I WILL write everyday for the next 366 days... starting Monday.

Remember that oh-so-naive sweet age of 22, when you pictured yourself at 30 and you're happily married to some hunk and have a career that is just what you've always dreamed of? Well, at age 28, the most successful relationship I've ever had is with my Jack Russell Terrier Lola, and my career, while successful, is not necessarily what I had pictured.

The marriage thing, well, that's a whole other issue, but the career thing I can control. I've always wanted to be a writer. I started that journey at a very young age, writing an entire newspaper (made-up stories, of course) and continuing that trend into high school where I had a monthly column in my school's paper. My junior year, I won the National Press Women's competition for column writing and had to travel to Nashville to speak at an event about what inspired my writing.

But then came college. At the University of Kansas, I enrolled in the Journalism school as a freshman. In my first real reporting class my sophomore year, my professor read one of my stories aloud to the class because she claimed it was the most well-written. When she set it on my desk, however, I saw a big red C- written across the top. A C-?!? I had never received a C-, let alone a C, in all of my years of schooling. I wondered, how could this be the best one, yet still be a C-? Well, according to my professor, it was because I didn't follow the rules. I hadn't used the inverted pyramid method - where all of the important information was at the top of the story, and the boring stuff at the bottom.

I understand that in newspaper reporting, you need to get all of the goods out there right away. Tell your reader what's important. I get that. But in my opinion, if I'm going to take the time to write something, I want my reader to get through all of my words. So I've always gone with the come-full-circle approach. Keep them wondering what is coming next.

Since my Journalism professors did not agree with my approach - and I was a stubborn college student - I changed my major to English. The verdict is still out on whether or not this was a smart decision.

After college, I found myself on the opposite side of the publishing industry than I wanted to be on. For the first couple of years, I was a publicist for a humor and gift book publisher. Then I moved on to be the Marketing Director of a publishing company that specialized in books for people with Autism. Currently, I am the Publisher of a company that publishes quilting books.

While I feel I have a good sense of humor, I enjoy giving (and receiving!) gifts, I am sympathetic towards those with disabilities, and I respect the art of quilting, none of these topics make me what to jump out of bed in the morning. I want to be writing novels and memoirs! Not producing, marketing and selling others' books!

Thus begins my journey. Each day for the next year (starting Monday!), I plan to do a different writing exercise from the book "The Write-Brain Workbook: 366 Exercises to Liberate Your Writing." (Do not ask me why it's 366 and not 365.) We'll see if I become liberated and write - excuse the cliche - the next great American novel.

I'm sure a lot of it will be a whole bunch of crap. But maybe, just maybe, my 237th post will land me a new career. And then, at that point, I can claim that I wasn't as naive at 22 as I had once thought - well, except for the hunky husband part, that is.