My first venture into the writers world was at the ripe age
of seven when I wrote my father a poem for father’s day. I recall it going
something like,
Kisses, love and hugs
Two for you and two for me
And are lovely things to see
Complete with artistic drawing of course.
I took a bigger leap in grade three with a free verse poem
called My Mother the House Wife. This
one extoled my mother as a ‘pleasant young lady who always had a smile on her
face.’
Obviously with talent like that, anything to do with
creative writing continued to be my spot to shine in school ;) I do recall
getting A’s and positive comments on stories that I turned in. However it was a
grade 12 teacher who hounded me relentlessly until I agreed to enter an essay I
‘d written into a National Writing Contest that gave me my first real
inclination that I was indeed a writer. I actually owe a lot to Mrs. Coy since
it was with the money I won from that contest that I later attended college
where I met my future husband. It does go to show how much we can affect one
another’s lives with our encouragement (and relentless hounding!).
Sadly, I didn’t have the inner confidence to pursue my
writing any further. I did take a couple of online writing courses and did well
but I never carried through with submitting any pieces for publication.
It wasn’t until I started work as a reporter that my desire
to write was actually ignited. Here I learned to step out of my comfort zone
and write for deadlines. Here I learned
to love seeing my words in print. I eventually branched out into writing weekly
columns for two different papers which gave me more confidence in my ability to
share my inner thoughts with others.
I believe all of the above experiences are stones of
remembrance along my rather rocky and winding path of writing. At times I have
felt very lost in the writing world. It can be lonely and for me there has been
a real battle with dealing with rejection, which is probably why I have not put
my writing out there in the publishing world. But still I want to write.
Presently I blog at gloriaguest@wordpress.com and here
on Inscribe. I have definitely found my involvement with Inscribe to be an
important part of my journey as a writer. I am also slowly but surely working on a
memoir and have recently started taking a Creative Writing class through the
University of Toronto.
I still have no idea
if I will ever see any of my writing in print but I all I can do is take it one
step at a time, gathering stones of remembrance along the way and hopefully one
day….
