The fastest, longest two weeks ever

I had planned on posting more often. I didn't want to this to be a once a week blog but at this time it is looking like that will be the case. The last two weeks have been spend reading, writing and researching just about everything for my Capstone project. I read articles, journal entries, books, magazines, watched movies, TV shows, documentary series and YouTube channels. Research is tiring anyway and then I was sick too! I had a sinuses infection. Nothing major enough to go to the doctor for but I did stay home one day and sleep.

I subscribe to TheRumpus.net and everyday my inbox is given a taste of proper blogging. Stephen, the blog's creator and head writer, talks about life and all of it's beautiful dirty messiness and how wonderfully painful and great it can be. He writes about his childhood and adulthood and work, you know, life. He is fast becoming one of my favorite writers to read. Mostly because he sends me email I want to read but also be he inspires me to write more.

I have wanted to be a writer in the classic sense from the age of about two. My mom tells me when I was little, a toddler in a car seat, I would tell her stories from the back seat of the car. Often they were the bedtime stories from the night before that I retold with myself as the heroine. I don't remember this but it does sound like something I was likely to do at two or three. I do remember in kindergarten reading stories and rewriting them in my head so they were more interesting. I mean, Dick and Jane were not just walking for hours and hours, something had to be chasing them or attacking them. I do remember one time in the third grade I got in trouble for writing a paper that was too descriptive. The teacher told me what I wrote was fantastical and not likely to ever happen. I thought what is wrong with that?

I was not kind to my writing talent after graduating high school. Though I wrote my share of art history papers during undergrad and a few short scripts that my screenwriting teacher really liked, I did nothing to groom my talent. After earning my BFA, I was afraid to start writing. I was afraid that because I had waited so long to start writing again I would discover my talent found a home in someone else, that person more appreciative of it and not bond by fear to not use it. I am glad to say that over that past few weeks I've learned it liked me too much to leave but like an atriphed muscle I'm finding it hard to use well right away.

I know I'm supposed to be writing about how I spend my money but the money thing isn't the real reason I have this blog. The real motivation is it write. Neil Gaiman, who I love, says the best way to become a writer is to write. Write a lot. Just write and eventually you will be good enough to share that writing with someone else. Stephen from The Rumpus says that best way to keep a blog is to write everyday. I believe him as studies have shown consistence more than content is what wins on the net. Please read a blog more often when it publishes daily verses weekly. I'm probably months away from being a daily long form blogger but I do plan on getting there.

I read an article on the plane this morning about a guy who was hit by a car, it severing his C6 vertebrae. The doctor told him he would never walk again. He told him You didn't know me well, do you? The doctor shook his head at him and walked away saying he was delusional. Five years later this man became the first person to ever walk again unassisted after such a traumatic injury to his spinal column. He did it through old fashion hard work and having a very detailed plan of action. He said to write down three goals you have. Now rewrite them until you have the three you really want to accomplish. Once you have that, tell no one. Telling people these goals makes you a talker, not a doer. I realized after reading this article that I am a talker.

I tell people my ideas and goals and I speak words hoping they come true. I have very little faith these ideas will come true mostly because I don't know how to make them more than words but also because I don't have faith in myself to complete them. I used to believe the world was mine to conquer. I'm not sure when I started believing I was defeated but that stops today.

Feb twenty five is the day I become a doer again. I have to go now, I've goals to write.