Why I Write

         
By Shannon Anderson
            I haven’t always known I wanted to write, but I have always known I wanted to express my creativity. When I was young, I sat for hours at a small table in the living room painting by numbers or drawing whatever I saw. Hours passed but I knew neither time nor place; I was immersed in the act of creating. I thought one day I would become an artist. I even attended my orientation class at University of Georgia as an art student. When I walked through the doors of the art school building and encountered the graduating seniors exhibition of beautiful sculptures and paintings capturing life in all its colors and attitudes, I felt in my gut I didn’t have the talent to succeed as an artist. I had had no previous art classes or training, and I assumed I lacked the talent necessary to succeed. Wistfully I turned to what I had always been good at; I became an English major.

Back in 1984, however, apart from essays of literary criticism to fulfill assignments, writing was not something I even thought of producing. I thought I might eventually write for a newspaper or edit a magazine, but becoming an author was the furthest thing from my mine, until Dr. Kilgo, my professor for my short story class, challenged us to write our own short story. We had only just read Hemingway’s Nick Adams stories, which are evocative of place and deceptively simple in their diction. I had no idea of the skill required to produce a finished story and blithely started mine shortly after class. When the due date arrived, I was mortified by my efforts, but turned in my story anyway. I received a poor grade as did most of my classmates. I learned that though I could criticize what writers wrote, until I understood the craft of writing, I would never truly understand literature. That assignment opened my eyes to the possibilities of writing, and I have been a student of writing ever since.

What I have learned in the 26 years since then is that writing is a craft. It requires skill and dedication to improvement. Now and then as beginners we write with a flash of brilliance, genius even, a gift from the muse that tempts and tantalizes so that we don’t quit. But writing is hard work, but it is more satisfying than any other work I’ve ever done. That is why I write. It satisfies my urge to learn each day what I think and who I am, to be in sync with the universe, to feel I’m “in the zone” when hours pass but feel like minutes, to play with language and express what I thought I couldn’t,  to capture in my words what I can’t capture with my art. With writing I can paint like Michelangelo, garden like, Gertrude Jekyll, sculpt like Rodin. With writing I can be the artist I always wanted to be. Words are my medium.