What is your line?

The wonderful Becca has a new site for Write on Wednesday. This is a great place to share ideas about writing, the creative process, and the motivations behind our words. I am very excited about this forum, and I think I will participate often.

Today, there was no Cucina di Nicola, as this week is the last week of school, and I have been playing chauffeur to all the social events leading to the last day of Nicolas' school: TOMORROW! He is graduating from elementary school, and moving into scuola media, a big change for all of us.

In lieu of my usual recipe, I am going to try an answer Becca's questions:

Have you found your line yet? Do you think you have one? How do you go about expressing it?

The answers to these questions lay hidden in a corner of my mind. I have always been creative, and when I was young I would dream of becoming a writer. Back then, I wanted to write children's books, stories full of surprising characters, colors, and made-up universes. I wrote my first short story for a national contest when I was 10. I was very surprised when I did not win!!! -Can you say self-confident?

I kept on writing, sometimes in a diary, sometimes in random pieces of paper, sometimes I did not. I do not claim to be a writer, as I have not the focus, nor the talent; but since I became a blogger, I have become motivated by the creative process again.

So, what is my line? I have started a short story that focuses on a woman my age, facing a mid-life crisis of sorts, looking at her past for answers to her future. The short answer is that I write about me, what I know, what I am, what I would like to be. It might not be worth publishing but it sure is therapeutic! I love to sit at the computer, open my secret file, and just write away. I do not stop to think about my so-called public, as I do not expect these words to see the light of day anytime soon. This is liberating.

I have also written about my country, my hometown, my family. These are all extensions of me. I guess I am still getting to know me, and in doing so, I just write and rewrite my history.

I have found my line, and I am happy about this. I write what I know, I write to know.