inspiring, and very real human beings, within the writing and poetry world through Instagram and have received an incredible amount of support and inspiration through this community
• Within my own social network and family I have admitted that this is what I do and have even shared some of my work
• I have read 100 books (How weird that it works out to exactly 100?!)
• I write. Every. Single. Day.
• I say outloud that I am a Writer (with a capital W)

I am blown away. I can’t believe it.  I am loving this. Yes, absolutely I am totally filled with doubt – about my abilities; about who I think I am to so boldly do this; about whether there is any point in this; about being laughed at; about being self-indulgent with my time and “playing” and not contributing in any “real” way to society; about being a terrible writer; about being a fraud.  You get the idea.

But….I’m not prepared to stop.  I don’t think I can.  I don’t know where it will lead.  And I’m not really concerned about that.  I am allowing my interests and passions to take me wherever it takes me.  I can’t explain this drive, and need, and itch, and passion, to anyone in terms that make any sense.

The one thing I have learned is that for me it is best not to talk about my specific projects.  That does make it a bit of a challenge when people ask what I’m doing with my time and with my life.  Almost all writers I know understand what I mean.  And almost all non-writers don’t.  So I have to not worry about people understanding or not understanding and must simply continue doing what feels right to me.

Come what may….