Hey World, I'm a Writer

Writing is scary to me, but not writing is also scary.

I’m scared to let people know what I think. I’m scared to put myself out there and be judged. But I am also scared of living a life without purpose and of being on my deathbed full of regrets and what ifs.

My fears started when I was young, and there aren’t enough words in this challenge to include everything I am afraid of and why. But generally speaking, I’m afraid of being seen, I’m afraid of failure and I’m afraid of being embarrassed for wanting something that I had no business wanting in the first place.

Specifically for writing, writing was for the “smart kids.” Not kids like me that struggled with reading. But as a kid, I wanted to be a writer. I wanted to express myself. I wanted to be thought of as smart and wear glasses. My Dad was smart, he wore glasses, and he loved writing. He never made it as a writer, but he worked hard on it his entire life. He wrote a play, a screen play, a children’s book and a bunch of poems. But writing was for him and for my sister, it was not me. They were the smart ones, while I was the nice one.

As I grew, I was also afraid that my sensibility was simply too gay and that if I really expressed myself, everyone would know that I was different.

As a young child and well into my teenage years, I would write short stories and then I would tear them up and throw them away so that no one would find them and read them and see me.

And I grew into someone paralyzed with fear. I kept all my effort a secret so that failure would be easier, and I let life pass me by because you really can’t put your all into something while hiding from the world.

But I did keep writing, and I also I kept hiding. I did stop tearing up my stories, because now I have a computer with a password. I have started two novels, four children’s books, two young adult books, three plays, one tv polit and one gay para normal romance novel. None are finished.

It would be too simple to say that I haven’t had some successes with writing in my life. I am 52 after all. I started telling stories at story telling events and I started to find my voice. I even entered a challenge here on Vocal.

2023 started with a bang for me. I worked with a therapist, and I started succeeding at some of the goals. These goals were more than just writing, they were goals about putting myself out there and trying. But on June 5th, I lost my brother. I worked hard to heal from that loss, and I was very close to healing, and then on November 11th, I lost my older sister.

These were hard blows, and they changed me. While I’m still scared to be seen, it doesn’t feel the same. It feels silly to be afraid of being seen. I am much more afraid of that death bed. My brother was special needs, I am not sure he had regrets, but I am sure that my sister did. And I don’t want regrets.

Being seen and being ready to die at peace are my true goals. Writing is just part of it. I decided that I needed a path forward for writing, so I logged onto Vocal with a goal already in mind.

I am so thankful for this challenge and to be able to write it here.

1st, I am going to put myself out there and enter every challenge for the year of 2024. This will help me work on writing by giving me a topic and a deadline. I’m not in school, so I need some structure and I need to try things that are out of my comfort zone. I seriously considered writing every contest except the poems, but I’m going to try the poems too. You all might want to skip my entries for those though ;)

2nd, I am going to rewrite my stories that I tell at the storytelling events to a written form and post them here on Vocal. Since I am trying to write a story a month for story telling events, I should have twelve stories to post.

3rd, I am going to read and comment on at least 3 stories a week here on vocal. If I want to be seen, I need to see others. And honestly, writing a review or a comment is just as scary to me.

This year, I am not going to work on being perfect or winning a challenge, that’s for 2025.

This year, I am going to work on being seen and letting the world know that I am a writer.