On Writing

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I'm often asked why I write. The simplest answer is: because I want to. But seriously, I love to write and when I'm pounding out the words on my little MacBookAir everything seems to feel right in the world.

Almost thirty years ago, I wrote my first song. After that, I wrote a few dozen more, along with a hundred poems... after all, aren't lyrics poetry too? 

My first published prose happened to be one of those poems. On a whim, I'd sent a few off to a greeting card company and heard back from one of their editors. They sent me a contract, which I eagerly signed, licensing them to use my poem. They even gave me a credit on the card. I was on my way! Yeah! Well, not quite. Today, those poems and song lyrics are sitting in a box, buried somewhere in my basement. Maybe one day I'll go through the exercise of typing in all those poems (used a typewriter in those days), and then format them into something I can give away on Amazon. It'd be a project, but someone might give it a read. 

I wrote my first novel almost twenty years ago. A dreadful tale about the personification of Death—like that hasn't been done before. The writing was clunky, the grammar bad, but I was having fun. And then tragedy! With eighty percent of the first draft complete, my hard-drive crashed. Keep in mind that I am talking about a time before Dropbox or home networks and Drobos or even some decent backup software. I've kept the hard drive, promising myself to reclaim the platters if I ever make enough money from my writing. I do have one printed copy of that story, a partial at best, and guess where that is? The basement, and in the same box with poems and song lyrics.

After almost finishing a novel, life got busy and a decade passed before the writing bug struck again. I still remember the day… a Virginia Beach vacation with my family and a story suddenly popped in my head. I'm always coming up with stories, but this time I wrote the words too. Using an iPad and the Notes App, I jotted down the opening page. And that was that, I started writing and didn't stop for another 100k words..

I try to write and read a little every day, but life still gets busy and most of the time my lofty goal of a few thousand words amounts to just a few hundred. I never let that bother me—okay just a little—I do the best I can with the time I have. As for writing, I have a few things to share about that too, which you can find further down.

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About Me

Who are you? Who Are you?
I'm a Walrus!

Brian Johnson - The Breakfast Club

Who am I? 

I'm a resident of Virginia, living with my wife and children, along with five cats (sometimes more), a finch, parrot and a lizard.

Although I live in Virginia, my heart is still in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania where I grew up. And I hope that one day, I'll be able to call Philadelphia home again.

Growing up, I liked to read short stories, but struggled with the words. You see, I had a secret: a sad little secret. Ashamed and embarrassed, I was the little kid in the back row of the schoolroom, quietly moving my lips along with the class while everyone read aloud. I couldn't read. I couldn't write. I hoped nobody would notice, but they did. They always did.

By the time I'd reached the fourth grade, my secret wasn't a secret anymore. The teachers knew something was wrong. Dyslexia. Maybe that is why I liked science fiction so much? All those crazy looking glyphs on the screen, glowing, flashing.
The fix? Back to the third grade for me, and then special classes three days a week. It worked. Once I started reading, I never stopped. Stephen King, Piers Anthony, Dean Koontz, and even the Judy Blume books my sisters discarded.

I'm still one of the slowest readers I know, but school was never a problem again. I finally graduated the third grade, and then kept on going until I finished my Masters. 

These days, I work as an engineer and spend off hours writing, editing and thinking up the next great story.