July 5, 2023

At my father’s welcome home party, our family friend, Don, reminded me of a book I had written for him when I was a small child. For our wedding, his family made us a beautiful cookbook full of family recipes and photos, including a photo of him reading the book I wrote for him. I don’t remember what it said or what was on the cover, but the photo of him reading the book shows the back cover with the text, “I’m Laura and I love to reed and rit books.”

Sometimes I miss the certainty of that calling. That small girl had absolutely no doubt in her mind that reeding and ritting books was what she was meant to do. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve gotten more doubts about my ability to do that, but the truth is, my doubt is not in my ability to read and write books, but in my ability to make a living from that. Somehow those two ideas have become entangled and I’ve been confusing my doubt about one with doubt about the other.

Small child me knew that reading and writing are inextricably linked. This is something I had at least kind of forgotten, because I’ve been joyously rediscovering their connection lately. I’ve been prioritizing making time to read, actually read, not just listen to stories, but sit down with a physical book and flip the pages as I become immersed in their narratives or arguments. As I’ve been reading physical books, I’ve had the compulsion to write and have written more “artful” writing than all year. (I’m not counting my journal entries, because while they sometimes have worthwhile phrases, their purpose is to sort thoughts, not to “create.”)

For the past few years, creating has felt so effortful, either forced or frustrated waiting for inspiration. I’m excited to rediscover that inspiration is something you create for yourself, not something you wait for, and that when you immerse yourself in other stories, writing, at least for me, becomes if not easy than much easier.

So that’s me. I’m still Laura. I still love to reed and rit books.