A letter to my web designer (and friend), Joe, about writing...
Laurie Repko -
January 11, 2018 Dear Joe,
I want to thank you again for setting up this website for me. It forced me to do something I thought I’d never be able to do: cultivate audience for my writing. This goes along with the post I have called “Here and Now” where I talk about putting things off—saving the best for last…what it really is, is an admittance of fear. Fear that I might actually get what I want. Fear that hard work really can take you to the next level—even if that level is only a privacy, a time, a state of mind.
I don’t have a whole lot of time to allot to writing. I have to work strategically to earn it—a moment here—there…stolen. Traded. It is an indulgence. And when I admitted to you in September that I wouldn’t get to post in a blog until winter break I wasn’t being snarky or facetious…I was being, well, fearful and honest. Or, fearfully honest.
This weekend, I read Negotiating with the Dead, a book about writing by Margaret Atwood (Thank YOU Kent for the recommendation, and Liz for the gift!). In it, she admits it is common among writers to offer up the same struggle—will a writer get an audience? Will it matter? Does one call themselves a “writer”? And if so, when? Is that pretentious? Egotistical? A lie? She asserts one has to merely put pen to paper—set out words as containers for thought and one can call themselves a writer—skill level, audience, eschewed…one who writes is a writer. So there it is.
With a place to put the writings (you), with a name by which to be called (her), and the impetus to issue it all forth (me) I feel consecrated. Free to create. Regardless of reception. This is about building myself in the next iteration. My "part C". A: childhood is over. B: adulting is well underway. C? The part that comes next. I see this as a transitionary time where my duties as wife, mother, and teacher are morphing to the next season.
I have been written about in a published work. I have written for a published work. And through those minor, isolated incidences, somehow a veil has been removed. I had a typo on a recent handout in class, and when I chastised myself while telling the kids to repair it, one spoke up and reminded me, “You write so much for us, what is one typo?” I later thought about all the letters, poems, speeches, presentations, worksheets, introductions, meetings, plans, created events...and especially the two recent weddings I performed… and realized I have been writing for years. And my mind was suddenly quiet. The audience merely needs to shift. The content can grow. Because in the end, it isn’t ultimately about the audience’s reception—it is about me “putting pen to paper”. Using the space to think and create.
In addition, I have a feeling this could be a fingernail’s grasp of what may come. Oddly, Ed and I recently watched the end of the Mad Men series where a few characters leave their place at the ad agency to pursue their next step…their plan C; and although it was only a TV show, I understand how things can really seem to fall into place. But when you make an effort for it to happen, results are most surely guaranteed. Mrs. V and I talked about me moving to the new high school and she reinforced the thought that transferring would divert time spent doing something for me—for the community. I just don’t know what that is, but I have an ear tuned to the future and am listening for whatever clues are out there… Meanwhile, I am also making sure to take the small steps I can to make things happen…eventually.