Let's put it into words.

The act of writing is like balm for my soul. If I hadn’t learned my letters, hadn’t been privileged enough to discover bedtime stories, the classics and contemporary novels, my life would have been much, much poorer. In novels, I’ve lived and died a hundred times. I’ve given birth, I’ve lost family members, I’ve experienced wars and I’ve suffered hardships and possessed epic courage, all while inhabiting the body of another. Historical fiction has taught me more than any classes about times gone by. I learn by trying to picture the emotions, fears, desires and behaviour of the person living at the time. Details and dates and years I could drill into my skull for school tests, but they slipped right back out again a few weeks later. A novel stays inside of me. Similarly, an unfinished story lives like an open question mark in my mind, forcing me to go back and complete the novel even if I didn’t much care for the writing.

Writing for the Joy of It

Reading lets me eavesdrop on another person’s most intimate thoughts. Writing allows me to slip under the surface of an invented character, sitting there quietly until I hear their voice clearly so I can pick up my pen and start tracing their story. Stringing words together, arranging them and then rearranging them to express exactly that which is in my head, brings me pleasure. I write for the joy of writing, but a large part of it is also the tickling sensation of wondering what others will feel when they read what I wrote. The greatest privilege of being published, aside from the wonderful feeling that an editor thought my story worth investing pages in, is that I get to plant myself into another human’s mind for a little while. I might bring that person enjoyment, pleasure, surprise, or perhaps I help them see life from a slightly different perspective.

Reality or Lunacy?

Most of my fictional characters are in a space where they struggle to differentiate reality from mind creation. This state isn’t permanent, but for the narrator, it’s real. Writing fiction is freeing because it allows me to see the world from a point that society might label lunacy. But if every person’s perspective of the world is created inside their mind, what is reality but a large group of humans agreeing to see and interpret the world in the same way?

The Lost Diaries

Writing can also be therapeutic. A year ago, I lost two cardboard boxes of diaries that I’ve filled since childhood. It was difficult to throw them out – they’d been damaged and couldn’t be rescued – but I find I don’t miss them as much as I thought I would. That furious scribbling from a teenage hand about injustices, friend betrayals and heartaches has served its purpose. Those diaries helped me understand myself better, and illuminated the journey now behind me. Visible on the stage’s background were my closest friends at the time, their lives and drama playing out on the page like supportive acts to my main. I had many teary laughs from reading about what I thought at the time to be infuriating and unforgiving acts. It turns out that the most enjoyable moments to read about many years later were those where my emotions ran wild and my pain was raw and uncensored.

Writing Poetry

My poetry blog started as an attempt to share my innermost thoughts during a confusing time. I was a new mother, trying to marry this identity with my professional, corporate existence. It was two polar dimensions fusing in one, sensitive person: me. What started with me writing prose turned into me writing poetry, something I didn’t much read before and certainly didn’t aspire to write. But in poetry, I found even less rules than in prose, and since I didn’t think I was any good at it and didn’t aspire to be published, I could explore freely. The poetry blog is now an intimate space that I don’t promote but that seems to have a small, loyal following. On it, I’ve shared posts that honour my foremothers and dear departed friends that helped shape me into the person I am. I’ve shared these with friends and family members that also knew them. Making our loved ones come alive again and expressing what they’ve contributed feels like a gift to offer those of us who remember them and long for them.

The Gift of Writing

I’ll always carry immense gratitude for writers who used their precious time to write, rewrite, struggle, doubt, edit, and ultimately share the thoughts and stories in their heads. Books like A Confession (Tolstoj) and The Alchemist (Coelho) helped me come up with answers to some of those questions always brewing inside. Other books, like Memories of the Future (Hustvedt) and Something I’ve Been Meaning to Tell You (Munro) help me live a better life. What other joy is there than knowing you’ve given these gifts to a fellow human, in whatever way or form?