This first ran on this site on 11/21/10. Everything in it is still valid except the line at the end where I say, "I've been at this for 41 years and so far, it seems to be working." It should now read, "I've been at this for 52 years and so far, it seems to be working."
From a reader of this site who goes by the handle, Dubba-hugh…
On every other blog run by a professional writer, I've seen the answer to the meme, "When did you first know you were a writer?" So, Mr. Evanier, why are you holding out on us? When did you first know you were a writer?
Disbelieve it if you will but it was in Kindergarten. I began reading Dr. Seuss books at a very early age. I largely taught myself how to read (I have no idea how) from the output of the Good Doctor as well as piles and piles of comic books, mainly of the Dell funny animal variety. About the same time I was first enrolled in Kindergarten, I was taken to the first play I'd ever seen. There was an investment firm up on Wilshire near Highland that had a small theater. I think it seated around 35 people and on weekends, they had local actors come in and put on plays for kids…some kind of invitational perk for the families of employees or clients. My Aunt Dot and Uncle Aaron were investors there and they got us tickets. So one Saturday afternoon, my mother took me to see a presentation there — a stage adaptation of The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins that I don't think Dr. Seuss or his agents knew about. (Can you imagine? A real estate investment company doing something unethical? Good thing that doesn't happen these days.)
It was a perfect intro to theater for kids. Our visit started with some sort of director or instructor welcoming us individually and then because I was new to this, explaining what a play was and how I should sit still for it and not make a lot of noise…a lesson I wish they'd teach adults who go to the theater these days. Our welcomer also explained that Bartholomew Cubbins would be played by a girl and that this was a long-standing theatrical tradition, as in Peter Pan. Part of my job as a member of the audience was to pretend along with the actors on stage…in this case, to pretend that the girl was a boy. I didn't quite get why they didn't just get a boy to play a boy but it was no hardship to pretend. We then saw the play, which was the perfect length for a kid my age — about twenty minutes. I remember the lady playing a boy playing Bartholomew doing a deft little sleight-of-hand trick as she kept placing hat after hat (actually, the same ones over and over) on her head to simulate hat after hat appearing there.
I was quite smitten with that whole world and when I got home, I re-read and re-re-read the Seuss book. We always had a couple of his checked-out from the public library and my mother, wisely thinking I might want to contrast and compare, had made certain we had that one in the house that weekend.
The following Monday at school, we were given construction paper and crayons to draw on. I decided to write a book. In fact, the book that I decided to write was The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins. I began to write and illustrate my version of it from memory. When the allotted time for drawing ran out, the teacher saw what I was doing and encouraged me to continue while the other kids did other things. So I sat there another hour or so until I finished…and she was so amazed at what I had done that she sent my "book" up to the principal, who was equally impressed. The next day, I created my own version of another Seuss classic, Bartholomew and the Oobleck, which I had not seen on stage but had read about ninety times.
I would later learn that this was a great way to launch a career as a professional writer. Many successful authors got their start stealing from Dr. Seuss.
So much fuss and encouragement was made over my little construction-paper books and about some subsequent, wholly original ones, that I just kind of assumed, "Okay, this is what I'll do with my life." In later years as I proved to be utterly inept at anything involving physical skills or math, that decision was constantly reinforced. Being a writer seemed like a great idea if only by default. If I stood a chance of doing anything well enough to earn a living at it, it was that. Years later, I met a rather stunning fashion model and heard someone ask her why she got into that line of work. She said, "I looked in the mirror and decided the only thing I had going for myself was my looks…and besides, I really enjoyed it."
I kinda always felt that way about writing and never considered any alternatives. When friends of mine were fantasizing about being movie stars or Los Angeles Dodgers or the President of the United States, I would stick with my goal because it seemed quite satisfying and, perhaps as important, quite reachable. I've been at this for 41 years and so far, it seems to be working.