My first published interview

photo by Robert WangI've been writing for some time now.  Even before I found my voice with this blog, I found myself writing for various jobs - a manual here, instructions there, web copy, form letters.  For some reason though I never considered myself a writer.  Now, Lord knows I read enough to have decent grammatical skills and anyone who has met me knows I have plenty to say.  But I even so, I never put "writing" in my list of skills until recently.

As I became more comfortable and confident though, the skills came naturally.  The less time I spend away from the cubicle environment, the less I felt the need to categorize myself.  I'm a great communicator and that comes through in my words.

With this knowledge, I embarked on my first interview for publication (outside of this site), which felt like a daunting task.  The interview itself was a piece of cake, as was the first draft or two.  When it was finished, I had a couple people read it over to catch any glaring oversights.  Even with the okay from my friends, I felt the need to nitpick and go over the writing piece by piece.  I found myself questioning my writing, my grammar, the article as a whole.  Then I knew it was time to let it go.  I turned it in and avoided looking at it again until publication.

I'm happy to announce it's release.  As I see it with fresh eyes, I have to admit it's not bad.  And I can now put this in the done column - my first published article.  Perhaps the self-doubt and criticism was part of the process of my first try.  Now when I submit articles I can do so with the confidence that I have done so before. 

You can read my interview here.  As you do, notice the lovely photo taken by my husband.