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Rambling thoughts… What is a writer?

How do you know… or who decides, I suppose… if and when a person is “allowed” to refer to themself as a writer?

Must your work have been published in paper form? Must it be an actual book, or are magazines, trade journals, newsletters, etc. acceptable?

What if your medium is online – web site articles, blogging, etc.?  (Is that cheating, somehow?)

Does it matter who publishes your work? What about self-publishing? (Cheating, again?)

Must you have been paid for your writing?  Must you sell a certain amount of product?

Must you have an audience of a specific size or demographic?  What if all you ever do is write for your own consumption?  (If a tree falls in the forest…)

Do you have to be “good” by some particular person’s definition? Or is the love of writing enough?

So many questions… and I suspect the answer completely depends on who you ask.

I think I’ll just keep writing until I figure it out.

Laurel Storey, CZT – Certified Zentangle Teacher. Writer, reader, tangler, iPhoneographer, cat herder, learner of French and Italian, crocheter, needle felter, on-and-off politics junkie, 80s music trivia freak, ongoing work in progress.