I just recently subscribed to https://fiveyearsawriter.blogspot.com/. What drew me to the first post I read yesterday gave strict attention to writing a bio when submitting your work. How does one encapsulate oneself in a few words she asks? I have struggled with this for years, how to ‘nail’ myself down in a few words, a few sentences and how to do that? Reading dozens of other bios (and I still do), I worry wart over content, depth, possible arrogance, lack of an MFA, teaching in a creative writing department (once being a Phys Ed assistant, I will assume doesn’t count), and so on. How do I pose myself properly, interestingly enough, and professionally, as a knowing writer? There are many short versions on my computer. Many…yawn. Yet, I have tagged a required bio along with pieces I have submitted and yes, accepted and published.
The blog begins: Who are you? This writer mentions how we shift and change and we do throughout our life. I agree because our styles and choices mulch over time and are altered by unforeseen events, shaping us differently whether physically or emotionally. And if a writer, or an artist of any type, ever-changing events does have solid merit upon who you/me are at that moment and how these shifts can variate when expressing ourselves in our craft.
As I thumbed backward once again in one of my writing group notebooks, I knew I wrote a piece similar to answer this question who are you? I found it in May of 2013. The delight and acknowledgment are parcels of myself that will always stay with me.
How exactly to take from this piece and write myself into a bio, well, a tiny flash of a writing challenge lay ahead if I so desire.
I am curves that shape the Mississippi alongside tall grass and tilted porches, and belong in Grandma’s apron of flour from freshly baked bread and blackberry stains.
I am a humid black night full of daydreams that change me deeper to me and hide from teachers that scowled and made me cry.
I am a small spring of fresh water chasing frogs through fields encompassed of endless horizons. I am a home somewhere over my shoulder.
I am silence and loudness chasing me in my room. I am words and watercolor that no one can take.
Sweet are the uses of adversity. – William Shakespeare
Sally: I am so pleased we connected through my piece on Brevity Blog. And I am delighted that my post on my own blog (thanks for the shout out!) has resonated with you such that you wrote this post today on your blog. It’s an endlessly fascinating question to me: Who am I? It’s why keeping a journal or writing log is such a rich experience — we capture the data about ourselves over time that helps us understand the ever-shifting answer to the question.
Amanda, I totally agree. It is endless what we experience and note down in our writing minds and world.