Unlike my friend Beth, I did not grow up dreaming of writing. Sure, I won spelling bees in 4th grade, I was in accelerated reading groups, read encyclopedias aloud for fun, wrote poetry and filled journals… but being a writer honestly never occurred to me. I dreamed of the stage and the lights and the dancing and the costumes. But I was always too afraid to take the leap and do it. I performed in local theatrical productions, but never actually called myself an Actor.

As an adult I was “accidentally” recognized for my writing way before finally going to college full time.

1. There was the time I was in basic training for the Army and had to write an essay about the necessity of timeliness in the military (some things never change). My drill sergeant informed me that my essay was one of the best she’d ever read and asked if she could keep it for future recruits to read. Uh… sure?
2. Then there was the time that my theater dreams led me to take a theater lecture class. I was an honors student, but had to take the non-honors class when the honors section didn’t have enough students enrolled. To give me the “honors experience”, I was chosen to consolidate my classmates’ one act plays into one script, and I surprised myself with the final result. Uh… I got an A!
3. Then there was the time I wrote a piece about my sister – I honestly don’t even remember where it was first published (this was pre “web log” era) and an editor from a now-defunct magazine called Sisters contacted me asking if I could rewrite it for their publication in exchange for a few copies of the magazine. Uh… sure!
4. Then there was the time I entered an online essay contest about getting fit and WON. The prize was that I would have my weekly missives about my fitness journey published on the website and they would pay for me to join a health club and see a dietician. Uh… DUH!!

Even with these writing successes (and a few others), I never thought “Maybe I should be a writer.” In my experience, a writer was either a reporter for the newspaper, a job I wasn’t interested in, or an Author… someone who wrote amazing stories or poetry that were published in books and housed in libraries. By this time I had two children and a marriage and a job… I couldn’t just decide to be something as abstract as a writer anymore than I could pursue my dreams of Broadway. Making any kind of leap was simply deemed impossible.

Then one day I found myself talking to an adviser at the University of Arkansas about returning to school to complete my degree. I chose to study English – not because I wanted to be a writer – but because upon review of my credits thus far, it was the degree I was closest to earning. Done. I just needed that B.A. on my resume. By this time, I was a single mother who needed a job. I had experience, but needed the degree. ANY degree.

For my final semester I needed one more writing class to fulfill a requirement, and found one called “The Art of the Personal Essay” (based on this book by the same name). As I sat in that class on Tuesdays and Thursdays a light bulb slowly began to burn… the coiled filament glowing a little brighter each week. We read e.b. white, Joan Didion, David Foster Wallace, David Sedaris, and Juhmpa Lahiri… so many authors I’d never heard of. I was introduced to “creative non-fiction” for the first time, and it was life-changing. I discovered that I had been a writer all along. I had been documenting my life in personal essays – published and unpublished – my whole life! I still wasn’t quite ready to leap… but I had a map of sorts to help me get somewhere. When I was selling back my books for the semester, I kept every one of the essay collections I was required to buy for that class.

I graduated and got that better-paying job thanks to that B.A. on my resume. I began working in fundraising and communication for a local non-profit organization. I was writing, but I still wasn’t calling myself a writer. I wrote for work, was paid to write, and enjoyed my work, and wrote here and there for the odd publication and website… but still I thought there was something else that I was searching for and not quite attaining.

I had the same fears of the publishing industry that I had harbored about the idea of moving to New York to pursue acting when I was younger. Plus, I had a new husband and baby son, and carving out time to write was most definitely a pipe-dream. Or, it was easy to put it in that pipe-dream box and shove it under the bed and ignore it.

I started blogging for myself, and that was fun, if unfocused. Then, in 2012, I sat in on a session at the Arkansas Women Bloggers conference in Mountain View…

Three amazing women, Angie, Beth and Kyran, shared their thoughts on honing our stories. They told their stories about their journey to becoming writers, and they encouraged me (because it was totally all about me) to find MY voice, and throw my words out there in the world and own the title “Writer”. They inspired me to go home and make small, almost imperceptible changes in my life and attitude and to keep my eyes on the goal. And I did. As Beth now admits she only recently did – I started adding “writer” to bios and “about me” questions. I started putting it out there for the Universe to hear… I am a Writer. I Write.

And today, I’m sitting at my desk, making a living writing words. I’m blessed with a husband who earns (a lot) more than I do, but I’m putting money in the bank account too, thankyouverymuch. The fact that he makes enough to support our family while I’m busy doing all this leaping doesn’t diminish the fact that I am still making the effort. I am claiming the title and I wear the hat. And one day, perhaps, I will sit at a table in a book store and weep – openly, most likely –  as people buy my book and ask me to sign it. But even if there is no book, I will still write. And I will know that the Writer was always there… I just had to acknowledge her. I just had to leap.