Flashback to 2009

For most of this week, when I wasn't working even more on Writing Soulmates, I was watching the video interviews that were part of the Flourish Writers Conference. I immensely enjoyed watching every one of them and took copious notes. What I especially loved hearing was the testimonies of these authors, how many of them had never considered writing a book, that they hated writing, had been in day jobs that involved very little to no writing, or maybe even had some crisis, such as an illness, injury, or the death of a loved one.

Humble beginnings, hope, healing...and the persistence when the going gets tough. Add to that the crises, and I have all the more a great reason to be a writer!

There was something about hanging onto, absorbing every word I could that made me think about ten years ago, back in 2009 (Wow! Hard to believe that was a decade ago already.)

I was working as a physical therapy tech for a private practice outpatient physical therapy clinic. I had written this "silly story". Back then, it was on one of those now-obsolete 3 1/2" floppy disks. Since I had no idea what to do with this story, I only worked on it at random times, maybe about once a month, if that.

What I'm about to say, I don't talk about very often. I think now would be the time to let you know even more how humble my beginnings were. The laptop I have now I didn't have back then. For some circumstances beyond our control, we didn't have a computer. Therefore, we had to use the public computers the local libraries have. For those times I wanted to work on my "silly story", I had to drive all the way over to the library in blind faith that one was available. I had to work around their business hours (never mind the fact I may have wanted to work on this on a federal holiday or at 8:30am or 10:00pm), and do as much as I could in the two-hour time limit.

What a big difference a decade makes!

One laptop, six published books (and counting), many hours of hard work, dedication, blood, sweat, and tears, and many hundred ounces of sweet tea (or like drink), and many hundred M&Ms later...

I'm a writing machine. It's the only thing I think about the minute my feet hit the floor; I can't get to it fast enough...at 4am. 

It's no longer something I do when it's convenient. It's deeper and something I need to do every day (yes, including Christmas Day). And, best of all, there are no more limits on places and times to write.

{Insert dramatic pause}

I'm here at the Panera in Fountain City on a horrible rainy Saturday morning (it's rained all week). I am camped out here, with my headphones plugged into my laptop, once again listening to some hard rock to get my fingers moving and the ideas flowing from my head to the screen.

Where do I see myself in 2029? I don't know. However, if you told me in 2009, I'd be an author, I'd think you were out of your mind.

What did I learn at the Flourish Writers Conference? I will have that in my next post. Please stay tuned.

P.S. Another remarkable thing about my writing journey was, when I finally got a flash drive and transferred Suitors (formerly the "silly story") onto it, and gave it the final title of The Long Road Around the Corner of Hope, I wondered how I was going to keep up with that small thing. If I had a spotty history of losing floppy disks, how was I going to not lose this flash drive? No, the question should be: At what moment would I know I really am a writer? I don't consider it an accident I'm writing this post a year to the day we moved. All I will say is: I could lose a sweatshirt or all of our drinking glasses could have broken, and I wouldn't have cared. The only thing I cared about was my flash drive. I had bought a wallet that had a safe place for it. I put it in there as the packing and the moving got more intense. And seeing as how I still have it after eight years and one move, my writing is going to get even more intense.