Courage is the price

When I was five I solemnly told my mum "When I grow up I'm going to be a writer..... or an acrobat." The years passed, and the lure of the leotard passed with them. So I decided that writing was the best plan after all.

My first attempt was an excruciatingly wholesome Famous Five style novel about smuggling. Trouble is, at eight years old I had no idea what on earth it was that grown-ups smuggled. My best guess? Fruit. After many hours scribbling and colouring, I decided Enid Blyton was a schmuk and tore the book up in a dramatic creative strop.

Many many poems, songs, scripts and short stories followed, but nothing stuck. So at 20 and about to graduate, I took the same decision as so many aspiring writers before me: "Fuck it, I'll get a job."

So here I am, seven years on, with Impressive Sounding Job. Except that Impressive Sounding Job isn't doing it for me. So this journal is going to track my little personal experiment - risking it all to be a writer.

Last week, I quit my job. In eight weeks, my new life begins.

Amelia Earhart* said "Courage is the price that life exacts for granting peace." I seriously hope she's right.


* I'm disregarding the fact that she subsequently vanished into the ocean in a light aircraft. Creative license and all that.