'Write Words' A Year in the Life of an Indie Author

The Decision to Write

It’s never been my life-long ambition to write a book. The only aspirations I had were to win the lottery and retire to my own private island; fully equipped, of course, with wi-fi so that I would be able to continue utilizing Amazon Prime. (Okay, maybe this wasn’t my life-long ambition since I pre-date not only the internet but also the home computer. But we won’t go there.)

After hearing me recount yet another crazy dream I’d had the evening before, my husband would say to me, You should write a book.

Nah, I’d counter. It’s too hard to find a publisher and an editor, and besides, you know I don’t like people telling me how to do stuff. And the conversation would end there, only to be revisited the next time I had a crazy dream.

The years rolled on and I wrestled with what I wanted to be when I grew up. As the home computer transformed from a goliath of a machine, not much smaller than a microwave oven (another invention that had rapidly gained popularity in the 80s), to the hand-held tablets that we use today, advancements in everything grew in leaps and bounds, and all of a sudden, the impossible seemed possible. But I wasn’t quite there yet.

Let me go back for a moment. I was a lonely kid. There is a bit of an age gap between me and my siblings, and by the time I was twelve years old, I was basically an only child. I didn’t have many friends. Oh, let’s be honest, I didn’t have any friends. Not any close friends, anyway, the kind you told secrets to and planned crazy adventures with. I had acquaintances. Classmates from school or kids of my mom’s friends would invite me over from time to time but I never felt like I belonged. I was alone a lot and I learned how to entertain myself by making up stories in my head. Grand, elaborate tales of daring escapades and breath-taking excitement filled with people who wanted to be around me.

As I grew older, I recognized the need to push those ideas aside. After all, who wants to listen to a fourteen-year old prattle on about her imaginary friends? That’s not really the express train to popularity in high school. But when I was alone, usually on a Saturday night, I’d replay the stories in my head, maturing the characters and honing the plots. They became my go-to form of entertainment when I was bored; thinking up situations that my characters would get in and out of, rehearsing what they would say or do or think or feel.

I eventually married… wait, that makes me sound like an old maid. Let me rephrase. I married when I was twenty-six, and the following years were filled with taking care of a husband, trying to become pregnant, working a full time job, moving cross-country, losing a baby, starting a new job, buying a house… you know, the usual. I didn’t have time to be bored. I had more than enough in my life to deal with, and writing wasn’t even a blip on my radar.

A frustrating decade of fertility treatments and miscarriages followed, and my thoughts were consumed with anything baby-related. By the time it