Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow Still

Lately I've been asked two questions with exhausting frequency:

'Are you moving to Norway?'

and 

'Why don't you write professionally?'

To the first.. TBD.  I love Norway.  My recent first visit to the county yielded feelings only of passion, stolen breath, and awe-struck wonder… and bitter bitter-sweetness upon leaving it.  I marveled at every bit of every thing that I saw.  I felt like I happened upon a dream I didn't know I was dreaming.  Norway, like something else I once mentioned, is the answer to a prayer I didn't know I prayed. 

The snow.  The white.  The frosted, sparkling, illumination of nature. 

The light that was not light, but rather an impression of lightness. 

The dark that came so soon, so fast, and fell so hard. 

All of it, all of it.. and that was just December.  

Tomorrow I begin my return journey to Norway.  For a little more than a month, I will make her my home.  I will revel in the even colder, even fouler, even more evil weather.  I will rejoice in the simple pleasure of going into my temporary home: coming home to warmth after having been in chill.  I will walk the streets of Stavanger; I will take flights; I will take busses.  I will live in the place that I think I could live.  

In short: I am moving to Norway, sort of.  For a month.  At least. 

To the next question... Why don't I write professionally?

The very long but short answer is that I am not a good enough writer.  Why don't I write professionally?  

Because what professional would take me seriously?  What editor would chose me?  What agent would take me on?  What magazine, online, paper print, or others, would publish my work?  And to whom would I give these words of mine?  But more importantly, who would bother reading them?  

Why don't I write professionally?

Because fear seizes me every single time I consider it.  Normally fear motivates me- in the instance of writing, fear freezes me.  Fear that what I think really is true- that I am not good enough.  That no matter how hard I try or how steadfastly I dedicate myself, I will never be good enough.  I have read writers who are good enough.  I have bathed in literature the was more a baptism than a bath.  I have witnessed words come to life.  

And I cannot do that. 

I am not Mark Danielewski.  I am not Elizabeth Kostova.  I am not Susanna Clarke, S. E. Hinton, Carlos Ruiz Zafon, or Peter Hoeg.  

I am not a great writer.  And until I am, until I can change the life of my reader, I will not be a professional writer.  

As of tomorrow I will be a sort-of resident of Norway and a still-resident of not-good-enough.  

And until the time comes that I am… until then, Dearhearts.