I’m sitting here, knowing I have a perfectly good blog to write on located in a different dimension. Unfortunately, I don’t have a lot of desire to write there. I’m not sure it’s who I am any more. Let’s call this part of some existential crisis I am having as a writer.
You see, I think that’s the problem. I am a writer. I started blogging back in the hinterlands of 2002 to keep our family updated with our lives in towns far away from them. Call me the original mommy blogger, who only writer to update family. That blog is still out there, but it’s anonymous and has some pretty funny stories about my now 14 year-old son.
I’ve changed. I have to write, but I’m not 100% sure what I’m supped to be writing these days. What I do know is that, more than anything, I want to write and not be beholden to some brand, or PR person, who doesn’t really give a flip about me, or what I think.
I am not just a blogger. I’m a writer. When I get down and nitty gritty, truly using my voice, I’ve had people tell me I was their “Judy Blume.” Which is, in my opinion, the highest compliment a girl could be given.
Somewhere along the way, I’ve lost my voice. Like Susan, it’s desperately being sought. Instead of the superfluous, I’m seeking the importance. Those words which flow from me, dark, thick, and melodic, like molasses from an old mason jar.
Like any good storyteller, I’m pretty sure that once you’ve lost sight of how to tell your own story, the stories of others won’t come either.
Sure, I’ve joked about what’s going to make me a better writer in my bio, but none of that matters. What matters is my butt being in the seat and the words coming out of me. And writing, for me, is like air. I need it to live.
It’s funny, I had a conversation with my son about my writing. He asked “Mom, what’s more important, commercial success or writing?” My answer was, and always will be, writing. Acknowledgement would be nice, but I have to get it out of me. I just don’t know what the “it” is.
And that, my friends, leaves me feeling leaden. I have to get it out, I’m just not sure how.
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