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Why Do You Write?

Why do you write?

Do you write for money
Do you write for fame?
Or influence
Power
Or love?

The half-joking answer is often, “Because I have to.”

I don’t know why you write. I only know why I write.

I’ve been writing almost as far back as I can remember. I wrote with a pen when I was in, what is here known as, middle school. I wrote so much my parents bought me my first, and only, typewriter. I didn’t write well, but I wrote often. I still have some of what I typed on onion-skin paper. At one point I even got something I wrote published! I was a voracious reader of Popular Mechanics magazine, so I submitted an article. My problem was (and still is) I’m not very handy or mechanically inclined (I blame my father, but that’s another story). No matter, I sat down and scribbled (as in sketched–when I still had a bit of a third-eye) the design for an adjustable wooden bookshelf. I typed up a short article, included the sketch, stuffed it in an envelope, and sent it off. Weeks (months?) later I got a reply and a check! No, I didn’t keep it and I don’t remember the amount. Some time later I got my monthly issue and, lo-and-behold, there was my article with my byline. My rough sketch was now a glorious technical drawing. Some more time passes and I get a mysterious package in the mail. It’s a book. Popular Mechanics had compiled articles into book format–the article about the bookshelf that only existed in my mind had made it in! I was thrilled.

Writing can be thrilling.

I continued to write, but submitted nothing further until I was in college. I had moved past Popular Mechanics and read something known as The Journal of Irreproducible Results (JIR), a funny and clever pseudo-scientific journal. I was a BioMed major at the time. I also considered myself funny. I typed a pseudo-scientific article I titled, “The Deliquescence of Squirrels “on the department’s only Selectric® typewriter–what a great typewriter. Even then, I didn’t think my article was very funny or good. No matter, the idea was clever and somewhat humorous, so I sent it in. Needless to say, it was rejected.

I wasn’t daunted and while I was still in college, I next submitted to Analog, the science-fiction magazine. I was a voracious reader, and I wanted to try my hand at the genre. I wrote a story and sent it in. Some time passed and the editor at the time, Stanley Schmidt, sent me a letter. It was a rejection letter. To sum up, it said he had never read anything so depressing in his life.

I’ve never submitted since then. That rejection letter crushed my desire to submit my writing.

Writing can frustrate and be painful.

But I didn’t stop writing, and continue to write, and write, and write. I just don’t submit.

My writing has evolved and gotten better. When I compare what I write now to what I wrote on the yellowing and cracking pages from my first attempts, there is a vast rise in improvement.

With all the strides I’ve made in this craft, am I tempted to submit again? I am, but I know I’m not as good as most of the people I read, and probably will never be. But, I’m good enough to be read, so I self-publish. Yes, that’s my distinction. And, yes, it’s an artificial one.

Writing can be satisfying.

One reason, the main reason, I write is that I enjoy words. I enjoy words, not academically, but in using words in humor-inducing and unexpected ways. I’m not sure why that is, but I do.

Writing can be entertaining.

I also enjoy the feeling of writing with a decent fountain pen. It’s tactile, and it actually produces something concrete rather than something virtual (the computer programs I write). To me, it’s a zen-like calming process.

Writing can be fulfilling.

I write every day. Even when I am not working on a story or book, I still do what I call free-writing. I take my notebook and just write stream of consciousness. Writing is part of every day. It’s not that I have to write, as the half-joking answer says.

Writing can be a habit.

I’ve been writing for so long, if I stop, it would be strange.

Word up!