I’m a word geek. I’m not ashamed to admit it. In fact, I’m quite proud of the fact.

Once, while talking with a college student interning in our office about the AP Stylebook, I confessed to the level of my love of words.

“I actually find that the AP Stylebook is fascinating reading, but I guess I’m a geek that way,” I said.

More later on my love-hate relationship with the AP Stylebook. By the way, if you’ve never experienced the online, web-based Stylebook, you are missing out!

Back to why this blog exists — its raison d’etre.

Writing is my life and has been for a long time.

While my role in public relations in higher education varies on a daily basis, it always is focused on the written word in one format or another. Previously, I spent nearly two decades in the newspaper industry. With the exception of a few summer jobs here and there, every professional position I’ve had has dealt with writing and communications.
Didn’t most journalists, editor and reporter types, anyway, get into journalism because of a love and talent for writing? Somewhere along the way, many journalists are pulled away from writing — someone deems them qualified to be an editor or work the copy desk. While the work remains word-related, the daily grind turns into telling other people how to write. Or telling them that being a writer is the worst thing they could do with their lives.

I had begun feeling the call of the written word long before I shifted to a new career in higher education about 10 years ago. Blank notebook pages seemed to call out to me to have prose scribbled upon them and I started reading books about the craft of writing. I found myself stealing minutes from busy weekends and long nights to start writing fiction again.

I actually managed to finish my first novelette! If you’re unfamiliar with the term, it is a piece of work that is too long to be a short story and too short to be a novella, somewhere between 7,500 and 17,499 words. I’ve also got several other projects I’m working on that range in topic and scope.

So, as if spending both my work hours and free time engaged in the twin pursuits of reading and writing isn’t enough, I’ve delved into the blog world. I’m sure I have the distinction of being the last person on the planet to have a blog.

Mainly, I plan to spend this space talking about the writing life — in particular, this writer’s life. Seem a little self-centered? Of course it is. It’s my blog and I plan to talk about me. But, I welcome anyone’s insight about writing, whether it be fiction, journalism, blogging, or just the craft in general.

And I welcome, too, to those of you who just enjoy reading well-written prose — I also will devote space to reading and good books from time to time and welcome your thoughts as a reader.

After all, without readers, where would we writers be?

Thought for the day: The difference between the almost right word & the right word is really a large matter–it’s the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.– Mark Twain