Being retired and living on a fixed income I don’t have the funds for other than DIY learning. One can read all the books in the world and practice but not learn the nuances of writing for readers, according to Nathaniel Hawthorne, “Easy reading is damn hard writing”. I am willing to put in the time to learn but some feedback in a course would be immense help in furthering my passion for the written word and possibly helping others in their writing journey, as I believe in paying it forward and do not believe that age should be a factor in one’s desire to be a writer.

I write reviews, blog, and answer any questions about freelancing or writing that I can and resource for what I don’t know all in an effort to pay it forward.

I like editing and reading. I would love to be a better writer, suffer from the dreaded inner critic, and build confidence in what I write with the goal on capturing the reader’s attention for a blog post, article, or daring to dream of the possibility of writing a story someday.

The real question is “Why do I Want to Write?”

For me, it is not a question of why, it is more that fact that I need to write for my own sanity. Something special calms the inner beast when the creative muse visits and allows me to exercise the mind and the creative juices deep within the recesses of the soul. When I am out driving, putting out the trash, lying in bed, or just about anywhere I am, thoughts of lines or plots just seem to come out of nowhere. When I am out running errands or just out with my wife, I notice people, places, and things that may be something to focus on for a story or poem.

I feel the need to write just as we need to breathe to live. Writing is life, life is writing; they cannot be separated. When I am not writing, I get depressed. There something about the solitude of being at one with nothing but language and how to use it to elicit emotions and thoughts by how the words are used that the reader can relate to and experience from the words on a page as they read the story created by the author.

To be able to write something that is like a child in a way, and share the joy, sorrow, place and time of the story. To give the reader an escape from their life for a few minutes or hours, where they are transported via the magic carpet of words on a page is what I as a writer hope happens.

The poems I write are a slice of life as I see it through creative eyes. I wrote a poem about a specific thing, yet readers saw different concepts of what the poem was about for them. I feel I did my job. They each got something out of it as their life experiences led them to an emotion. That is what a poem should do as far as I am concerned. To put into words life experiences and have the reader relate in some way that makes them feel something. The same goes for prose.

It is by writing that the authors fulfill some inner sense of themselves. At least for me, I find a sense of calmness that nothing else brings quite the same feeling. When I am writing, the rest of the world disappears and a unique place and time enters in its place. It is this strange sense of calmness that rejuvenates the inner grounding of the soul. I have literally spent hours editing, reading or writing without any sense of time passing.

There are stories to entertain, cause discussions, escape the pressures of real life, and more that comes from reading the works of authors. In the fast-paced world we live in, there is nothing better than to take some time to read a good book. Being a voracious reader myself, I may be slightly biased.

I write, therefore I am a writer. I had a short story published in a local weekly the “Osborne Joy” in Osborne, Kansas. Does this make me a writer?

If you have read to this point, I appreciate your time and hope my writing has engaged you.

Sincerely,

Robert Medak