Just Call Me President

Wowza! I’m so excited to announce that I was voted in as President of the Writers’ Guild of Alberta on the weekend. Many of my blog followers will know that I’ve been involved with the organization for a few years now, but this promotion is a big step for me, so I feel the need to officially ‘announce’ it here. It’s a great organization- we support, connect, and engage with Alberta writers through various programs, advocacy initiatives, and retreats, and we’ve got close to 1000 members, which makes us the biggest guild in the country.

During our conference, I was able to meet a few of the people who have held this position in the past. Most of them are well-known writers, which means I have some big shoes to fill: especially because I don’t consider myself a ‘writer’. I’m a reader, first and foremost, and the majority of my ‘writing’ is on this blog alone, which isn’t very creative, compared to the excellent writing of my colleagues that I’m lucky enough to surround myself with.

So why volunteer with an organization dedicated to writers, if I’m not one myself? I get this question quite a bit actually. My answer is this: if there were no writers, there would be no books, and the idea of a world without books sounds like my own personal hell. Being a writer isn’t easy; they don’t get paid very much (if at all) and most write in their spare time, which means a lot of evenings and weekends lost to writing a single book. It’s a pretty thankless task, so I’m making it my mission to keep writers happy and healthy, so they can keep writing books for me to read. So, I guess my volunteering is a bit selfish when I put it that way…but that’s what keeps me going!

Shameless plug alert: if you are a writer in Alberta, you really should become  a member of the WGA. Click here to sign up!