I just finished reading an article posted to the Pittsburgh Mom website titled “Know
Your Truth…and Stand by It.” It was written by blogger Heather Starr Fiedler who frequently
finds herself defending her views and opinions online. She must know in her heart
what is true for her and stand by it.
The timing of this article is interesting to me because
just yesterday I told my husband, “I need a sense of direction.” I was speaking
in terms of my career, which still doesn’t feel well-defined as yet, and which
I feel (as a 40+-year-old person) should be by now.
My husband, being the helpful gent he is, pointed due north,
and then south, east, and west.
“You are vastly unhelpful,” I said.
“You just need to pick a direction and stick to it.” Life
always seems so black-and-white simple when I talk to my husband. And yet it
rarely seems that simple in my own head.
So reading this blog post about knowing your truth has made
me think: What is my truth? Who do I want to be? How do I want to identify
myself as a writer? A novelist (my lifelong dream)? An eco-mommy blogger (my
current pastime)? An essayist (my only “officially” published genre)?
I’ve struggled for a couple of months to come up with a
cohesive website for my writing, but keep coming up short. How do I reconcile
these various parts of my career into a cohesive whole, the “me” who is Sue
Nelko Carr, writer? What is my truth as a writer?
I’m still narrowing that field down, but here are a few
items for starters:
I am a wife and a mom of two.
I care deeply about raising my children in a chemical-free,
healthy environment.
I am sickened by the state of our nation’s food production
system.
I am a frugal, highly budgeted shopper.
I am working to reduce, reuse, and recycle more each day.
I enjoy exploring these ideas via the written word.
I also enjoy creating new worlds and new characters via
fiction and would love to be a career novelist.
Because I am a wife and mother (and also hold down three
part-time, paying gigs), I struggle to find the time to write anything most
days.
So where do I go from here? Good question. One I will
continue to explore (though which direction I’ll face during the process is
still a mystery--thanks darling!).
In the meantime, please check out my latest blog post for Mrs.
Green’s World in which I explore the environmental benefits of the increasingly
popular and deliciously frugal staycation. Enjoy!
