This is a story of something lost, something found.
As it sometimes does during West Virginia winters, the peaceful deep snows of December have turned to a miserable rain. When the days soak you to the bone and sunset plunges temperatures below freezing, there isn’t much to do but crawl under an electric blanket and curl up with a good book.
I fancy myself as an old-school writer.
That’s not to say my inspirations come from an ornate decanter of brown booze. Nor does it mean my writing space consists of a brooding, dusky den lit by a desk lamp as a trail of smoke wafts from the red-ember end of a burning cigarette.
All I mean is that I write with a pen. For some reason, I cannot peck out my words on a keyboard and make them come to life on the screen. Not initially. My brain doesn’t work that way. To make the magic happen, I need a pen and a piece of paper. Save the MacBook for later. Just give me my pen.
Also, maybe save the decanter of booze for later. My confidence or creativity might occasionally need a little liquid inspiration. Keep the lighter, too. I’m not a smoker. But given the stress that comes with this passion, my nerves just might find it handy.
You see, I really started writing Brothers of the Great Crusade way back in the tail-end of 2017. This might be a good time to mention that I am a perfectionist who knows that I am far from perfect. I’m a workaholic - in my day job as well as this dream job. Much like the brothers in my book, I grew up on a farm with a blue-collar family in the mountains of West Virginia. If there’s one thing I know, it’s hard work. I’m not scared of it. But I also know that my dream of becoming a successful author is such a long shot that it will require the perfect story at the perfect time, that it has to have the perfect set of circumstances.
My dad always liked to tell me that luck is just the moment when preparation meets opportunity. There’s a ton of truth in that. I’ve got preparation by the barrels. It’s the hope of an opportunity that gives me anxiety and keeps me up at night. By September, I could feel those doubts about the opportunities setting like concrete in the cracks of my confidence. A work of historical fiction with three main characters, written in the same letter format which inspired the idea - was it good enough? Was I good enough?
Can someone hand me that decanter of booze? Because by the end of summer 2018, I had lost confidence in myself and faith in my gift. I had completely given up.
It wasn’t until December of 2018 that I found the will to continue. Just by chance, I came across this other book about WW2 that was having a moment. I picked it up, read it, and thought it was fairly interesting. More importantly, it gave me hope. It made me believe again. Deep down, I knew if this book could make it, so could mine!
No, really.
Yes, my dreams would still be a long shot. Yes, they would require many long hours of hard work. And yes, my anxiety over things I cannot control would just have to shut up while I wait for the moment when a hundred different pieces fall perfectly into place.
Finally, my fear of failure was outweighed by the regret of living with what-ifs. I closed that book, looked around, and wondered - where’s my pen?
As rain and wind mercilessly whipped through the mountains, I came to a life-changing realization. Maybe I write this great story and it never gets picked up by an agent, never gets published, or never hits a bestseller list. That risk is one ante we all must wager in this game. The hard truth is that you can put your heart, soul, and a year of your life into a story and get nothing in return.
But do you know what else is true?
If you don’t finish the story, it’s never going to get picked up by an agent, it’s never going to get published, and it’s never going to be a bestseller. So even if you ante up and lose, what have you really lost? Your time and efforts. Your pride. But for a chance to live a life you cannot stop dreaming about? That cold winter’s night, I finally accepted these truths as a risk I was willing to take.
The risk was far better than waking up three years from now with a bitterness in my belly, kicking myself, and constantly wondering what my life would have been like if I hadn’t quit.
So every morning of the workweek, I started setting my alarm for 3:30am. My feet are on the floor by 4am. This way, I can write for three hours before I leave for work. With very few exceptions, my weekends get sacrificed in the sake of chasing my dream. Didn’t I tell you I have no fear of hard work?
But even if things don’t workout and nothing comes of this, I won’t regret it. I won’t have to spend my life wondering what if I had really tried. And if nothing else, at least I found the antidote for my fear of failure. At least I found the antidote - and my pen.