Day Three: Tripping Over My Pencil

Day 3... wow, what commitment!
Although it's late and I'm heading to bed soon, I've thought of this moment all day. I've come up with various scenarios as to what I expect to come out of this 30 day journey (see "A Christmas Story").

30 days.
On one hand, it's nothing. On the other hand, I've done so little writing over the last three years that 30 days of writing is such a marked improvement. So, what on earth am I going to come up with to write about for another 28 (almost 27!) days? Is it possible to write for a solid month about not writing?
I know I'm not the only one out there with pages tucked away still hoping to "be a writer" someday.

I think it was... 12 years ago - me and the family were all geared up to head to Cambridge to meet Orson Scott Card (he had just written a book about writing characters and some other more popular novel). But I got sick. I begged my husband, Michael, to take my book to get it signed for me anyway.
Michael took the book and the kids and told Orson Scott Card I wanted to be a writer.

Card told him, "She all ready is a writer."

I thought that was amazing for him to say, but I wanted someone to buy my writing - then I'd be a real writer. I wrote for a couple of local newspapers and I still didn't see myself as a writer. I got my MA in Writing - and - you got it - I still don't think I'm real. If I'm not a real writer, then why keep writing?
Because if I don't, it drives me nuts - so here I am - writing a blog about writing and not writing.
I spent much of my academic career doing the same thing.

Maybe what I really need is for someone to pay me to not be a writer... maybe then I'd feel like a writer. Maybe then I'd be able to stand up to myself and say, "I am a writer. I can do this!"
Nah, that's too easy.
I'd hate to succeed.