The Single Step

Yesterday, I decided that I would become a writer.  Just like that?  No.  I've been agonizing over this for the last 44 years.  Ever since, I could write.  I didn't pursue it because I was afraid.  I didn't think that I could be successful.  And plus, my family had decided that I should go to medical school and become a doctor.  I wanted to at first, but I was afraid to pursue that too and after a while, I started getting involved in too many other things: raising a family,  a nursing career, trying to make lots of money...

I'm the ripe old age of 52 today.  I have been such a malcontent.  I mean 16 years ago I moved to Georgia and it has been no picnic trying to carve out an existence down here.  The culture is vastly different from home, which is Massachusetts.  And though I've adjusted, I've never felt completely a part of. 
But, I've had difficulty feeling completely a part of anything in my life.  It's not that I'm that different from anybody else...well, I don't know what it is.

I want to write as more than an outlet.  I would hope that I could publish a book or two. If they never become bestsellers that's fine with me.  I just want to publish.  My brother, who is a Vietnam vet, recently wrote an autobiography and found a publisher for his book.   He said that one publisher said that they could not handle the content in the book.  I am almost reading my brothers novel and the truth that he tells in that book is intense.

See, that's the thing about this society.  We have so blurred the lines between tactfulness and outright lying that people can't recognize the beauty in telling the truth.  I want to follow my brother.  I want to do what he does....in my own way.

So, I sit here.  I'm not sure exactly how to proceed except, that I will proceed.  I don't know wether I will be successful in my endeavor or not, but I haven't defined what success is for me yet. 

I am beginning my journey of a thousand miles....