Any time someone asks me what I’m studying in college, and I tell them creative writing, I receive a condescending smile followed by one of two responses:
“What are you going to do with that?” or “You’re never going to get a job!”
I have gotten used to the snide comments over the years, but I will never get used to people putting me down for what I love to do.
Just as someone goes to college to become a nurse or a psychologist, I go to school to hopefully one day become a successful writer. I think that is where people have an issue with what I love to do; my job isn’t guaranteed. They assume that I will be poor; unable to pay off my student loans, and that I will have to live with my parents for the rest of my life.
To the people who think this: remember, your job isn’t guaranteed forever either.
Writing is something I have loved doing ever since I was in the fifth grade. My friends and I would write these cheesy stories where the boys that we liked, liked us back. That was my favorite part about writing at that time. I could become a character who was completely different than myself. In the case of eleven-year-old me, it was someone who boys actually liked.
As I got older, my subject matter involving boys stayed the same. The story lines got more intense and my love for writing grew. I no longer wrote for the boys that didn’t like me back; I now wrote for the girls who were in the same situation as me.
I came to college undecided. My mom always told me to do something that I love. My problem was that I loved a lot of things: kids, helping people with their problems, writing, the list went on. I knew writing was something that I had always enjoyed as a hobby, but I never pictured it being my career. I pondered the thought for a few weeks and decided to just go for it. I knew if I didn’t like it, I could always switch majors and have writing as my hobby once more.
I fell in love with the art that is creative writing more than I ever imagined possible.
People fail to realize that writing is also art. When most people think of art, they think of a painting. But writing allows the reader to create an image in their mind. The words on the page transport them into someone else’s life. Perhaps the most important thing writing does is allows the reader to feel a roller coaster of different emotions. It has the chance to change a person’s outlook on whatever the subject may be.
The next time you’re reading a novel that you just can’t put down, I want you to think about the person who wrote it. While that person may not have been a creative writing major like myself, I think it will be safe to say that the skill they have to make you feel a certain way is definitely not useless.