Who's in Your Writing Community?

Hello Readers! 

It is no secret that writing can be a lonely task filled with long hours spent with only your computer, a half drank cup of tea, scattered notes, and the voices of your characters keeping you company. When that day's work is done, you might be exhausted and wish to find respite away from the real world or use it to get a break from the one you just left.  

Though separating the writerly and non–writerly life can be efficient, it can also make the former feel isolating, observed only through surface level conversations with friends and family who don't have common ground on the subject. I personally enjoy the chance to explain my ideas to people at family gatherings and in small talk, but I came to wonder what it would be like to find a community of people just like me.

Over four years spent at college and making connections in class and out, I discovered the value in sitting around a table with like-minded people. Just recently, I found myself in the middle of a Sigma Tau Delta meeting (it's an English honors society; if your school has one, I highly recommend joining!) gossiping about the professors in our department and sharing class experiences. This was a very mundane thing to be doing, especially among people with similar majors, but something about it felt very significant, as if I was finally seeing the clear connections between our lives. This web, if you will, only became more noticeable in my workshop classes as I realized how invested we all were in one another's work and then again when we hung out just for fun and spent time bonding. 

I've also been lucky enough to find a housemate in the creative writing major with the same passion for reading, writing, and publishing career pursuits as myself. It hasn't escaped me in recent months how cool it is that when I want to bounce a plot point off of someone, share work, or freak out over a book that I have a built in buddy who I know will give good advice and resonate with my thoughts. In the spirit of the week of Thanksgiving, I can't help but be thankful! 

I am especially thankful when I think back to my humble beginnings as a writer. Imagine me, 9 years old, an ancient Dell laptop, and a piece of cinnamon toast (for some reason my first memory of sitting down to write includes this delectable snack) one weekend morning. That little girl wouldn't believe me if I told her that now she writes everyday and sits around tables with other writers she truly respects and values. Those people, whether I've worked with them for one semester or many, have had a profound impact on the way I write and granted me the wish of seeing someone read and react to my work. The conversations I have in the workshop room are what keep my head on straight and the fuel that keeps me chugging along when doubt creeps in. 

To spend time with these people is to be amongst a crowd that intimately understands my hopes, struggles, and humor when it comes to being a very bookish college student. The experience of explaining my book or ideas to those in the writing world versus out of it are two very different ones, with one growing into a longer conversation about the nuances of my kingdom's economy and the other with polite smiles and more surface level questions. Though both engage me, the first inspires a feeling of being noticed and seen by a true peer. 

You might not be in a place in your life where it is easy to create a writing community and that's okay! For the longest time, mine consisted only of me and the extended family I shared my newest chapters with. If you're on the prowl though, the internet is magical and as I've recently experienced, Twitter is full of authors who may be strangers but have hearts full of support. The amount of #writerslift's and encouraging comment chains I see bring tears to my eyes and prove that you can find community anywhere you look if you really want to. 

I promise there are writers out there just itching to work alongside a talented person life yourself and that your journey will collide with theirs one day. Keep writing and working; it will pay off! 

P.S. If you're looking for a Twitter stranger to connect with and see writing content from, check out my new one: @marissacwrites! We can join in on the virtual community together.