Dude. Did you see how much  Barack Obama made off his books last year? I am so going to write a book.

No.

Really.

I am.

It’s something I’ve wanted to do since high school, but the problem is figuring out what to write about. I’d love to do one of those eye candy craft books with pretty pictures and projects that SEEM simple until you try to do them, but I seriously doubt I could come up with enough original projects. Much less projects with some sort of theme (all knitted, felted, or sewing).

I’ve also been toying with writing a “memoirs”. I’m not sure my life is all that interesting though. It’s not like I’m Augusten Burroughs who grew up in a family so dysfunctional that it makes my family look more wholesome than the Cleavers. (BTW, I just noticed that the “Cleavers” sounds like a family of homicidal butchers.)

Then, there is the whole fiction angle. Friends and I used to write these really elaborate, but completely unrealistic chain stories. We even had one online for a while. I’ll have to contact Jen and see if she still has the dumb thing. It was hilarious. Or maybe not. Maybe you had to know all the people we were writing about. But I digress… I can’t even seem to come up with a character to write about, much less an entire BOOK.

A few people have advised me to just start writing, and I know they are right. But I can’t even make myself blog more than once per week. Well honestly, if I was doing something other than making a mad dash for the finish line on the quilt in progress, I might actually write more. Only  48 more squares to go… (that’s just over half.)

One of my friends suggested starting with the blog entries themselves. Is that even a good idea? Do people want to RE READ what I’ve already written?

I do love to write when I have something to say. On a few occasions I’ve even written some things that make a tiny difference in the world. The one that comes to mind most readily is when I wrote a long elaborate letter to the HR department and building supervisor of ERCOT to investigate having a Mother’s room in the new addition to the office space. At the time, I was still nursing Alexis, and pumping at work was hell because there was no definitive room to use. I got shuffled around at least 3-4 times in about 10 months. I got compliments from people I didn’t even know on that letter, and a year later, long after I’d left the company, a friend of mine emailed me to let me know that they had indeed decided to include the Mother’s room in the new building.

The biggest problem with my current job is that it doesn’t make a difference. I just want to make a TINY difference in the world – or even one person’s life. Is that too much to ask? Can I make that difference by creating an eye candy book? or writing a funny story? or telling people about all my health problems? I don’t know. But maybe that first book could lead to something more important. Or maybe it could just provide relief from daily misery.

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