Day # 165 - In His Service

For years, all I thought about was becoming a writer. I dedicated every spare moment to my craft, waking early to let the creative juices flow. I was prolific, writing six screenplays, five novels, hundreds of poems, dozens of short stories and essays.

Then I stopped.

Just like that. I stopped writing. Years went by and it was always somewhere in the back of my mind, like a dirty secret. I talked about it once in a while, like an old man who'd been the high school football star. Yeah, I'd tell them, I used to write. Wrote a whole bunch. I could have been one of the good ones.

Eventually, I started writing again, but fiction seemed so trivial. I wrote speeches and I wrote on politics and social issues. Suddenly I was creative again. But I missed fiction. Is it really trivial? No. It's vital.

I wrote a column for the chamber of commerce during my chairmanship. It was cheerleading, mostly, I was vacuuming the carpets on the Titanic post-iceberg. Pointless, but it kept the muscles somewhat loose.

Then I started this blog. I don't know what I hoped to accomplish. I'm not even sure what inspired me, but here I am, writing. Is it "creative" writing? Probably not. Am I going to win a Pulitzer or make a fortune doing this? Nope. Does that matter? Not in the slightest.

The point of this project was to improve myself. Mission somewhat Accomplished. The beauty is that self improvement never ends. We can always get better. We can always do more, be more, expect more (of ourselves.) With this in mind, I volunteered at my church's creative arts department. I went in last night, with several other members of the church, and discussed how I can be of service to God through my writing.

When I think of some of what I've written, I feel a bit embarrassed, maybe even ashamed. Would I want my children to form their opinions of me by reading this stuff? Probably not. The best way to counter it is to write something they can be proud of. And what better than service to God and to mankind? It is my sincere hope that this blog helps you, dear reader, as much as it's helped me. I know many of you who read me, mostly on facebook, make comments, and many more of you don't. I pray that in some small way, I can inspire you, even though that was the last thing on my mind when I began.

I wanted to work the fat out of my mind with this project. I wanted to become a novelist, or essayist. I wanted to make my life better, and, perhaps, make a better living from my keyboard. I still don't know what will happen, but I know my life is better. I also know that if I can serve God using this ability (is it odd that I don't want to call it talent?) that I have put it to the best possible use.

In a time in my life when I feel my heart being pulled in the direction of ministry, this may be the perfect way for me to begin down this path. I hope you will be there with me. I hope my experience will inspire you.

In spite of the challenges of the past year, I feel happier and more fulfilled than I have at any other time in my life. Yes, there are things I need to fix, relationships in need of mending, but I feel as if God is giving me the tools to make the necessary repairs. Every day is a new beginning, every day is the best day of my life.

Take care of yourself. Use your talents to serve others. God bless you.

- Adolfo

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