Write Like Love

I consider myself fortunate, because I discovered my true love when I was very young. Though occasionally neglected, this has been an enduring love, and I think it will last forever. I decided by the time I was ten that I was going to write as an adult, but I can remember writing stories as soon as I could write anything at all. What do first graders write about? I’m not sure, but I seem to remember a story about animals whose voices got switched. . .

Few of my stories star talking animals at this point in my life (ok, there’s one story, but old habits die hard) but my enthusiasm and delight in writing hasn’t changed since the day I cried over getting only honorable mention for a "book" I wrote in fifth grade. I decided then that I was going to be a writer or die trying. So far I’m not a professional of course, but it hasn’t killed me yet.

I haven’t made my first effort at getting a piece of fiction published, not counting submissions to college publications, though I have had poems published. It would be easy to say that it’s because it’s hard to find a publication that’s appropriate for the type of stories I write, but the real reason is that I’m afraid of failing. Ironically, even though poetry goes deeper into what I feel, fiction is more personal, and the rejection would hurt more. But I met someone this summer that has made me think of making a serious effort to put myself on the line and try. One of the professional artists I worked with this summer isn’t that much older than I am, probably her late twenties, and she’s successful, at least to the extent that art is how she makes her living. I’m awed by that the same way I am of people I know who have their own cds, maybe they’re not famous, but they’ve done something, and they’re sharing it with people. So I’ve promised myself to pull out my copies of The Writers Market, and find some place I can send a story and see what happens. The only problem will be picking a story, it’ll be like choosing a favorite among your children.

I think I owe it to myself and my writing to make a serious effort sooner than later. One of my friends, a woman slightly older than my parents, is taking the next year off to write children’s books. I wish her well, because that takes a lot of bravery. I’m not sure that even with my enthusiasm for writing, I could dedicate a full year to writing. I’ve never had that sort of time though, writing has always been something I’ve done when I’m not working on something else. I work full time now, spent four years in college as a full time student and working part time, and even before that all the way back to age twelve I babysat my brother full time during the summers. I worry that my attention span wouldn’t allow me to write full time, but I don’t have a basis of comparison, so I’m not going to lose sleep over it unless the opportunity presents itself to me.

While I’ve said I love writing, I think it’s worth saying that I believe that writing itself is like love in some ways too. (if only so the title makes sense!) Or not so much the process of writing itself, but the ideas that lead up to it. In one way, the ideas catch you off guard much in the same way that love does. They often present themselves when you least expect it. One of the two stories I’m working on now is like that. I was with co-workers on lunch break, in a bookstore. I was annoyed that they a. didn’t want to eat, and b. they were reading (I never read something I haven’t paid for yet. It feels wrong) so I was sitting there, bored and brooding over something else entirely when the idea for a story was prompted by a fleeting thought. A whole plot about betrayal and the limits of unconditional love wound out in my mind while I sat there, and I had to wait five hours before I could even write the first word. That leads to the other way writing is like love. Having a new inspiration for a story you think will be really good is a lot like how it feels when you first realize you’re in love. Not as intense, but the same expectation, excitement, and dreaminess is there. It also happens a lot more often, if you’re lucky, and turns out well more often too. Not to put down loving a person, but you can have ideas for half a dozen stories at a time without anyone getting mad at you.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that we need to be passionate about something in life, and my something is writing. What’s yours?