I am a blogger…Yes, I am!
“I write…because there is a voice within me that will not be still.” ~Sylvia Plath
I met my college writing teacher sometime last week. We exchanged hi’s and hello’s. He asked me about a post shared on my Facebook account. “Are you blogging?” I was surprised. (I thought, did he actually checked on my blog?) I hesitated to say yes, so I just nodded. He said, “Great!” I was surprised again. (He was one of the few people who knew that I have this dream of writing to express my thought. He was also one of them who encouraged me me to pursue it.)
The thought of blogging came to my mind when I was in high school. I was a writer of the campus paper then. I participated as a feature and editorial writer in some journalism competitions, but unfortunately, winning was very elusive to me. Haha.. Our school paper adviser made a blog for convenient posting of our articles. That’s when I met the idea of becoming a “blogger”.
Then I started to dream of becoming one — as a frustrated writer I am, I wanted to write about my thoughts, my experiences, the people around me, and whatever goes under the sun. I love the thought of having them posted and knowing that some people from other parts of the world are able to read them (feels like an online diary). Not just writing them on an old notebook I have been keeping since.
I was 12 when I started writing. I can still remember, I used to write my thoughts on a recycled notebook ( a notebook I used during the past school year with some extra clean pages left) because I couldn’t afford to buy a new one. I wrote in “dual-language” (Visayan-English). 🙂 Eight years later (when my knowledge about the universal language has improved and became better), I re-read my writings. I couldn’t help but laugh with my grammar and sentences. I realized that I had always been trying hard. When I was writing those, my main goal was only to express what I had inside my head and never thought of having anybody read them.
As the years pass, my love for writing grew like a bud slowly opening and waiting for the right time to perfectly bloom. I tried hard to learn English, hoping someday, I can write using this language.
A good friend of mine once told me, “When you write, write from within, write what is on the top of your head, not what people expect you to write. Your grammar may not be perfect and your sentences may not be well-constructed, who cares? It’s normal. English is not the language you grew up with. Just be open to criticisms and accept corrections. It’s one way of learning.”
With it, I found the courage to pursue my dream.
Virginia Woolf once said, “So long as you write what you wish to write, that is all that matters; and whether it matters for ages or only for hours, nobody can say.”
Then I found Side by Side. A dream come true, a prayer answered.
It’s a long way to go, but be doing it slowly. 🙂
Hugs and kisses from yours truly. :*
Thought Diary 