writing beyond the blog | the equals record

In late August of last year, I covered the Republican National Convention as a journalist. It was my last hurrah as a TV news producer, and I spent a solid 60% of it serving as chauffeur to my correspondent and camera person. One afternoon they wanted to film a taped report near a run-down area of town, and they needed extensive B-roll, or stock footage of the area. I dropped them off on one street, with instructions to "park and wait" for their call. I smiled a smile so fake and somehow natural from my year and a half of perfecting it, and said, "Sure thing!"

I parked at a meter. It was something like 150 degrees outside, so I left the air conditioner on. I turned on music. I reclined. I lifted the seat up. I reclined again. I turned to a different radio station. I turned the music off. I turned the music on. I dug through my purse. I had finished my book. I went through my briefcase for the trip. I zipped it back up. I opened it again. I pulled out a 4-5 pages of google maps. I turned them over, grabbed the pen sticking out the top of my purse, balanced the paper on the steering wheel, and started to write.

I wrote for two hours, until my correspondent called and asked me to pick them up. I'd filled the backs of the sheets of paper with maps on the front, found more scrap paper in my notebook, and continued on, until I had no white space left.

That evening, after the convention's conclusion, I typed everything I'd written into a word document, emailed it to myself, and forgot about it for the next six months.

About a month ago, Melanie linked me to a post on the Equals Record, a quarterly print publication with a website dedicated to creative nonfiction written by women, that she thought I'd enjoy. I loved it, and I kept reading. Some of the pieces resonated with me, while others I skimmed.

I noticed a tab for submission information at the top of the website and read through it. I remembered the essay I had written that hot day in Florida back in August waiting for my crew, and without thinking or heavily editing it, I uploaded it, put in my personal information, and hit submit.

I feel like I've been lost lately, vacillating between whether to apply to grad school, how to pursue a career in travel writing that also pays my student loan debt, what I ultimately want, and so on. Since hitting "submit" to the Equals Record and hearing back from them that they'd like to publish my essay, and asking if I had a second part to it, I haven't felt as lost. I've been driven, inspired, and curious about what's next. Writing opportunities have opened up in other areas, as well.

All of these words and this very long post is to say that yesterday the Equals Record published my first essay, entitled, "A Fatherless Girl." The second part, "An Adopted Dad," is live today. It's wildly different from any writing I've ever published - it's not a blog, a byline, or a ghostwritten op-ed. I wrote yesterday on instagram that seeing it published made me nervous and "fulfilled." I felt awkward after saying that - "fulfilled." But it's true - writing for myself, about myself is scary, and it is fulfilling. Creative nonfiction has always been my favorite writing - it's downright awe-inspiring to see the various ways we all tell our stories, and I feel a little more centered having gone back to it.

I need to make more time to be alone with a pen and a few scratch sheets of paper.

"It's doubtful that anyone with an internet connection at his workplace is writing good fiction." - Jonathan Franzen, The Guardian