Esther Schindler [EXEC] <72241.1417@compuserve.com> asks:
> How often do you tell someone that you write, only to have them
> tell you that they've always intended to write a novel one day? as
> if their intention is just as valuable as the effort you really
> put into it, as the late nights spent struggling with the nasty
> paragraph that refuses to sound right, as your pride in
> re-reading your text and saying, "yes, that's what I wanted!"?

Yeah, every so often, I get somebody who says, "Yeah, I could be
a writer too, if I just had the time for it." Yes, and I could be the
Prima Ballerina of the Bolshoi if I just had the time for it. They
don't understand that it takes *years* of training, work, isolation,
trial and error...that it's a *craft* that, like any other craft, from
woodworking to brain surgery to playing the violin, takes years to get
right.

jms