Dear Dad,

I write these words, which will likely never reach you, not to hurt you or humiliate you, or in anyway show that I do not love you.  I’ve been blessed to be your daughter, but there are some things that weigh heavy on my heart, and I wish to release them now.  They are, in their own way, leaving, disappearing, dissolving, but it is time I am done with them so that I may move into fulfill of my purpose.

When I was young, I had but one dream: to write.  I had but one love: novels.  To me writing - poetry or short stories or my loftiest dream, a whole novel - was the highest achievable form of art.  Books shaped and affected me, and as I grew, I wanted first to tell stories and to move people, then later to shape people with my pen.

But you always said no.  I do not begrudge you this now, but for a long time I did.  Some of the greatest hurts in my life were caused by you in my youth.  You, not allowing me to study English.  Me, finding out years much too late that I could have  studied at my favorite writing school, with some deception from a family member.  And the worst moment of my young life, you, telling me you were not proud of me when I stayed home to try my hand writing a novel - my dream crushed.

It is not your fault.  Your scientific mind was allotted proportionately to me as well as mom’s literary one, and my aptitude in math was stunning, considering I cared not a bit for it.  Even later, I returned to school, time after time, always too scared to pursue my passion, but instead, squirreling along numbers in neat, clean, lines.  It made me feel smart, but it did not make me feel worthy or useful.

And just as you, my father on Earth, pushed me into your direction, more frequently, my Father in heaven pushed me His way.

You see, Dad, Writing is his purpose for ME.  I cannot change that.  I have tried to lose it, dodge it avoid, or turn it into something else - writing for profit, for advertising, for employment.  But these forms are not my calling.

God has called me to an artistic calling - creative writing - in the worst of times:  When there is no money and no living to be made from it, when Amazon and Barnes and Noble chains have taken profit out of the rare published author’s hands, when the internet and TV and iPods have reduced reading novels to a quaint affectation.

So here I am.  I have asked God to take away my desire for completing my degree in this direction, and instead, I have now come to find that studying my craft is the one way to truly achieve the heights I desire to scale as a fiction writer and, maybe, one day, a poet as well.  I have a school.  I have courses.  I have a gift.  I have to practice, hone, tame, expand, learn, train, and amplify this gift.

I can do nothing else.

Dad, it would be my dearest dream to hand you my successful novel, but you are sick now and novels take time and care and crafting. I’m afraid I’ll be too late for you to ever be proud of me as a writer, but it’s not too late for me to feel that pride for myself.

So I’m editing tonight, had to force myself too, and I came to the part of the book where something tragic happens…

And even though I made this decision years ago, wrote in NANOWRIMO in 2003, and have lived with it ever since, the writing … well, I damn near cried.  CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?

This is my one true path, I know it now.  I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with the business I haven’t been able to build lately or how to make writing my business or how to get unstuck out of 2 chairs instead of one, but I know this now.

And it feels DAMN good.  This is the purpose God put me here for.

Amen to that!

In “Bird by Bird”, Anne Lamott writes about this radio stations, which plays self-pitying, self-loathsome music about how badly you SUCK in one ear, and meanwhile raps on about your appearance on Letterman and all your great success to come in the other.

Well, it was playing loud and clear today only the programming was strictly about how pitiful my writing is. I’ve never quite felt this way, and I blame American Idol. A long long LONG time ago, I wanted to be a singer more than anything else, and I supposed if I’d had the proper encouragement, opportunity, and DISCIPLINE I could have done it. Turned out God had other plans (like the ONE day I was in a rock band at age 14), but that’s ok, I learned to live without it, and just sing in church and too my kids, and WHO cares if I’m off key? (Unless of course Simon Cowell stops by my church, and oh, just the thought is too funny - wouldn’t he be repelled at the door?)

Then I’m cleaning up the kitchen and I’m thinking about these poor sods who really do believe they have talent and they’ve got BIG FAT NOTHIN’! I went to clean up the kitchen and KFKD was playing loud and apparently DJ’d tonight by Simon himself, only now he’s a smug and heartless expert on writing and I’VE GOT NOTHIN! GO HOME! THAT WAS THE WORST THING I’VE EVER READ!

I feel like I was once good, GREAT even, and now, who knows? I’m too alone in this process. I need some damn support, and fast.