"Have you been writing?"

It's a question that I know I'll be asked any time I meet up with my, as I call them, "395-ers". We all sit around and talk about what's new and how's life and where have you been for the last few years and, inevitably, at some point this question comes up.

It's an odd one for me because I'm always writing, but it somehow still never feels like enough. I feel like a fraud because I've never made a concerted effort to "get published" or "write my novel". I just kind of...expel words. It's not for lack of process or passion, it's just how I've always worked. I write professionally so OF COURSE I'm writing, but I know what they mean. They mean short fiction. Am I writing short fiction? And the answer is both yes and no. I guess it's hard to determine because I haven't FINISHED anything in a while. Scraps. Bits and pieces. Character studies. I write them all the time. But I don't finish them. And so I always come to a crossroads kind of confessional moment when they ask that. Yes, I write. But it's not enough and it's a humbling moment that happens over late-night beers and it only happens with my 395-ers. And that's why I need to keep seeing their faces and having those conversations and remembering that with writing, it's never enough.

So, starting now, I'm gonna try more. I really am. So that next time I see them, it's not a lie or a half-truth, it's just a fact of being. I write. I write all the time. I write ads. I write short fiction. I write really terrible poetry. I write rambling blog posts. I write lists. Words can't stay inside me. This is already a truth. I just need to keep it a reality.

<3 Thanks for sending me these people again, writing gods.