I'm going to do it now anyway, even though I don't feel 100% willing, because, oh, I knew why when I started typing.
A long time ago, not so far away, I was one of those kids that the other kids would have hated because the teacher always read my work out loud to show what good writing was. Most kids didn't hate me though because I was pretty funny and too skinny to be threatening in any other way and writing well is really not considered that essential a skill by gradeschoolers. And then less long ago, but still it's been awhile, I grew up and became a technical writer. After years of festering as a secretary, tech writing was the perfect career for me! It paid well, I was good at it, I didn't have to dress nicely, and I didn't have to get up early, and it was challenging and interesting and there was even that whole bubble thing going on and I got caught up in that too. But all good things have their other side and eventually the demoralizing, soul-sapping, creativity-killing aspects of my job caught up with me. (As a courtesy to the reader, those aspects are ... oh, let's not go into that here.) And then, blessedly, I was laid off. I'd been laid off plenty of times before, but this time I got laid off when I was desparately wishing I could quit and so this time I didn't go back to work. I've been Housewifing and Momming the past three years or so.
And then this year in September I declared myself a freelance writer, or sometimes a would-be writer. I've submitted three things and received three rejections. I can only remember two. Either I've got the number wrong, or one was so painful I've blocked it out. The rest of the time I just write la-de-da write write write and research markets and talk myself out of sending anything to the ones I find. What kind of stuff I write is well, sorta like this. I consider fiction strictly for reading. And that whole technical writing thing has pretty much soured me on fact too. So, I'm left with this middle ground which is, um, well, this.
A long time ago, not so far away, I was one of those kids that the other kids would have hated because the teacher always read my work out loud to show what good writing was. Most kids didn't hate me though because I was pretty funny and too skinny to be threatening in any other way and writing well is really not considered that essential a skill by gradeschoolers. And then less long ago, but still it's been awhile, I grew up and became a technical writer. After years of festering as a secretary, tech writing was the perfect career for me! It paid well, I was good at it, I didn't have to dress nicely, and I didn't have to get up early, and it was challenging and interesting and there was even that whole bubble thing going on and I got caught up in that too. But all good things have their other side and eventually the demoralizing, soul-sapping, creativity-killing aspects of my job caught up with me. (As a courtesy to the reader, those aspects are ... oh, let's not go into that here.) And then, blessedly, I was laid off. I'd been laid off plenty of times before, but this time I got laid off when I was desparately wishing I could quit and so this time I didn't go back to work. I've been Housewifing and Momming the past three years or so.
And then this year in September I declared myself a freelance writer, or sometimes a would-be writer. I've submitted three things and received three rejections. I can only remember two. Either I've got the number wrong, or one was so painful I've blocked it out. The rest of the time I just write la-de-da write write write and research markets and talk myself out of sending anything to the ones I find. What kind of stuff I write is well, sorta like this. I consider fiction strictly for reading. And that whole technical writing thing has pretty much soured me on fact too. So, I'm left with this middle ground which is, um, well, this.
