In third grade, all I wanted in life was to be a writer.
I was a short, scrawny thing, determined to be the next Laura Ingalls Wilder. In a series of stories printed on my parents’ computer and given to all my friends, I told the story of a pioneer family who traveled west in their covered wagon. It was the exact plot of the Little House books with the names changed to show my creativity. My friends complimented me on the stories and asked for more, so I knew I was destined for great success.
I asked my friend Jenny to be my editor and handed her everything, confident she would approve of every last detail. Oh, the arrogance. She said my page-long covered wagon packing list was boring and that I needed more plot. I was furious, convinced she had butchered my baby. I fired her and did what I wanted. Oh, I wish I had those stories–they would make great English teacher jokes. (Jenny, you made a great third-grade editor).
Fast forward to college: school only deepened my desire to write. I majored in journalism, but wrote dozens of papers every year on every subject. I learned to write better, but also that writing is work and not just dashing brilliance on paper. My senior year, I dabbled once again with self-publishing. I wrote a textbook for credit, but I’m pretty sure that of the five people that read it, four of them were my husband, my professor, and two family members. I briefly considered writing an entry about myself on Wikipedia to see how fast they deleted it, but didn’t think I had any humiliation to spare. Nobody in the world remembers that book and honestly, like the pioneer stories, that’s ok.
Good writing advice I’ve read, learned, collected since: write often, write on a schedule, write concisely, write well, write often. Have steel skin. Kill cliches. Write what you know. The truest statement? “I don’t like to write, I love to have written.”
Writing is easiest when the words pour out of your hands and appear nearly perfect on the page. More often, the process is more tortuous. I dump verbiage on a Google document, moaning that I should be fired. I get water, check email, but the document is still there when I return. Two points of structure emerge, and then another. I begin to think in English again and just as I’m hating every word on the page, it’s done. I show it to my editor-brained husband to ensure nobody sees my misspelling of “the.” A wise thing, to give words space. An hour later, I’m calm and confident again.
I still dream of writing a book, but life has derailed a bit. It often emerges again and I remember how much I love the clacking of my keyboard, the details of children’s literature. Buried deep in my email inbox is an idea for a children’s story that I had two years ago. It’s a story for Nate, a story of his family and his childhood. I will write that story, even if it’s just for him. That story I know.