The pressure to produce

I’m writing this post even though my website isn’t ready. I’m creating a website even though I don’t really need one. I’m writing and revising and workshopping and submitting even though I don’t have a book to my name and maybe never will.

I’m doing all of this as I teach four classes per semester as an adjunct at a state university, hold a part time position as the managing editor for a small press, take one class at a time in a hairbrained bid to get a PR degree, and try to be present for my family.

But I’m not unique–I know so many writers, all of us too old to make those horrid “30 Under 30” lists. We’re not emerging writers and we’re not established writers. We’re all just swimming toward a shore that looked deceptively close when we were younger and seems to get farther away the longer we paddle.

But I am (we are) stubborn as well as struggling. The voice inside my head that tells me to keep going isn’t loud, but it’s persistent. Every time I submit to a journal or to a contest a tiny bubble of hope, no bigger than a bit of carbonation in a glass of ginger ale, floats up to the surface. I shrug and tell myself “Maybe.”

So, just like that saying “Dress for the job you want, not the job you have,” I’m creating this website for what I hope one day to have and have done. And I’m creating this blog as a community space where we, all those paddling writers and I, can whisper “Maybe” together and celebrate the big and small successes and remind each other to keep trying, even though we’re fighting through jobs and chores and family obligations to grab those few precious moments when we have the time and the energy to write. To tell each other it’s okay that sometimes we can’t find those moments.

So, coming soon to this blog, look for interviews with authors and editors, guest posts from other writers, news on my projects, and musings on how I might be tired but that doesn’t mean I’m done.