I was recently motivated to dust off an essay that I wrote about six years ago.
The theme and style of the piece as I remembered it seemed in line with material accepted by POUI – The Cave Hill Literary Annual, Department of Language, Linguistics and Literature at the Cave Hill Campus of the University of the West Indies which has recently agreed to publish another of my jottings and has encouraged me to submit again.
I found the essay, printed it out–I still work best on paper–and sat down to take a look. Embarrassed does not even begin to describe my reaction to my writing. It is certainly well-intentioned and the
story has potential but from the first sentence one can see that the author is an amateur, and well, let’s just say
that my editing skills were not where they are now.
Although I am appalled that I actually submitted this to be published six years ago, I am pleased to have this concrete proof of sorts that I have grown as a writer. Like many writers, I go through periods of doubting my ability to put words on paper that other people will actually be interested in reading. This self-assessment is a significant event in my journey.
Tel me about a moment in your career when you recognized that you had made strides towards your writing goals.