Write the Book

Everyone has a dream. Some dreams are childlike and never make it into maturity, but are treasured anyway, even if they are never pursued. I am told that my earliest dream was to become a carpenter. In its simplest form, it’s just daddy idolisation – the same way I tried to shave my face when I was little and got the nick to prove it. But that’s really too simple. I love making things, doing things myself. Being able to look at something at the end and know that my mind and hands created something new and often imperfect, full of character. In my adult life that translated into crocheting, a craft I was taught by my mother when I only barely had the motor skills for it, and has stayed with me ever since. I love watching it take form over time. It’s a form of therapy to me – keeping my hands busy while leaving my mind free to float away.

When I was older, the dreams changed, but the motivation was the same. I wanted to be a fashion designer or an architect. I never pursued either. And to me, they weren’t so far apart, really. It was all about creation. About being unique in a world of homogenised sameness. And for a brief period towards the end of my high school career I wanted to be a marine scientist. It appealed to my analytical mind, that in a world of uncertainty, there was a place of logic and sureness and dolphins.

Through fear, I landed in law in university. And I always knew it wasn’t right. I did the bare minimum to get by, apart from a few bright spots in indigenous land law and criminal law where my inquisitive mind took over. I transferred to an Arts degree which I never finished and ended up working in my own business and writing. And finally it did seem to be coming together, that what I would create would be words and stories. I had told stories my entire life, I just hadn’t noticed. Because it wasn’t something I was doing that was seperate from myself, it was who I was. Then the dream changed and I wanted to write a book. I had a fantasy trilogy in mind and worked to the exclusion of all else to finish the first draft by my 23rd birthday. I only ever sent it to one agent and I haven’t touched it in years. It is still very close to my heart, perhaps too close. I don’t know that I have the clinical ability to fix what I know needs to be fixed. It needs the kind of overhaul that would very easily translate into a complete rewrite.

But in spite of all of that, I always felt that my dream was to write a book. I read a review once of a science fiction book. And while that is not a genre that I enjoy at all, what the reviewer had written has stayed with me ever since. They wrote ‘[the author] has re-wired science fiction. Everything is different now.’ And I knew when I read it, that I wanted to do something like that. Something so creative, so unique that it stands completely on its own. It’s hard to even write that, because that dream seems so completely unlikely and unrealistic.

I read recently a couple of things that have got me rethinking my dreams. Marilyn at Live First, Write Later wrote about facing the reality of giving up on her book dream, maybe temporarily, maybe forever. And Jenny at The Bloggess, wrote about doing that thing. That thing that is impractical, irresponsible or just plain embarrassing because it’s what you really want, deep down in your soul.

And I wonder, I have wondered for some time if writing a book what I really want, or do I hold on to it because it’s been a dream for a long time. Or am I tempted to let it go because it is scary and the fear of failure is breathing down my neck, telling me that I don’t have the talent for it – that I am the worst thing possible – just plain mediocre.

I don’t know. Another thing that is hard to write. If I was giving myself advice I’d say that I do know, I just don’t like the answer. What I do know is that I’m great at beginnings – it’s following through that I struggle with. I also know that I’m coming up to a year of blogging. Possibly the longest that I’ve ever stuck at anything, so I have no doubt that it’s what I’m meant to be doing. What I also know? People don’t write books, books write people.

I can only hope that if I stick to what I know is right, the rest will make itself known in its own time. And I might have accepted that I’m not a person who writes a blog as a platform to launch into something else. I might not be a writer who blogs. I might be a blogger.

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Tagged as: blogging, dreams, novel, Writing