When I began taking writing classes at a local community college in 2001, I was relieved to find out that there were students of all ages in my classes - literally from 18 to 80 years old since I was 41 at the time.  One of the reasons I had been afraid to take a class was that I was worried I'd be older than the other students.  Another had been that, with a degree, I thought it would be strange to take a lower division creative writing class at a community college.  That bit of ego was laid to rest right away too.  It turns out that plenty of people want to write and take writing classes.  In one of the first classes I took, the person sitting next to me already had earned a PhD. 

One of the older women in my first class had already taken that particular class eleven times.  She and her friends had no intention of ever not taking the class.  The semester I was enrolled with her, as a matter of fact, she missed nearly every class due to illness, yet she was enrolled and, according to the professor, she continued to do the work and do the writing from her hospital room.  She ended up earning a certificate in Creative Writing from the college and won a Poetry award. 

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I can always make up a lot of reasons why something's not going to work out for me.  I gave myself 41 years of excuses for not ever taking a writing class before walking into that class that day.  If I could have done it any other way I would have but, ultimately, I had to stop making excuses and start writing. 

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I don't know where the writing is going to end up but I do know that I have now learned to write; I've produced a body of work.  My words live not just inside my head anymore.  Everytime I press send, everytime I press enter, my words have an eternity of their own now.  

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Thanks for reading JWorld Cafe, The Poetica Magazine Blog

Linda Pressman, Blog Editor