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Blogs by Stephanie Silberstein
Crossroads 12/9/2008 6:25:05 AM
Once again, I'm at the crossroads. It seems I've been on this path before, where I have to choose between my writing life and the "normal" life I'm leading. Last time around was back in 2006. I had more than enough money to live on without getting an outside job--I had student loans then--but I let my older brother tell me it's time to "grow up" and "get a job". Never mind that the most grown-up I ever felt was in choosing to write...
Well, two years later, here I am at that crossroads again. I can stay in the high-stress job I'm in, fighting an uphill battle to teach autistic children in a school system that believes autistic = severely retarded and pressures me not to teach anything at all. Or I can find a way to embrace the dream, to make my first novel a success, to complete my second novel... to be a writer.
I am choosing to write. No, I am not going to become homeless in order to write. But I'll take a little LESS money in exchange for an office job where I can write in between phone calls.
It might sound overdramatic to say that it's a matter of life and death. But it is, it really is. This job is stressing me to the point that I fantasize about being sick so I can stay home. When I do get home from work I just want to sleep... or play on the computer. There is no way I can write AND teach, especially not given the environment I'm teaching in.
