lately it occurs to me
Nearly five years ago I made a post (Not Fade Away) in which I outed myself as a Deadhead. This time, I have another confession to make, a shambling, shuffling, feet-gazing muttering sort of confession: another outing.
I started writing fiction more seriously when I had early retirement thrust upon me. Since then, I’ve published a collection of short stories and a novel and have more in the pipeline. In the last week or so I’ve admitted to myself that I no longer think of writing as a retirement hobby: I think of myself as a writer. It’s something I’ve been reluctant to do; a step I’ve been reluctant to take. There were several reasons for that, notably an inhibition against letting my ego loose and a certain resistance to opening myself up to ridicule for pretension, but the time has come to take it seriously.
In a sense, I’ve been a writer since I first began my blog on 17 August 2002 – twenty years ago: imagine that. Blogging is a form of journaling but, nonetheless, a form of writing, and I’ve written and published an awful lot of words in those twenty years (as well as a lot of awful words 🙂 ). But now, as well as friends, I have strangers buying my stuff and respected editors giving me their support when they don’t have to.
I’ve said many times over the years that I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up; I do now – I want to write and I’m doing it. At nearly sixty-three, this has been a long time coming, but better late than never. I’m not a hobbyist, I’m a writer.
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