In 1998, my name got published in the newspaper I would one day work for. Along with three other Idaho high school seniors, I was being recognized by the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE).
I didn’t need an award to know I was a writer. I’d always known. But being told so officially that I was a good one… It felt like permission. Permission to pursue a thing my father – my idol – questioned. Bluntly and repeatedly.
Dad saw my talent, and he also saw that I was desperately young and romantic. Here was a documented genius who’d turned from philosophy and physics to the practical path of medicine, staring down a very-not-genius creative writing major with no plan.
“What will you do?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I said.
You love what you love.
Today, on the NCTE-founded National Day on Writing, I’m sitting behind an office door that reads, “Department of Words.” For 24 years I’ve made a living doing what I love. Words and words and words about everything you can imagine. And in a time when you can ask AI to write the Great American Novel, I feel tremendously lucky to work for a company that values my craft. That word is cringey, but it’s the only way to say it.
In my longish career, I’ve (mostly) learned not to be twee, so I won’t go on and on about the profound, unending power writing has over me and why you should care about it. But oh, you should care. From Pliny’s Natural History to Brautigan’s poetry, there are ways of understanding, challenging, and deepening our humanity that only come from writing. Not just the greats – absolutely anyone working out on the page what they think and feel and who they are.
I’d say that wins October 20 (apologies to National Brandied Fruit Day).
