Insecurity is like a boomerang. A yo-yo. Seventies clothing. You can toss it aside, but it always comes back to haunt you like a ghastly fashion nightmare.

I swing, if you haven’t noticed, between extremes. I can go, within any given point of time, from “Damn, that’s good!” to “This isn’t half bad…” to “Oh my God, I suck. College freshman in ghastly seventies clothing could do better than this. I’m never writing again!” I suppose it’s part of my charm. Or my neurosis. Or one in the same.

Honestly, though, at 35 I’m finally finding a middle ground. Most of the time. Most of the time, I read what I’ve written and think, that’s not too bad… My goal isn’t literary greatness. My goal is to write what’s on my heart, hopefully do it well, and if one, two, or maybe three people think, “I can really relate to that,” I will consider myself successful. It is a start. I have started well, and I am pleased with that. I will press on, trusting that I’m not the only mother in Cow Town who struggles with insecurity and mommy guilt and a morbid hatred of aerobics instructors.

I will try not to let it happen again. The boomerang, the yo-yo, the bell-bottoms—out with the trash this time. What goes around does not have to come around.

writing