I love writing, the feeling of hitting the keyboard to write like pushing the pedal down in a car, with my head out the window and the words coming into my head to be released as quickly as I can through my fingers to the keyboard.

There is no destination.

I am enjoying the journey of writing, placing my works on Medium to share them with whoever chances upon them and chooses to read them.

But I feel lonely sometimes.

Lonely because sometimes I don’t feel many close to me understand what I do and the excitement that I get from writing and getting it out there.

When a friend asks what I am doing, I say I am “writing”.

There is an awkward pause.

I need to fill in that pause so I say, “ I applied for a job”, “went shopping”, “got x and y done.”

They think writing is not a job, it is not enough. I know it is more than enough.

I want to say that it takes a f*ck of a lot of focus, perseverance and hard work to sit down and write each day.

I know what they’re thinking. If I don’t get paid for it, it’s not a “real” job.

The truth is those are more my thoughts than theirs.

Writing is the most meaningful and soul driven exercise I have ever done, reaching deep inside and extracting emotions, thoughts, and ideas that are waiting to come out and be shared, and putting them into succinct words and phrases that become paragraphs, pages and even a book.

I’m afraid I won’t be able to continue if I don’t get paid for it. I’ll have to find real work and put writing aside for now.

I’m afraid I won’t return because it’s hard to start a writing routine and even harder I imagine to restart one.

There are a lot of fears.

And I feel alone.

This is why I was excited to join a writing community such as The Writing Cooperative.

I yearn for a community of people that go through similar fears and get what I do.

Writers inspire me by the sheer fact that they get down to the act of writing and publishing their works.

I know getting to that point isn’t easy.

In order to do this, writers need to step over the fears of society, their families, and the hardest part, the fears we put in front of ourselves, which can be hurdles to jump over on the easier days and barriers that seem impossible to move past on the harder ones.

We love the “likes” and “shares” on our posts.

When I see the large number of shares for a post of a fellow writer I am curious about how they did it and envious to be honest.

But I know that the real impact of a post may not always be captured in how many likes or shares we get.

It is deeper and more lasting than this.

We will never know most of the time.

A friend wrote to me when she saw my post on Medium. She said that she loves Medium and has always wanted to write on it but has hesitated for a long time. When she saw my posting, it encouraged her to do the same and she thanked me.

Scared, she held my hand in cyberspace and said under her breath, “if she can do it, I can do it too!” as she pushed the “publish” button, sending out her our her work and voice into the world.

In doing so, she has just inspired another to do the same.

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A chef, writer and lover of foods and words, I commit to writing one post each week as part of The 52-Week Writing Challenge with the Writing Cooperative.

I will write each week about food, or as I call it in my book The Accidental Chef, a taste memory. This is my first post to set the stage, an “amuse-bouche” of sorts, to set the stage for stories to come over the next 51 weeks.

I am late in joining the 52-week writing challenge, which started at the beginning of the near year, as I just found it. However, it’s fitting that I am starting it this week as I continue my travels and writings in Thailand.

April 13–15 is Songkran, the Thai New Year water festival where celebrants splash water on each other for good fortune and main streets are closed to traffic for water fights. It helps that this takes place in a tropical climate!

If you’re having a rough start to the new year or it hasn’t gone as you imagined, why not join the Thais in celebrating Songkran (from the Sanskrit word saṃkrānti, meaning transformation or change) by throwing some water on a good friend (emphasis on “good”), having the person throw water back at you (only fair), and pushing the reset button to bring in a brand new solar year.

There are always ways to create new beginnings, some that involve champagne others water.

Happy Songkran!