My name is Jo’Ann Ruiz Garcia and I am a writer. While that may sound like a line you’d hear at an AA meeting, I offer it as another type of testimonial…the type that is more of a self-discovery. Of course, I have always known that I am a writer, but I haven’t always had the confidence to admit this is my primary state of existence. I write everything – from to-do lists in the morning, to what I am eating as a snack, to how bad the ending to the football game was tonight.
Writing is life.
It’s everything.
What would I do if I couldn’t write?
And yet, somedays, it’s the absolute bane of my existence. It torments and exhilarates all at once.
If I don’t have to write, I can’t stop writing.
If I MUST write, I stare at the screen in quiet desperation.
Can I make this a career?
Can I write for pay?
Should I just try an assembly job or a secretarial job?
I just feel this year, more than any other year, that something must change. In my life. In my work. In my home. In our finances.
Because teaching doesn’t pay when half of what you make goes right back to pay the medical insurance.
While this normally has nothing to do with my writing, it now suddenly does.
I cannot write for fun. I cannot write as a hobby. I cannot simply write when I FEEL like writing.
I MUST figure out a way to write for a living.
Could it be through writing poetry? The poetry of life?
Essays?
Applications for grants geared toward middle-aged teachers past their prime?
Waiting for divine intervention.
TELL me what to write.
SHOW me a sign.
I have not because I ask not.
I am asking for direction. A sign.
The answer is obedience.
Write everyday.
Write everyday.
Write everyday.
This makes 1.
Letters and The Word 