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Diving into my second to last course for my master’s in creative writing, I shall be forced to consider my “professional persona.” This is, more than likely, a good thing and I wonder where I will end up with it. I’m a pretty simple person. I prefer long runs with a sky full of stars and little light from the moon. I like nothing better than brushing my horse, saddling, and setting off with a friend, or just my horse, for several hours of riding, a few Pull ‘n’ Peels stuffed into my pocket. On pack trips, I always have a small journal stuffed in my bag, so I can write by flashlight in my tent. Long hikes in summer feed my soul and spirit, followed by ice-cream to refuel (it’s on the list of top ways to refuel in some highly respectable medical journal, trust me). I wrote my first novel, and much of the second one in the top of a barn. So, professional persona?

Like every course I’ve taken in this program so far, I know that at the end of ten weeks I will have figured it out. But here, on the threshold of the beginning, there is a wide chasm, the trail covered in slick snow where one misstep would send you careening down into a steep canyon never to be seen again, at least in one piece. In the meantime, I’ll just keep dancing in the barn loft.