They called me “Queen of the Johnnies” when I was 11 years old. I worked at a preschool not far from Bayshore Elementary in LaPorte, Texas. I cleaned Playdough off tiny tables and chairs and wrestled with a mop and vacuum on a regular basis. I made the $1.60 minimum wage and an extra $5 when I mowed the grass.
I got the nickname because I loved to tell the story about having to clean the walls of the little boys’ bathroom. Left unsupervised to do their business, they had a peeing contest to see who could reach the highest spot.
I’m not sure what the owner was thinking when she hired a scrawny sixth grader, but I’m glad she gave me the chance to earn my own money. It was how I paid for the name-brand tennis shoes and jeans that I desperately wanted but knew we couldn’t afford on my dad’s minister of music salary.
I’ve had a job ever since. Through high school I cleaned homes, a dance studio, and a financial office. In college, I helped to pay my way through Gardner-Webb University, a private Christian school. I started in the cafeteria my first year and talked my way into the sports information office the next three. I kept stats for football and basketball and helped by writing Bulldog club letters and releases.
I declared English as my major when I arrived on campus as a 17-year-old because I knew I wanted to be a writer. One weekend during my freshman year at college while doing my required reading for religion class, God whispered to me and confirmed that writing was indeed my true calling. That day, God’s word and my desire came together. I Cor. 2:12-13 says:
“Now we have not received the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God. Which things we also speak not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words.”
Reading those verses showed me that not only did God want me to write, but that He promised he would give me the words I needed.
New Testament verses weren’t my only assignment that weekend. I was also immersed in American literature and the poetry of Walt Whitman. I had the dorm hall mostly to myself that Saturday, so I climbed up on top of my desk and called upon my inner Walt Whitman. I shouted my version of a “barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world” declaring my joy in knowing my true calling (Song of Myself, 52, Walt Whitman).
It hasn’t always been an easy road to becoming a writer. After graduation, I did a stint at my alma mater, writing press releases and newsletters while using my creative skills to write a $5 a week column for The Cleveland Times newspaper. After a move, I went back to my cleaning roots as a Molly Maid before finding a job writing ad copy for a newspaper.
I finally hit my stride as a writer at The Concord Tribune. I left there after a few years to be a fulltime mom, keeping journals of those times and writing two children’s books in my spare time. I did stints as a preschool teacher and a sporting goods salesperson before heading back to fulltime writing with The Greer Citizen. From there, I landed my current job in marketing and communications at Greer Community Ministries in 2013.
Today, that journey comes to an end. I am retiring. Though I had moments of feeding the call to write throughout my career, I haven’t always had the peace or confidence that I felt that day on top of my desk in my dorm room at Gardner-Webb.
Until now.
Once again, I will sound the barbaric yawp of my calling as I find a seat behind my desk and slide into that place where God’s whisper and my desire merge. With a boisterous cry I summon my muses and ink up my fountain pens to tell my stories.
Life’s a journey. Pay attention.
“Missing me one place search another,
I stop somewhere waiting for you.” (Whitman)
