What am I hiding?

In talking to my husband the other day, he expressed surprise that I had signed up for a creative writing class and that I seemed so interested in pursuing my writing.

I was a little surprised too. I thought I had talked about how one day I would like to be a published author of fiction. But he hasn't really shown a big interested in my ideas about it, so I haven't really shared all about it like I have with a few other folks like my writing buddy Amita. And then he kinda made me feel guilty (not on purpose, it was all me) because he looked over his comments in the past analyzing if he had made disparaging remarks. I really had to think about how much of this part of my life I have exposed him too.

Honestly... not much. I have problem sharing my writing with people close to me. It's a bit of a love/hate relationship... I would love to have the feedback and support but then again I would hate to have to face my family's criticism. Years ago, I had a boyfriend who read my personal journal... more than once. THAT turned me off from writing for years; I burned my journals and still have a hard time writing personal stuff down.

My honey is very supportive and always has been. So I explained that I was giving myself 10 years to write an original manuscript, take the time to edit it, submit it for publishing, get it rejected several times, etc. before it's published. We talked about some of my original ideas. I have 4 in the works, one has been about 10 years of thought and I have started it at different times in my life. I have about 3 chapters of two others, and just an outline of the fourth. All of them are slightly different genres but all within the realm of sci fi/fantasy with a strong paranormal bent.

One of the "how-to get published" books I was reading, suggested getting short stories published in various sci fi magazines first to at least get your name known. That means I have to come up with yet ANOTHER original idea for short story format. *Sigh* It would actually be a good exercise. And, like Jim Butcher did, I could start writing in one genre that is marketable for the publishing houses until I have a reputation and then switch to what I really want to do - paranormal mysteries/romance.

Besides the writing class starting, I'll have to check out some of the better respected sci fi magazines, buy a few, see what they look for.