30 Days of Truth Day 11: The Write Stuff

The prompt for Day 11 of 30 Days of Truth is "Something people seem to compliment you the most on."

Doesn't it feel weird to write about something people compliment you on? We really should be allowed to toot our own horns once in a while, but humility is such a virtue, right? In any case, one thing that people have complimented me on is my writing. I LOVE to write. I have since I was young. It's evolved over time. I started writing in a journal in 5th grade, and by the time I was 20 I'd filled about 25 blank books with writing. Everything from crushes, to letters that could never be sent, to poetry, to what I was up to at that time in my life to free writing. As a teenager, I wrote a lot of poetry. I have an enormous binder full, and every once in a while I share a little bit of it here. I wrote some short stories, which I haven't shared here, but perhaps I should. I know none of them are DONE done, but they may still be good enough to entertain SOMEONE out there. I wrote for my high school newspaper for three years, and at one point wanted to become a journalist. I have started a novel I'd love to finish one day. I wrote a column for a local paper a few times when I was 17 or so.

Now, this is where my writing lives. Even if no one read it, I'd still write here. Because it's in my blood, and I love it. I also do some ghostwriting online, which is wonderful and lets me use a part of my brain that parenting and housewifery doesn't. I would write if no one was reading, but when people tell me I am a good writer? It certainly feels amazing!

Here's one of my old poems for you. I originally wrote it in London in 1999, then revised it for a poetry class I took in college a couple of years later.

South Ken

I walk, surrounded
by the sounds of buskers,
the sight of husks full of people
sleeping bag cocoons of bodies.

These sights, sounds and feelings
send me reeling with awe,
the shock of a flaw in such a magical city
overflows my mind.

Voices pull me back, flush
with the rush of normal people bustling,
by, accustomed to hustling by and ignoring
“Homeless and Hungry – Please can you help?”

Imagine living
a life dependent on the giving of strangers
facing the dangers of cold and sickness
with only a sleeping bag and cardboard sign.

Playing a flute
in a putrid underground tunnel
people funneling by with glassy, uncaring eyes
thinking ‘maybe if I had smaller change’.

I pause before wood,
tiny statues laid on blankets, and should I buy
a polished lion or butterfly just to feel better?
I don’t meet his eyes.

And we walk
surrounded by din, talk winding around us like a snake
I can’t seem to shake off this white noise
wondering why
we never stop to wonder why.

Read the other 29 Days here.