So much, in so many different directions–these top-of-the-head thoughts are not at all a complete list:
To be stubborn.
That, cliched as it sounds, we must all be more alike than we seem, because otherwise we could never manage to write about anyone but ourselves from inside. Research only goes so far.
That I won’t be good at everything, but that I can learn most things to some extent, at least. And that I’ll never be as good as I’m trying to be even at the things I’m good at, though that doesn’t let me off the hook for trying.
That you can never have too many adorable baby pictures. (Oops, sorry, writing didn’t teach me that. Becoming an aunt taught me that. My bad.)
That it really is possible to do those crazy things you dreamed of doing as a kid, if you work hard enough.
But they’re never going to work out quite as perfectly or simply as I imagined when I was a kid.
All manner of self-knowledge. Every story tells me something new about myself, my weaknesses and strengths.
How to get up and talk in front of people. (The irony that writing, which appealed in part because I didn’t particularly want to get up and talk in front of people, would teach me this is not lost on me.)
That the things we do matter. That not just writing, but also everything else we do, ripples out, affects other lives, even if we never see exactly how it does so.
That I am overly fond of the words “gazed,” “stared,” “suddenly,” “hesitated,” “shrugged,” and “sighed.”
