The Ubiquitous Human Desire to Write

In all many of the significant books and television shows of my childhood, somehow there was always a character who wanted to write. In Little Women it was Jo, in the Anne books of L.M. Montgomery it was Anne Shirley Blythe, in Christy it was Rob Allen, in The Waltons in was John-Boy and in Little House on the Prairie it was Laura Ingalls Wilder. All of these characters, some fiction, some loosely based on those who actually lived and one or two actual historic figures, each had the same basic desire to produce the written word. I once considered myself part of this group. But like most who desire to produce such creativity, I have my continual doubts. Sometimes it seems like it was easier, way back when, to be published. Maybe because there were fewer people, and of them, fewer could even read or write. But I have neither the mountains of Tennessee and Virginia nor the Prairie’s of America’s heartland as inspiration. I was raised in a rural suburb in south eastern Pennsylvania in the 1980s and 90s, not Civil War era Massachusetts or pre-World-War I Prince Edward Island. There is nothing special about where and how I was born and raised. I find myself wondering: who would want to read about it?