Day One in the books, or On Being a Writer

I was asked an interesting question today. It was the first day of Calvin College's Festival of Faith & Writing, my first official writing conference. A friend of a friend leaned over to me while we were waiting for James McBride to deliver his plenary talk, and she said, "So Wendy tells me you're a writer."

I guess it wasn't a question in its true interrogative form, but there were many questions loaded into that one statement she directed at me. She was giving me a chance to refute it. She was giving me the opportunity to say no or that I hope to be or that I'm working to be. In that statement she was giving me the chance to disagree. 

I made a face and didn't answer right away. 

And then I decided I wanted to answer her unspoken question with the cry of my heart for almost as long as I've wanted to  be a doctor (age 3). And nearly as long as I've wanted to be a student at the University of Notre Dame (age 6). 

Yes, I said. I'm a writer. 

She didn't ask me if I was a doctor or a student at Notre Dame. She said she was told I was a writer, and she gave me a chance to deny or confirm. 

I confirmed. And when I tried to say I was an unpublished writer, I was reminded of the poems I had published when I was in elementary school. And the article in Women's Lifestyle about the year my dad was in Iraq. 

So I confirmed. I am a writer. I am a published writer, and I wrote my first novel when I was in middle school. Now I have a novel which I am 1/3 of the way through. And I have a series idea I'm excited about and a collection of essays started and a devotional idea to flesh out and two other novels tucked in my brain. 

I'm a dreamer. That's nothing new. But, for the first time in my life I'm not just a dreamer. I'm a doer. I'm a writer.