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Elizabeth Aquino's avatar

I don't know how I missed this post. There's so much I want to say, to respond to -- including the quickening I felt in my heart when I saw your first "book." I, too, have always written and had a time when I submitted and published essays and poems, one after the other. I received a three-week writing residency at Hedgebrook on Whidbey Island during the summer of 2015, and it seems like a dream now. So much has gotten in the way, or I've allowed my mind to fill up, leaving me so little space to really write. I feel, at the age of 59, that I might never possibly complete the book, but that that might be ok. It's like a very dull disappointment that some might say is a cop-out or a give-up or just plain laziness, but I feel a certain freedom in just doing the "small" writing I do mainly for myself now. A daily creative practice that includes watercolor and collage and is deeply pleasing. Reading, I like to say is really my only constant. I am never without a book. That being said, your post INSPIRES me to begin again. Aspire again. Write more seriously with intention again.

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Matt Asaro's avatar

Thank you for this. I've been wondering to myself that last few months if "I have what it takes" to be writer. Doubt seeps in. You've reminded me here that by making a consistent writing practice and committing to it, I am a writer. Whether writing into the void, or writing for a substantial audience of readers, I have ideas to share. Connections to make—for myself if for no one else. So, that's what I'll do. Thank you.

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