Yes, I'm a Writer. YAY! by Joylene M Bailey

                       

   

What was my writing Eureka moment?

Well, let’s start with this:  I don’t think I’ve ever actually exclaimed the word EUREKA! in my entire life.

I have had some other moments, though. Like the day it suddenly dawned on me that I hated cooking. What a shock and a relief. That was more of a whadaya know? kind of moment. I hate cooking. Well whadaya know?   

Or the day in my mid-thirties when I realized with devastation that I would never learn everything there was to know in the world. That was a What? Noooooo! kind of a moment. 

And then there was the Huh moment when it hit me that Cap’n Crunch was my favourite cereal.

My writing moments have been more of a gradual dawning.

From my earliest childhood I made up stories. I’d make up stories in my head to put myself to sleep at night, or from the back seat of the family station wagon as we traveled across Canada every summer.

I often scribbled away on any scrap of paper I could find. And I became a great letter writer from my adolescence on. I WAS a writer, only I didn’t know it. I didn’t know I could call myself a writer.

I took the Writing for Children & Teenagers course from the Institute of Children’s Literature while my own children were toddling around my knees. I wanted to see if someone else thought I might be a writer. They did think so, but I didn’t believe them. I thought my instructor was too nice and didn’t give enough critique. Her comments were always more positive than negative and I didn’t think that was helpful at all.

I thought I had to be published and well known to call myself a writer. So, how would I know I was a writer unless I got published? But if I did send something to a publisher and didn’t get published how would I know whether it was because they didn’t like it or because I wasn’t really a writer? What a vicious convoluted circle.

When my daughters were school age I wrote little stories and vignettes for school newsletters and Sunday School papers. I even created an entire mid-week kids’ club curriculum for our church. And I still didn’t think I could call myself a writer. I didn’t know that having my writing in those little newsletters WAS “being published”.

I was afraid to send anything out into the world. But I kept writing. As cliché as it sounds, I couldn’t not write.

The gradual dawning started later, as I spent time with other writers. At conferences and writing groups I found out they were ordinary quirky people just like me. They were all at different stages in their writing journeys, they each had their own styles of writing and unique voices, and I was okay right where I was. As others shared their journeys I realized I could relate.

Indeed, I WAS a writer.

But I was still uncomfortable saying so out loud. I couldn’t call myself a writer.  

Then there was the Spring WordShop where the speaker shared that he was an intuitive writer. He never planned ahead of time what was going to happen, he just wrote and let the story happen on the fly. (Some people call this a pantser) I thought, “Hey, that’s the way I write! And it’s okay.”

That was my AHA! moment, which lands somewhere on the spectrum between whadaya know and EUREKA! That’s when I knew I could call myself a writer.

Since then I have been published in a couple of children’s publications, an anthology, FellowScript, and my blog. Being able to call myself a writer has given me the courage to send out manuscripts whether they be rejected or not. It doesn’t matter. I’m still a writer.

It is dawning on me as I write this blog post that THIS may actually be my EUREKA! moment. Or as close to EUREKA! as someone like me gets. 

YAY! suits me better.

Documenting my journey for this post has cemented in my mind that I am definitely a writer; that from the very beginning God gifted and called me to write, with my own unique voice. And that doing so brings Him joy.

YAY!

photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/28402283@N07/3346906435">Light Bulb No. 1</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/2.0/">(license)</a>

 Photo credit: What if I fall

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My Romance with Words

How did that passionate relationship begin?  Almost every romance arouses the question of who made the first move.  Did she smile at him across the room?  Did he linger at the corner, hoping she'd walk by that way?  Did he offer to walk her home?  Did she gently reach for his hand? The romance of writers and words has as many tales and trails as any other blissfully turbulent romance.  So who made the first move in my romance with words?  I think I'd have to say words.  The infatuation began early, perhaps before I went to school.

Nicknames have always been a big deal in my family.  My siblings were Karen, Terry, Clark, Jim, and Michael, but those names were rarely spoken.  Instead Big Runt braided my hair, Joe MaFraw listened to "Blue Suede Shoes," Clarkensteenysteiny had a paper route, Jazz played in a band called "The Children of Stone" (after the Rolling Stones), and Micaheloochi, the baby, shaved off his blonde curls.  I was Lupe or Lupita Jane.  Maybe the intrigue of such unusual names produced the first sparks.

In the first grade, my primary reading skills called for a family celebration at the completion of each reading level.  When I read, "Look Dick.  See Spot run," cheers and applause filled our living room.  At six years old I had a full-blown crush on words!  My sister, Big Runt taught me a language in which two syllables (in-ig) precede the audible vowels in each word. That was a profound contribution to an already delightful relationship with words.  My friend and I would spend hours talking together in our secret language.  It wasn't writing, but it was words.

When adolescent life took hold, so did the desire for writing poetry; a way to express all the tangled emotions (hormones) of growing up and falling in love with a real person.  Words that were  pinched from a broken heart and arranged on a page held a compelling mystique.  

I also became a constant reader, visiting the library (no internet back then) every Saturday.  I wanted to spend a lot of time with words, which is not surprising I guess.  Most lovers enjoy each other's company.  My relationship with words progressed through the years, strengthened through the winding ways of life experience: marriage, children, loss, faith, heartache, joy, laughter.   All these and more led to keeping a journal, writing stories and more poetry.

