Day 50 of 100 intentional reflective steps.
I began this 100 day exercise as a way to discipline myself to write every day. Less important but also significant, I wanted to see if there were readers out there who would absorb and enjoy my particular brand of honestly, snark, humor and faith. 50 short essays and 9,000 page reads later I have arrived at the half way mark.
I love writing. I love telling stories. I actually claimed out loud that I am a writer. (Albeit to a stranger sitting next to me on an airplane while we were grabbing each other’s asses trying to find seat belts.) At this point “I am a writer” should roll off the tongue smoothly but it feels awkward to claim that mantle. Awkward like meeting new relatives and finding out they are all lip kissers. And lets not even mention the fact that you have to dodge the toothpick with half of them! I feel like I am dodging, repositioning and steeling myself for a weird response. It just doesn’t feel right yet. But I’m doing it anyway.
All my life I have mentally captured images and tucked away cool words and phrases in my mind, to be pulled out for use “someday”. I dreamt what it would be like to be a writer. It just never seemed like the right time. Now is the time. I have several articles for different publications in the works, and am playing “cat and mouse” with a book proposal. This is fun.
And it turns out being a writer is a lot like my old life, just with better editing and more illustrations.