“We all have stories to tell,” I say to my Creative Writing class. “We tell stories all the time. We swim in them.” I draw their attention to the Thomas King quote I’ve put in our Google Classroom: “The truth about stories is that that’s all we are.”

Students bob their heads up and down. They are nodding, but they are also wary. After all, we’re starting our “Narrative” unit, and they know they will soon be writing “a story” that they will have to share with others. This is terrifying.

I have been where they are, I tell them, so I am confident that they are brimming with stories – both real and imagined. To prove this, we do an inside/outside activity (also known as concentric circles) – two circles of students, facing each other – and tell each other stories for nearly half the class. A time I was embarrassed, a time I felt proud, a wonderful gift I received or gave... The classroom is alive with voices and laughter. Stories fill the air; we are joyous.

“The stories we tell define who we are,” I say afterward, and I believe it. Then we try to capture some of what we’ve just said, to put our voices on paper. The mood in the room changes. I write, too. It’s hard.

Some days, I write quotations on the board:

“The most powerful person in the world is the storyteller.” – Steve Jobs

Even as I scrawl the words on the chalkboard – in yellow or white or pink – I am telling myself secret stories about my own writing, about my own power. At first, I don’t notice these subconscious stories. I write all the time, I think. I am, after all, writing nearly every day. I jot down ideas in random places and tell my students that I am collecting story kernels and poem fragments. I write in front of my students: I start poems and essays; I leave them half-finished to “show my process.” The students have (mostly) turned in their poetry assignments. My best poem sits, unfinished, covered with notes and nudges. I tuck it away.

Meanwhile, Monday evenings come and go. I tell myself that I’m too tired to write anything up, that I will write tomorrow. By Tuesday evening, I tell myself that it’s too late to publish a “Slice of Life” on the Two Writing Teachers blog (my writing haven). I tell myself I’ve missed the window this week, that no one will want to read this late. I will write next week.

Weeks pass. I think that I am not writing in public because I am busy or bored or boring. I think that I have already written about this or talked too much about that. I whisper to myself that a particular story is “not mine to tell” or “will get me in trouble” though I don’t know what for or by whom. One day, I manage to catch hold of a thought as it darts through my mind; almost immediately, its brethren make themselves known: not good enough, not funny enough, not interesting enough, everyone knows this, too many people are reading this, not enough people are reading this…

Ah! Well. I give myself a little lecture about writer’s block and allow myself a little laugh about having been here before. Then I set myself a writing deadline – which I happily ignore. But my self-imposed deadline doesn’t disappear. Instead, it lingers in odd places, growing bolder: “Your students have turned something in,” it says, “why do *you* get to skip writing?” “Writing is reflecting,” it cajoles, “and reflecting makes for good teaching.” “This won’t get easier,” it scolds. 

Finally, today – Tuesday, not Monday – in class, not at home, I cave. I ink the word WRITE in my calendar. I come home, play games on my phone, do a little training with the dog, chat with the children, tidy… and then I make myself say the thing out loud, even if it’s under my breath.

“I am a writer.”

And I write.

After all, “We become the stories we tell ourselves.” – Michael Cunningham

Next week, I will write again.