Make Way for a Writing Life!

My library of writing inspiration continues to grow.

I have wanted to be a writer for as long as I have been able to write.

I suppose, by definition, as long as I have been writing, I HAVE been a writer!

At my youngest, "playing school" involved writing stories in response to my sister's assignments.

One of my earliest diary entries.  I was an art journaler from the beginning...lol!

In elementary school, my favorite tasks were sentence starters, when my teachers would begin a story, such as, "You are walking down the sidewalk, when you see a strange pair of glasses.  When you pick them up...." and then our job was to finish the story.

The journals I've been keeping on-and-off since I was seven years old.

In middle and high school, I wrote for the school newspaper and our literary magazines.  I even joined literary magazines publishing works of students from school districts across the city.

In college, I never stopped writing, with classes in English, American, and Spanish literature, plus a multitude of history courses.

In my twenties and thirties, I dreamed of becoming a published author, and my journals hold constant chastisements that I never make it past writing diary entries.  I have always been conscious that my desire to dedicate myself to writing never goes away, and yet I haven't contributed the time or ambition to make it happen in any intentional way.

Stories and quotations from published writers contain a wealth of inspiration.

Now I am in my forties, and while I don't think I'm running out of time, exactly, I'm certainly not getting any younger.  I am back to my commonplace books, collecting inspiration from the lives of famous writers.  (A discouraging number of them, by the way, seem to have died in their 40s!)

More spreads from my current commonplace book

I am back to my daily writing in the style of Julia Cameron's morning pages (though my writing seldom takes place in the morning).  And I am planning to do some focused writing for my Living Stones blog, since I am most interested in focusing on matters of faith and Christianity.

Because of my renewed focus and intention, I am going to put this Drawing Near blog on a bit of a hiatus.  It has become clear that I cannot keep too many balls in the air at the same time, and if I am going to sustain my writing practice, then my art and crafting is going to take a backseat for awhile.  I hope to maintain my blogging and mail art friendships, and am still interested in swaps with those who might be interested.  I continue to be reachable at aleakaskey@yahoo.com.  But for awhile, at least, I won't be making updates on this blog.

It is likely I will pop back in from time to time when I can't bear to be away any longer, but for now, it won't be on any kind of a regular basis.

So be well, my friends.  I continue to wish you lives of creativity, hope, and happiness!