Ending on a Serious Note – #JusJoJan 2023

Welcome to day thirty-one and our final day of Just Jot It January for 2023. Today’s word is write.

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Ask a writer why they write and you will likely get a somewhat different answer from every person. Within those answers, however, is often a common thread. Writers are driven to write.

Someone asked me if blogging was really writing. Questions like that have an undertone. I have noticed a similar undertone with questions concerning various genres of writing. As if somehow, what a person chooses to write is in some way not ‘real writing’. Then there are the other questions and accusing observations. “Would I know something you’ve written?” “Oh, you self-published (with the eye roll).” “Can’t anyone have a blog?” “Have you written a real book?”

Today as we wrap up this month of prompt writing, I want to thank Linda Hill. Year after year she tirelessly sponsors this challenge and I am always amazed as she is one busy woman, mother, writer, and editor. This year this challenge has inspired me in a way I hope will be revealed as the year progresses. Thank you, Linda!

I want to thank all the bloggers I follow. I wish you knew how many times I refer to something you have written. You are carried into my daily conversations. I frequently speak of the things I have learned from you. I have held positive thoughts for you. I have shared your successes and your stumbles. I have laughed and cried with you. I have prayed for you. You may write in isolation but your are read surrounded by the world!

The same holds true for those who follow and comment on my blog. We have developed relationships. You have expressed your caring for me, my family, and my words. You have encouraged me to continue to write – even if it is just a blog 🙄.

So, thank you all for writing. For allowing me a glimpse of who you are. Thank you for sharing your world, your culture, and your writing. I carry your words with me more than you may have realized.

I want to close with this delicious Ray Bradbury quote. This is what I wish for you.

“If you want to write, if you want to create, you must be the most sublime fool that God ever turned out and sent rambling. You must write every single day of your life. You must read dreadful dumb books and glorious books, and let them wrestle in beautiful fights inside your head, vulgar one moment, brilliant the next. You must lurk in libraries and climb the stacks like ladders to sniff books like perfumes and wear books like hats upon your crazy heads. I wish you a wrestling match with your Creative Muse that will last a lifetime. I wish craziness and foolishness and madness upon you. May you live with hysteria, and out of it make fine stories — science fiction or otherwise. Which finally means, may you be in love every day for the next 20,000 days. And out of that love, remake a world.” 

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Written as part of Linda Hill’s JusJoJan.

Prompt word today (write) submitted by Linda herself from Life in Progress.

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