Being a future writer across two centuries
I want to be a writer and to create novels and plays.
This idea first came to my mind in the early eighties, when I was attending high
school. My composition teacher surprisingly asked me to read my homework
aloud to my young fellows. I did it, embarrassed, also noticing their surprising
faces. My tutor then pointed some important aspects one could figure out in my
narrative and that the students can use as inspirational models for good writing.
As I went deeper into my adolescence, sports and girls turn out to be prominent
and the project of growing into a new Hemingway vanished. At the university
entry door, I focused my attention on other subjects as math and geography,
and was very satisfied with my essay’s grade, a six or C, which would be
sufficient for passing the exams.
During my college years, business matters, financials and spreadsheets
definitely murdered the arising poet inside me. PowerPoint presentations buried
him completely. As a young consultant, I started making good money that soon
brought me opportunities to travel and know places around the world. Then, I
found another job in another company. And then, another job in another
company. And then, another company. All of a sudden, I realized that I had
become a serious and responsible person. That is, to say, an adult.
I got married, bought an apartment, travelled a lot, built a house, and planted
some fences and trees. Life was becoming less and less bright, more and more
boring each year.
Five years ago, my son was born and, at our first mutual gaze, I felt like having
an intense explosion of life inside my mind. I decided to give up a career that
was requiring long working hours in order to create space and time to enjoy
being along with my family. A small personal revolution came under my way.
The birth of my son wonderfully changed my vision about what is indeed
essential in our lives. Simultaneously, the heart of the poet started to beat
again, as a phoenix of hope, resurrecting from the ashes.
How could I reboot the system in order to re-learn the good writing and start
practicing it again?
Since I had a family to look after here in Brazil, I decided to begin an on-line
undergraduate English program. I was extremely happy when Northeastern
University accepted me as a distant learner. However, the M.O.O.C.´s
revolution very soon showed up, as a tsunami, which made me conclude that
spending almost one thousand dollars for one semester-credit course did not
make sense at all. Therefore, I simply decided to wait and, after almost one
year of M.O.O.C.´s existence, the first courses about writing started to pop up.
Here we are.
Being a good writer could have several meanings. Even not fulfilling the dream
of becoming a well-known writer, the art of developing the skills to forge an
impressive piece of writing-work allows one to play important roles during life.
For example, we can support and guide young children walking their first steps
in literacy, writing, and in learning a new language. In addition, good writing
gives us the ability to think in a more comprehensible way, to develop
arguments that are more objective, and to find better solutions, which could
benefit everyone who get along with us in our daily life, mainly when we have to
solve problems together. Moreover, a good writer can express himself better,
clearer, more effective, and, thus, become more apt to make things happen in
his life. In essence, a good writer could be a better creator in our world.
Learning how to write well implies, also, in working out and improving our
reading. This fact, in turn, enhances our capacity to absorb the world around us
and, thus, to understand our own history. We can read this as the writing
process generating self-consciousness.
Besides, writing could be an extremely interesting activity to have during lonely
periods in our lives. At different lengths, these periods will come, for sure, for
everybody in the world. Instead of feeling depressed, as the old age comes, the
active writer can find meaning and deep significance in his life, while he
continues to learn new things about the world. Many believe that the continuous
learning is one of the principal inductors of a healthier brain for the aged. Long
life learning is a routine that the daily battle of writing can bring to all of us.
Writing, as well, can just be funny and pleasant as any entertainment activity,
devoid of whichever purpose. It can be as surprising as a good thriller, and
sometimes, perhaps, as terrifying as a terror movie. Certainly, the writer will
have to face his ups and downs as a roller coaster. He can have, also, his
‘feeling like a clown’ circumstances, especially when his masterpiece goes
under an evaluation of any kind. In any case, the practice of writing is like a
show that always moves forward, definitely with a huge chance of succeeding.