I was having drinks recently with a really awesome lady, and she remarked to me that she never knew I was a writer.  Now this lady has actually stuck out a friendship with me for just about 25 years and although we have not been super close as of late, we have always updated each other on the big milestones.  I went home and pondered the reality that very few people knew that I wanted to be a writer, including myself.  Looking back now it is obvious, I have so many unfinished notebooks and partially written ideas scattered around my house, and a great many finished projects too.

I remember the first time I was assigned to write a short story, during mystery month at school.  I was about 12, and I did nothing but write for a week straight.  I went through the entire writing process we were taught, the brainstorming, coming up with a theme, climactic action, and as it was a mystery, developing the character with the surprise twist at the end.  I had written this all down in an old green notebook that I found in my grandfathers work shop.  The night before I had to hand in the story I re-looked at the assignment and was actually a little upset that it had to be typed out and not handwritten.  So I pulled one of my first all nighters, typed the story out and handed in both the typed version and the authentic handwritten ‘whodunit’.  I re-read the story I wrote a couple of years ago, and although I know it will never be the great lost work of K-Ghislaine, it had a couple of points of charm in it. And it also laid the framework for how I go about writing today.

Although I no longer have much interest in fictional works, I have written all sorts of things without ever realizing what I was actually preparing myself for.  I have books of poetry, short stories, some philosophical essays, and even two songs.  I cannot pretend any of them are works of art, but as I move forward with my writing career it seems a little less terrifying to know all the years of practice and preparation that I have put into it.  Writing my blog makes me very happy, because I do subscribe to the idea that you are better at the things you know and you love.  I never knew I wanted to be a writer, I just have always written.  I loved it before I even knew I was doing it, it’s actually kind of how I felt about sex.  I knew I would love it long before I lost my virginity.  I came so close to writing a completely safe for work post.