And So It Begins

As a person who enjoys writing and spends A LOT of time on the internet, it's a bit surprising that this is the first real blog I've ever had. I blogged a bit on MySpace back in the day and I have a Tumblr, but as I said on my Twitter earlier, that's mostly for reblogging gifs of Matt Smith's lovely face. So I'm starting a legitimate blog with, like, my thoughts and stuff. Don't expect anything witty or profound, but do expect a lot of commas, I like them too much for my own good.  The rest of this post will pretty much consist of why I am blogging.

Writing has always been something I've enjoyed and has come pretty easily to me. I won first place in a writing contest in my school in first grade. I wrote really dumb little stories throughout my childhood, including at least one about my Beanie Babies. I know. Embarrassing. In seventh grade (2001) I started writing my first novel which was about a lonely girl whose parents died in the attack of September 11th. It was terrible and I only got through about 5 or 6 chapters, but it helped me to escape reality. Later that year, I befriended a girl who wrote a lot of poetry, so I decided to try my hand at it. I recently came across the poetry I wrote from about ages 12-15 and they were the most ridiculous and emo things I have ever read, but that was my outlet when I had no one to talk to and wasn't sure who I was. Though I'm terrible at research and analysis, throughout my school career I've been able to throw together an essay the night before and still get an "A" or "B" on it. Once I get lost in my writing, it starts to come out like word-vomit. It's not always brilliant or even coherent, but it's something I enjoy and don't allow myself to do enough in a way that is recreational. 

A couple of days before November started last year, I decided to do NaNoWriMo. Just in case you've been living under a rock and don't know what that is, it is National Novel Writing Month. The goal is to write an entire 50,000+ word novel during the month of November. A lot of people on the internet participate in this, so I decided it seemed like it was worth a try.  I wrote a 50,530 page novel with 2 days to spare. I felt so accomplished, especially considering only 4 of my 14 writing buddies completed their novels. It may have been a ridiculous story about a girl (who was essentially me) falling in nerdfighterlike, but I had a lot of fun doing it. During the whole month and after finishing, I was very secretive about this project. Many of my friends knew about the novel itself and I posted a few Facebook statuses about my involvement with NaNoWriMo, but if people asked me about the plot I didn't tell them. If people asked, I'd blush then tell them as little as I could get away with revealing. I've always been very secretive about my writing. I have a bit of social anxiety as it is, but when we'd do peer editing in school, my heart would race and I'd silently freak out about the fact that other people were reading my personal thoughts and ideas. Most of the time I'm not even comfortable with the thought of my teachers/professors reading my writing. I'm not really sure why this is; I don't remember a time when someone was particularly critical about something I've written.Whether it's due to extreme self-consciousness or being part of a very critical family or something else entirely, I don't know.

All of that to say that I want to start writing and getting comfortable with sharing it with people because I keep thinking more and more of writing novels and maybe even one day publishing one. Not that this blog is going to really be "creative writing" but any writing helps. Perhaps no one will ever read this blog, but the fact that I'm putting myself out there is a step in the right direction. If you are reading this, I really appreciate you for helping me get over one of my fears.