wow, you're a writer!

so i did something last weekend that i have always in my life wanted to do. i joined a writing class. it's an online class where you work on a few different pieces and your writing community helps critique your work. i'm excited (and nervous).

we had to write a bio for our class to introduce ourselves to the rest of the group. here is part of what i wrote:

"It was sometime after I turned 10 that I first wrote a “chapter book” that I was really proud of. I had finally taken one (of the many) stories that lived in my head and put it down on my college-ruled lined paper. I remember showing it to one of my uncles which, when you come from a huge Persian family, are a dime a dozen, and he looked up at me and said – “Wow, you’re a writer!”. And I think I have been ever since. From the journals lining my bookcase telling my stories, big and small, to the drafts upon drafts of unfinished work I have saved on my hard drive for each time I am “inspired”, I know that writing makes me content in a way that nothing else does.

I work in education at an amazing charter school in Brooklyn, only a 10-minute walk from where I live. I enjoy my work so much and am inspired each day by the people around me. Even though I first moved to New York City seven years ago, I am just now making it home. People and moments in this busy, bustling City make it almost impossible not to fill your head with stories to write. So I started a blog to help me document and it keeps me connected to the writing process." ...

i share it here because this space and the people who check and read this blog either every day or even once in a while, have encouraged me to take this step. as soon as i joined, i wrote to my family to tell them the news. my parents have always encouraged me to write. i think it's partly because of them that i even enjoy and do it as much as i do. my favorite was the last line in an email from my dad after i told him i joined this class: hope you can go some place next summer to just concentrate on that [writing]. plan it and we all help. love you, I am so proud of this wonderful daughter. Dad