I love your story David. I’ve read MG for years (I live in Boulder, CO) and had to laugh that they didn’t even tell you that you won. That speaks to the gritty kind of theme they had. I still read it, but have lost some interest since they were bought. Many have said it already in the letters, but it’s just not the same.

Thanks you guys for offering your thoughts

Agreed- great question.
I’ve been writing forever, it seems, though I kept trying to pursue a different professional path for a while.
My first professional writing gig (not travel writing, though)–strange as it sounds– was in high school. My hometown had a crappy local paper that few people read, but the editor was desperate for writers and I sent in a resume and was hired. He didn’t know he’d hired a kid (much less one who was really opinionated and held entirely different political views). I guess I wrote for that paper for a year or two.

Fast forward a decade.

After I quit my job as a psychotherapist and creative arts therapist specializing in the use of poetry therapy (see, words were still important!), I was trying to figure out what I was going to do with my life professionally. I started writing again–I’d been so busy helping other people write that I’d pretty much abandoned my own writing, except articles about my work for publication in professional academic journals. It was during this time that I came across Matador and started writing articles and was eventually brought on board as an editor.

While continuing with Matador, I’ve steadily been expanding my portfolio and places published. I’ve just finished up a guidebook contract for Fodor’s that involved writing several features on arts, culture, and history, as well as a couple itineraries. My editor there offered me two more features in another guidebook, so that’s the next project. I’ve got another guidebook contract pending and a few magazine articles I’m working on.

I hadn’t done any type of group writing since undergrad, and just this year started up a writing group with friends that felt really solid in pushing each of us along and inspiring us to put on a cabaret performance. I’m setting up shop in a new town soon, and plan to join a writing group there, too. I think right now is the time for me, but that has less to do with believing it will lead directly to more published people, and more with just honing my craft.

And David, thanks for sharing your inspiring story & reminding us “that the ‘joy’ of publication is really short-lived” and that it’s a never-ending journey we’re on, not a final destination. Reality checks are vital.

for me it was a contest in the Mountain Gazette. MG is kind of a cult classic of a magazine in the Rocky Mountain West. Been around since 1972 and published pieces by Ed Abbey, Hunter S. Thompson, and more recently, works by Mary Sojourner, Craig Childs, Dick Dorworth, and others.

In 2003 I submitted a story called 3 Fires. It’s not archived online, unfortunately. Anyway, this story won, and was published. My first publication. It felt ‘magical’. At that time MG had a circulation of around 65,000 all throughout the mountain west — Wyoming, Colorado, Montana. I wasn’t advised or anything that I won. I just walked to the local newspaper boxes one day, scooped out a Gazette, and damn. . there was my story. Later I got a check (holy shit!) for $75, and also an anthology called WHEN IN DOUBT GO HIGHER.

I’d been writing ’seriously’ at that point for about a year (although I’d ‘dabbled’ in college).

I thought at that point that this was it–I’d just start being able to publish all they time. I was IN baby.

That’s when I learned that the ‘joy’ of publication is really short-lived. All you want to do is just move on to the next story. And that’s when really saw how hard it all was. That it wasn’t just one publication.

Mountain Gazette (http://www.mountaingazette.com/) is still around, although since then it’s been bought by a media conglomerate and I haven’t read it in a while.

one last thing that stayed with me about that first publication–on the flip side of the page was the back cover. it was an ad for Patagonia. It showed a mountaineer bivouacked on some big wall somewhere. he was eating oatmeal with his compass.

this ’spoke to me.’

And thanks for the feedback everyone, super helpful.

I recently interviewed someone (article pending) I’ve been chasing (NOT stalking) for a while. After some undeliverable email bounce-backs and zero responses, months later, I got a Twitter direct message from him but on something completely unrelated.

In fact, I don’t even really now how he found me…I was following him on Twitter, but he wasn’t following me. I took that opportunity to turn around and ask him for that interview I’d been chasing and we eventually hooked up. If you want to read about that, I blogged it here.

It’s funny how things sometimes just work out.

I do have a question for the Matador Editors. What was your first professional writing gig, how did you get it, and what are your reflections on it now? As a Matador student, I’d be really interested to hear what it was like for the Editors right there at the very beginnings.

I am also working on another article for Matador about how best to take advantage of a writers’ group, if you choose to join one. So, if you decide to go that route, stay tuned for those tips.

I would also be more than happy to chat with you about the FT/writing life. Been there, done that and it’s tough. I had to set a rigorous schedule outside of office hours to ensure that I was managing all of my writing and meeting deadlines ~ all while still looking for more writing work so that the pool never ran dry. There was no such thing as a “break” at work ~ that’s when I wrote or conducted phone interviews. There was no time for distractions. Luckily my husband understood (and still does) the very early mornings and late, late nights and weekends of me locked in my office trying to reach my dream. I’m still working on ironing out all the wrinkles, and I’m sure all writers continue to struggle with managing workloads throughout their writing careers. No one said being a starving artist was easy!

Blush, blush.
I’ve never been in a writer’s group, though I can see their value, especially if you follow the advice JoAnna offered in the article we published here on the Notebook last week. I haven’t taken classes in yeeeeaars, but I feel the same way about them as I do about writers’ groups: all depends on the facilitator, your peers, the purpose, the style and structure of the class. It also depends on your own personality: if you’re a person who finds it difficult to take or give constructive criticism, or if you’re somewhat uncertain of yourself as a writer and haven’t found your own voice yet, groups and classes can sometimes (not always) leave you feeling more confused and unsure of yourself.

Bottom line: put the ass in the chair and write.