And You May Ask Yourself, "Well, How Did I Get Here?"

If you had told me three years ago that I would be the techie person for the Slushbusters, I would never have believed you. For years I shared a desktop computer with my husband. The only reason we had a computer was because of him. I had to ask for help. A lot. Inserting a picture or changing page orientation was beyond me. Track changes? Never heard of it. Any time I had to do something hard, like sending a digital photo or an attachment in an email, I needed him. I lived in fear of clicking the wrong box whenever the computer wanted to install updates.

As soon as I started taking my writing seriously, I got my own laptop. Hello, learning curve! Within three months I had dislodged my wireless card while traveling (Yikes!) and had to call tech support, who walked me through a hardware repair. Talk about empowering! After disassembling my keyboard, my computer and I had a much more intimate relationship. I realized that a “can do” attitude was all I needed to learn so much more.

That’s how I wound up starting the blog. (By the way, I highly recommend Blogging for Dummies.) And setting up the Skype. And suddenly, in the middle of our meeting the other night, I found myself showing the group the Google Analytics that tracks blog hits. They thought it was pretty high tech stuff. I guess it is, but it no longer strikes me that way.

I’m hoping that the same thing is happening to our writing. That the stuff we read in other books, and wonder, “How did she do that?” is somehow sinking into our brains. The spot-on dialog, the gripping, well-paced plots, the flawed-but-loveable characters. I hope one day, each of us will be at the center of a group which is thinking that about our work, and all we have to say for ourselves is that we had a “can do” attitude and a need to know how, and somehow, over time, we got there.