For the love of blank notebooks…

Hi there! My name is Rebecca, and one of my many odd quirks is that I have a tendency to hoard notebooks. Now that might not seem so strange given I am a writer—were it not for the fact that most of those notebooks are…blank.

I’ve lost count of the number of times I have entered a stationery shop of some variety and found myself gravitating towards the aisle where the notebooks are kept. The next thing I know I am running my fingers along their covers and spines, or opening them up to stare at the pages within. It’s rather fortunate that I can talk myself out of buying a notebook without a specific reason—most of the time, anyway—or I’d be up to my eyeballs in the damn things!

“…a blank notebook represents an endless realm of possibilities…”

Each time I buy or am gifted with a new notebook, I bring it home and shelve it according to shape and size and purpose. And I know the chance is high that I will never actually use it. I’m not entirely sure why I always know this. Perhaps it’s because I do most of my note-taking on my tablet and all of my writing on my laptop and thus have little need for a good, old-fashioned notebook. Perhaps it’s because I am a perfectionist and don’t want to sully those beautiful pages with anything but the perfect words—perfect words I could spend an eternity searching for. What I do know is that, to me, a blank notebook represents an endless realm of possibilities. There are so many things the pages could be filled with, so many stories and thoughts and ideas…but only so long as the pages remain untouched.

I have always wanted to be a published author. I will delve deeper into my writing journey at a later stage, but know that if you asked me a year ago what I wanted to do when I ‘grow up’, I would have said “something related to the environment…and an author.” If you asked me five years ago, I would have said “an engineer…and an author.” If you asked me ten years ago, I would have said “a veterinarian…and an author.” And if you asked me on my very first day of school I probably would have said “I don’t know…but I like stories.”

When I was a little kid, not only did I write stories, but I would craft them so that they looked like a ‘proper’ book. I would take pages of A4 paper and cut them in half, write on those book-sized sheets and insert page numbers and chapters and everything, and then I’d complete the effect with a blurb on the back and a front cover drawn in my very own hand.

But despite having an imagination that keeps me awake for hours most nights—and which drove my parents nuts when they tried to get me to go to bed when I was young—I’m also something of a realist. I know that striving to become a published author is not the same as becoming a doctor, or a builder, or an accountant. There are no guarantees that your hard work is going to pay off and that the end result will put food on your table and a roof over your head. That is something countless creative types have discovered through the ages, be they artists or musicians…or writers. And it is something I know younger creatives without an established career or secure income (several of my friends and family members among them) struggle with every day.

That’s why I’m currently pursuing a university degree not in writing, but in my second love: science and the environment. The degree itself seems to never end and it takes up a lot of time I would prefer to spend writing, but one can’t have or do everything. That’s where this website comes in.

“I want to start sharing my writing journey, and snippets of my stories, with the world…”

This website aims to satisfy the creative part of me that often gets shunted aside to make room for the things more likely to guarantee me three meals a day and a bed to sleep in at night. But I want to start sharing my writing journey, and snippets of my stories, with the world while I continue to struggle towards that perpetual dream of mine: to become a published author.

So please, have a look around this site. Learn more about me and about my writing. Visit one of my brand-spanking-new social media profiles (links in the header, footer and sidebar), or drop me a line via email. Comments, questions and advice are always welcome from anyone at any time—but especially from those who share my love of notebooks, blank or otherwise!

Rebecca Alasdair