I don't know if it was instant or gradual, but it became an enduring love.  I don't see a breakup anywhere in the near or distant future.  

WORDS LOVE WRITERS LOVE WORDS 

Message In an Ink Bottle by Gloria Guest

Long before I would ever think of myself as a writer, my grade twelve English teacher took it upon herself to decide for me.

To my great annoyance, Mrs. Coy thought it was her duty to convince me to enter a fiction story I had written for her class to a National high school writing contest. Tiny in stature, she made up for it in determination and no amount of hiding out in the crowded hall ways deterred her from hunting me down and lecturing me about entering the contest. Finally I relented and submitted my story… and placed first for Alberta! No one was more shocked than I was and no one was more pleased than Mrs. Coy. Yet it still didn’t register with me that I was a writer. I chalked it up to simple, good fortune.

A few years later I remembered my good fortune and wondered if there was more to it. So I took a writer’s course through the Institute of Children’s Literature. I quickly became frustrated with the instructor wanting me to write to set rules and regulations. My style had always been to just let it flow, often with no knowledge of how the plot would develop or how it was going to end. I did finish the course but wondered if writing really was for me as I didn’t seem to fit the mold.

Years later, in need of a job, I applied for a position as a reporter for the local newspaper. It was with much trepidation that I ventured into the world of writing news reports, meeting tight deadlines and interviewing and reporting on many local, provincial and sometimes national events and leaders. My confidence in myself as a writer and more importantly, a new found love for writing, grew. It was also a time of honing my writing to fit word counts and to write to the precise guidelines of an editor. Going with the flow had to take a back seat to discipline and my editors quick, red pen. During this time I also branched out and began writing life lesson columns for a city newspaper. Eventually we moved to that city and I took a job as a freelance reporter and columnist for the newspaper there, where I covered local and provincial/national news, sports, politics, arts and much more. I had many amazing experiences as a reporter and cherish every last opportunity. Mainly, I cherish the people I met, so different from one another, yet each with a story. I developed my interview skills and learned to read faces and nuances that prompted me to search for deeper clarity. I sharpened my editing skills and by the end of my newspaper days, there weren’t many red marks if any, on my copy.

Since those days I’ve struggled to find a new place for my writing. At times I’ve deeply grieved the loss of having someplace to regularly see my words in print. It reminds me of another time when I was convinced I might never have the opportunity to write again. While out walking in the pasture, I spotted what looked like a chunk of glass embedded in the soil and nudged at it with my foot. To my surprise out popped an antique ink bottle. How had that gotten there? And how did I manage to find it? I  knew right then that God was using a little, unearthed ink bottle to give me my very own message in a bottle. Eureka! I was a writer.

Now, that little bottle sits in my cabinet as a symbol of the moment that I knew I was and always will be, a writer. I look at it often these days while I  hope and search for new opportunities to come my way and pray for the courage to take them when they do.

DEVELOPING THOSE EUREKA MOMENTS by Bryan Norford

 The story of Archimedes reminds me of the evangelist Dwight L. Moody, who, suddenly overcome with the grace of God, also went through the streets asking people, “Have you  heard about grace?” Of course, the obvious response from the uninitiated was, “Grace who?”

At the outbreak of any new understanding, passion often outstrips coherence, but eventually that passion coupled with a logical proclamation will change the world. There were three occasions when I came to a new understanding of my faith, which has, over time, given me insight and direction for writing. 

The first, as a young man, I felt honour bound to defend the Bible, but suddenly realized it didn’t need me to defend it. What a relief to know the Bible would still be secure even if I failed it in some way. It has stood the test of time for two thousand years, and the Old Testament for much longer. I could relax in my faltering attempts to support it.

The second was the discovery of the difference between simplistic and simplicity. I read somewhere that simplicity results from journeying through the complexity of a subject. Only then can a subject be fully expressed in simple terms. To miss that journey risks a simplistic response to critical matters. Another reason to read widely while writing.

Finally, the most obvious, yet the most difficult to fully embrace—but which has had the most impact on my writing—is awareness of the absolute necessity of reliance on the Holy Spirit for His inspiration. Frequently, I experienced the occurrence given in Isaiah 50:4:

“The Sovereign LORD has given me an instructed tongue, to know the word that sustains the weary. He wakens me morning by morning, wakens my ear to listen like one being taught,” 

As a result, I often arose to write in the middle of the night, and developed a habit of very early rising to ensure a clear mind to record what I believe God gave me. To leave it till later is to risk it fading in memory and impact.

This eased my deep sense of inadequacy of speaking for God. After all, as Paul said, “Who is equal to such a task?” 2 Corinthians 2:16. Strangely, the same reference in first Corinthians has an answer: “‘For who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct Him?’ But we have the mind of Christ.”

Really? We have the mind of Christ? An astonishing claim, and impossible without the insight to God’s mind from the Holy Spirit. As I age, I become increasingly aware of my sin-soiled thinking demanding the clarifying perception of God’s “foolishness” for my “wisdom.” 

I must seek the illumination of the Spirit as I read the Word, and other Christian writings. Then I need His inspiration as I write. Anything short of that is “chasing the wind,” a way to cope, not assurance of hope. I love the idea of “eureka” moments, but it is the steady development of those insights which will leave a lasting heritage.