Act like a writer, become a writer
After the first full day alone in my house as a laid-off writer/editor, I’ve had plenty of Thinking time and Doing time and Reading time. (I’ll get Exercise time tomorrow, I swear.)
The Doing time was more tedious and less rewarding than I would have liked it to be, but I tied up some loose ends with my former employer and spent some time on my resume and job sites.
Then the Thinking time took over and caused bouts of anxiety about The Future and Becoming a Writer. Oh gawd, THIS again? Haven’t I already droned on about my "becoming a writer" drama enough, like back THEN and THEN and pretty much every November when NaNoWriMo comes around? Yes, I have. And yes, it all still scares me.
Reading time was the highlight of the day for me, because I caught up on blogs, news, random internet pages, and a book that one of my coworkers loaned me a couple months ago that sat neglected on my shelf for too long (Book of a Thousand Days
My friend Steev is in the throes of a defining period in his comedy career with Blewt Productions, and I’m wildly happy for him and my other friends from college who have followed down that same path. If they make it big, it’s because of serious hard work and dedication in addition to raw and crazy talent and imagination. I feel really lazy in comparison. But I found inspiration in something that Steev wrote while blogging his adventures in L.A.:
"Act like a big production company, do the things a big production company does, and before you know it, you’re a big production company."
I’m starting to act like a writer and do the things that a writer does. Sooner or later, I hope to discover that I’m actually a writer. Until then, I have a lot of work ahead of me.
(But oh, please, never let me stoop to even whispering the cliche that it turns out I was a writer all along, even if it’s really true.)
