Dear Readers:

After that first Saturday creative writing class, I raced home and dove into the reading, homework, and writing assignments. My enthusiasm soon turned to trepidation. The syllabus seemed overwhelming. The assignments were written in Greek. This could be a long, exhausting sixteen weeks. I’ve always been a person who takes things seriously, having been born during the second world war, when parents looked grim and everything from meat to telephones was either rationed or just plain non-existent. Even when the swinging 50s rolled into town, my family still had to watch our pennies. I worked my buns off in high school and college and pursued a career I thought would land me an instant job. With that background, I was not about to flub-a-dub this writing class. I’d told too many people over the years that I planned to write my book – next year. And now that year was here.  The teacher told us we would have to read our works aloud in class. Reading in front of an audience didn’t scare me. I’d done plenty of public speaking in my medical career years. What was scary: would my words written on the page make sense or make me look stupid? The plot thickens.