If you write, you are a writer.
Unbeknownst to me, my lifelong writing journey started around age 12. I was the kid who couldn’t put down her book at the dinner table, and read under the covers with a flashlight until the wee hours. My top book-devouring speed was one book every day. When I wasn’t reading after class (and maybe during), I invented stories about smart girls who solved mysteries and defeated bad people. Nancy Drew and Trixie Belden were my heroes.
I scribbled in notebooks with a blue Parker fountain pen that blobbed ink everywhere, including on my permanently blue fingers. Wincing each time my finger got jammed between two keys, I learned to two-finger type on my mom’s old typewriter so I could enter a local youth literary contest. I won an honourable mention. Twelve-year-old me would be surprised by all the detours that lay ahead before I finally called myself a writer.
In high school, guidance counsellors pushed girls towards careers in science, so my passion for the literary arts took a back seat to make time for more serious subjects. After all, everybody knew you couldn’t earn a living from writing books, and the fear of ending up under a bridge took root. Those roots grew deep and tangled. It wasn't until the summer of 2022 that I hacked my way out, some 40 years after my honourable mention. It took a lifetime of self-doubt and two long years of pandemic isolation to reset my priorities.
Don't get me wrong, I wrote extensively throughout my career: country economic reports for banking clients; academic papers; business and leadership articles for international business magazines. Yet, I didn't consider myself a writer.
To me, writers were quasi-mythical creatures graced with the divine gift of storytelling. Well, I'm certainly not a mythical creature. Nor do I have a divine gift. Madame Spagnol, my high school writing teacher in Montréal, insisted that writing was 1% inspiration, and 99% perspiration. No kidding.
So, I wrote, and wrote, and wrote. I asked for, and received, quality feedback. Then I edited, and edited, and edited. And the cycle started over. There’s always more to learn about the craft of writing, but also receiving feedback graciously and editing ruthlessly. Through it all, I busted the myth of divine intervention and dared to call myself a writer. Officially.
If I write, I am a writer. Repeat that. And write. Every writer charts their own course. My grandmother wrote bits and pieces of her life on the back of cigarette cartons, in notepads, in her kids' exercise books, on napkins. After my grandmother died, my aunt Simone found her random, disorganized notes. She laboured over every piece of my grandmother's writing, and created a booklet for our family. What a gift to have insight into my grandmother's life from Montréal to Espanola between 1930 and 1980. My grandmother was a writer and a poet, although she might not have considered herself as such.
Whether it's journal entries, short stories, blog entries, articles, poems, a memoir or a novel, someone will be thrilled to read your work. Take a deep breath and dive into the magical pool of storytelling. You'll be happy you did, if just for yourself.
