Inspiration

Posted on MegsMishMash@blogspot.com 5/25/10
Transferred to WordPress 3/31/14

Today I was inspired. It may seem silly, but the movie Julie & Julia inspired me. In short, it inspired me to sit down and write. All my life my family and friends have told me I should be doing something with my ability to write. The first person I remember encouraging me was my paternal grandmother Steiner (Nana). My Aunt Sis and cousin Niki have always told me I write well and that they think I should do it for a living.

Through the years I have journaled for different reasons. I’ve journaled on the rocks overlooking the Atlantic Ocean in Maine when I was a teenager. This was during a time in my life when everything seemed so urgent and life altering. Boys, parents, decisions about school and what I wanted to do with my life were the hot topics back then. The smell of the salt air and the dramatic scenery around me (towering pines, the craggy playground of rocks on which I sat and the crashing Atlantic waves) filled my senses and head with creativity and they gave me the “urge to purge”, as I like to call it. It was the perfect setting for unleashing my thoughts, dreams and aspirations onto paper. I’d give anything to have a place like that to write on a daily basis.

I’ve journaled in bed in the wee hours when a thought or emotion overwhelmed me and I just had to get it out on paper. Mostly at those times, the things I jot or journal are ideas I have for a book or a creative piece….a name of a character… a theme for a chapter…a thought that expresses exactly what I want to convey, that I just don’t want to forget – because it’s PERFECT…you know?

These days, when we write on the computer and share it with others, we call it blogging. And so it goes…

I am blogging on my couch, outstretched in comfy clothes adorned with my new, beautiful, green, Murano necklace my love brought back for me from San Antonio, last week. I want to surprise him by wearing it. I’m in green and black and the necklace looks just right with the outfit. I love green. It too inspires me 🙂 But I’m getting off topic here. Actually, it loops me back to part of why I felt so inspired by the movie Julie & Julia.

In the movie, Julie mentions that she is A.D.D. Though I have never been diagnosed professionally, I think those who know me well could safely say that I am in fact a very distracted person at times. I find many things interesting and have a hard time focusing on any one thing for too long unless I am sincerely impassioned by it. I relate to Julie in this way and a few others. She also has friends and family who know she likes to write and who know that she has written a book – it just hasn’t been published. She feels uninspired at times in her life and like she is not/has not done something with her talent. Together with her husband’s help, she embarks on an endeavor to start and finish something for the first time in her life. If you’ve seen the movie, you know what that is. The POINT is, I can relate to that too. The only thing I have started and finished in my lifetime (and I am now 41) is high school and a 2-year massage therapy certification. I never finished a college education in my 20’s or even in my 30’s but I stopped and started a good handful of times! I am, now at age 40-something, finishing my Bachelor’s degree.

The movie caught me off guard in a way I didn’t expect. It spoke to me and said, “Megan! Get off your duff and WRITE! At least try to publish what you HAVE written, and get working on the things you have had in mind for years”. My worry is, however, that I have too many different things in mind. Too many different types of things: A cookbook, written together with my husband and son and illustrated by my son. A Children’s book, with the hope that my mega talented, quasi-pseudo-step-sister would illustrate for me. A collection of life experiences written in a way that teens may identify with. A story of my childhood growing up in Maine, as a tribute to my parents who afforded us the most amazing Summers there and as a keepsake for my son Nathan, who has grown to love it as much as I have. I want to write ALL of these things and I DO want to publish them. But, can I do all of those types of writings and make a name for myself? Can I make a name for myself this late in life? Can I do it without a degree that is specific to the field of writing?

The answers to these questions are ones I can’t answer, but I know I want to try.

Thank you Julie Powell, for setting a goal to do something amazing and for sticking with! It is your story in particular that inspires me!