Literary Pixie

By Sammy Ginsberg

I stopped reading books and attending literature events because they made me feel jealous. Even though I loved them, I could not ignore the negative emotion I felt during and after. Why were they good enough to be published and I wasn’t? What made their voice more important than mine? I was no longer going just to listen, and I was no longer enjoying the events; I was seeking validation. 

I kept hoping that one of the authors would see in my eyes the voice inside me and say, “Sammy, you are good enough to be published. You are [now actually] a writer.” Obviously they never did and never could. There are two main reasons for this. First, you can’t tell someone is a writer by looking at them; you have to show them what you have written. Second, the purpose of the event was to sell books, not to validate emerging writers. 

Even though I know now that I am writer, for most of my life nobody knew, not even me. I have written nearly every day in my journal since I was 13. I wrote on the toilet, I wrote on the tube, and I wrote on receipts. I wrote for student newspapers, I wrote for small literary magazines, and I wrote on my blog. Yet, because I hadn’t published a book, won an award, or written for The Guardian, I thought I wasn’t a writer. 

Only recently have I started to call myself a writer; usually I call myself a blogger. No one can say I’m not a good enough writer because I’m not a writer, I’m a blogger. Even though I’m actually a writer who writes for a blog, or if you remove the adjective clause, I’m a writer. There, I said it. I’m a writer. 

When I wrote in my journal for the first time at 13, I became a writer. My thoughts were valuable and deserved to be listened to, but I didn’t think so. I had already won the Best Female Reader of the Year in my class and had finished all of the unabridged versions of Jane Austen. How could I be a writer just like Jane Austen. I was not good enough. 

I decided to become good enough. I read over 300 books (thanks Goodreads!), took 9 creative writing courses, completed a degree in English Literature, worked in publishing for three years, and attended over 200 readings, but I still thought I wasn’t good enough. 

And then I had a mental breakdown. My breakdown forced me to accept my thoughts. I had to believe that I was good enough in order to stop crying and make a decision. I needed to believe that my thoughts were valid in order to take action and quit my job. I was too afraid to quit in person, so I wrote a very honest email where I shared my mental status with my manager and told her I would be handing in my resignation letter on Monday. 

On Monday, my manager and the company gave me permission to leave immediately with full pay if I felt that I needed to. For the first time in my life, my mental health was validated. I didn’t want to compromise my values, so I stayed long enough to train the temp. It was comforting to know that if I felt terrible again I could listen to that, and everything would be okay. If I had not been able to use words to accurately reflect my internal experience, I never would have been able to get out of that painful situation. I do not like to think about what might have happened. All I know is that writing saved my life.

Once I wrote that email, something clicked and I realized that everything was going to be okay. I was going to put my happiness first, and deal with the consequences. I was going to love myself. Anything was better than before. I started to write something else, but I didn’t know what. Turns out it was the beginning of a blovel. This blovel. This novel. This book.