Writers Club

With the calendar indicating that my fortieth birthday was imminent, I wanted to do something stick-neck-out-ish to challenge myself not to get fat and complacent. So, I joined the Steinbach Arts Council writers club. I felt sort of shy about pretending to think of myself as a writer, and wondered if I'd feel stupid and naked there, much like I did in science, geography, and history (oh, and math...) throughout my school life. But the point was to challenge myself. Stick my neck out. Take some risks.

The first challenge was the Carillon News annual Christmas writing contest. I couldn't think of a thing to write. But I got very stern with myself and had myself a bit of a talking to.

"Self.

You MUST submit something. It does not have to be brilliant. It only has to be written, and submitted."

In the back of my mind, I knew that if I sent something in and didn't get so much as a nod, I would know for sure what a boneheadlosernogoodgoodfornothingwannabe I was. So, it was pretty easy to beat my own personal best. So far, my personal best had involved staying small so that there was no question about it- I could not succeed.

The other, much larger, much scarier, much more tear-inducing concern was that two Decembers ago, my brother Ken had won first place in that very same writing contest. He wrote an incredibly brilliant, layered piece that was so loaded in symbolism that much of it embarrassingly sailed right over my head.

I felt really intimidated to swim in the same pool as my really smart, really talented brother who I'd never see again on this side.

The day before the deadline, I still had no epiphany of brilliance.

So, I tricked myself. I logged into my blogspot, and just did what I do: Open the gates of neural pathology and semantics, and let my fingers do the talking.

I couldn't get the dang laptop to connect to the internet. But, determined to beat my pathetic personal best, I phoned the editer and asked for an extension until the following morning, so that my less electronically crippled husband could help me out with the internet issue.

A few days later, I received an e-mail from the fearless leader of the writers club, congratulating the media winners. I anxiously scanned the names in the e-mail and found that my name was not in the mix. Now I was really starting to feel like I was back in grade 11 geography. Plus, I was ashamed at my selfishness. Here I was part of a secret club- kind of like a writers cult or something, and I ought to be thrilled for all the cult members who had gotten their names in print. Instead I resented and envied them.

But then.
On the first Wednesday of the month of December, I got a phone call from my mother.

"Well.... You made it!" she chirped.
"Made it through what, mom?"
"You made it in the paper!"

Here's where it gets all layered and weird and holy and Anne-Lammott-ish.
All the layers started floating and intersecting and a whole bunch of them got bunched up in my tear ducts and clogged up my throat and my ability to breathe. I couldn't speak. I began to fear that my mother was victem to the dreaded dementia and she was hallucinating.

I made her read the name out loud. Tell me the page number. Tell me she was sure. And I wept. For my brother, for me, for life.

But what about writers club? Well, it turns out that they had done an internal review on each other's work and voted in the best pieces to be sent to the editer of the paper. I hadn't been able to make it to that month's session, and just assumed that I ought to send my work directly to the editer himself.

Which meant that I was the only member of the cult to get paid for the honour of seeing my name in print. I was like some kind of writer snob now, who could write off huge portions of her house, due to being a writer and all. I would have to claim the thirty-five big ones on my income tax receipt, look for tax cuts, try not to let it all go to my head- remember the small town from whence I came...

What I really learned was this: Time will continue to pass in 24 hour segments. You can live small, offend no one, not even dare to take any risks. Or you can celebrate. Embrace. Live out loud. You may or may not get your strokes, but at least you know you challenged your own status quo.
At least you get to know your own heart.