Being a creative person is interesting. I was going to say difficult but really, it’s mainly just interesting. You have to accept the fact you are a bit different from the rest of the world (when you don’t, only then is it “difficult”). True, everyone is an individual. Nobody is truly “special”, but as a person that dreams up different worlds, speaks through the voices of imagined strangers and finds a perverse measure of success in rejection (cause if you don’t it will be the end of you), you have to acknowledge that you’re a bit…odd.

Which brings me to my point – every creative type out there needs support. They need support not only from people that can relate to their particular eccentricities and from those that enjoy their art (my blog readers, my crit group, readers of my stories, thank you!), but from people who genuinely care.

At times, this support requires people with a particularly immense amount of patience and faith.  People who maybe can’t even rationally explain why. Parents, blood relations, they are all in this category. People who should give unconditionally. It doesn’t always work out that way, but the unwritten Law of Things says family needs to always be there for family and one hopes they are there for us creative types.

However, if you are truly fortunate, you may find your strongest source of encouragement and inspiration outside of even those tight circles. You’ll find someone so enamored by your frailty, so blind to your eccentricities, and so in tune with your vision that they will gladly sacrifice for you so you don’t carry the burden alone. With parents, family, there is that bond of blood and shared growth. A stranger? It defies explanation and is more powerful because of it.

I lived half of my life incomplete. Nineteen years ago on this day, that problem was fixed. It’s not a round number or one of the many decade milestones people are so fond of celebrating, but it’s an important one for me.  It’s a half-way point – a point at which I will soon have been married to my wife longer than not. That is cause for celebration.

True, we dated for a couple years but even then it was tenuous thing. It was before we made that vow in front of friends, family and the deep, vast Universe full of gods and God and forces yet unknown to Love, Honor and Cherish.  And I do, even still and always.

Thank you for agreeing to explore this crazy thing called life with me, baby. Thank you for your support through my roller coaster career path. For having faith in the insanity I commit to paper (but not so much you won’t tell me when the straight-jacket is necessary). Most of all, thank you for being here by my side through everything. Despite the far flung ideas always bouncing around in my head, I couldn’t imagine things any other way.

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