Writing about writing about writing.

Don't think this is some kind of new year's resolution. I don't really go for that sort of thing. Rather, it was just sort of... time. The stresses of graduating, travelling, moving, establishing, and of course the recent holidays have lessened. And since my schedule this week doesn't have me working past noon at all, what else would I do? Write! And clean... but my kitchen is still having 'issues' so I can't really get in there... honest! I'd love to dive into that mess, but I'm stuck doing writerly things!

Right now, this poet is waiting for her tea to steep and her toast to... toast. But other than that, my duties as a writer should include writing poems, revising poems, thinking up poems, sending out poems, reading poems, reading about poems, reading about poets, reading about writing poems, writing about poems, and writing about writing poems. That last one is what all this is about. So there you have it. That's what I should be spending my time doing when not at work or keeping house. It's my real job. And I actually enjoy all of it. Not like my real-real job where I get paid to be bored and hopeless...

So while I don't do the whole 'resolution' thing, I have made a conscious decision to focus more on being a writer. But that could have happened at any point in the year. Why do I feel the need to stress this?

I don't want to feel that little bit of embarrassment anymore when I tell people I'm a writer. I wonder if other writers, the established ones especially, ever felt this, and if so, when did it go away? The main character of "Californication", a writer of course, mentioned once that he doesn't throw around the title "writer" lightly; everyone calls themselves that, even if their writing could be easily considered subpar. I don't want people to assume I drift aimlessly among the masses of scribblers who lack passion and knowledge.

One of my main self-imposed tasks as a writer, of course, is to listen for the mailman to come... I love a rejection letter, but a letter from a journal that actually wants to publish some of my work? That could be the cure for this insecurity.