A Leap of Faith

       I have decided to join the digital age of creative writing. This is my first blog and I apologize to any one kind enough to take the time to read it. It will be somewhat stream of consciousness.  I am an English teacher by profession and a writer in my dreams. Writing is one of the things I truly enjoy. It is a creative outlet and I made a New Year's resolution to do more of it. Like the cliche goes, "A writer writes."

      It's fair to assume that means every day--we know what happens when we "assume." Perhaps this endeavor will help me develop the good habit of writing daily. I have a lot of mixed feelings and inner questions  about this. Am I being arrogant or narcissistic? Who am I to think I have something worth saying or that whatever it is is worth reading? Is my inferiority complex showing?

     For what it's worth, I'm not a total stranger to writing. In fact, I think I'm much better at writing than I am at teaching people about writing. I was published in college once. I wrote an essay that was published in a school literary magazine. My wife and I were planning our wedding at the time so I wrote an essay from the groom-to-be's perspective. I dig it out once in a while and it seems verbose and sappy to me. I'm still trying to break the habit of trying to impress college professors with my writing and word choice. I know my students find it annoying.

        I've also written some short stories that I've read to my family members during the Christmas season. The story started out as hackneyed version of Dr. Seuss meets "Twas the Night Before Christmas." It  was a way to chronicle the yearly events of every one's lives, but now that people are getting older the format doesn't seem to work as well. Like every other frustrated and lazy writer I have a story/novel I'm working on as well. I almost never refer to it as a "book" because it's not one of those until someone publishes it and Steven Spielberg's people contact me about the movie rights.

      I'm not sure about how to frame or classify my blog. I was told not to have too narrow a theme and that sounds good to me.  Suggestions and a little constructive criticism are welcome. If you read this whole thing, I thank you. Was it too long?