{"id":2207,"date":"2014-08-10T05:00:55","date_gmt":"2014-08-10T12:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/?p=2207"},"modified":"2014-08-09T22:43:22","modified_gmt":"2014-08-10T05:43:22","slug":"becoming-a-writer-my-long-and-curving-road","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/writing\/becoming-a-writer-my-long-and-curving-road\/","title":{"rendered":"Becoming a Writer: My Long and Curving Road"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0\"kindergarten<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a smart plan: Get a teaching certificate.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I ask you: Who in her right mind would choose to work for years writing a novel that might never earn a single penny? Not I. Nope. Back in the days when I was choosing a career, I was far too practical for that. I liked to read, but writing a book myself? \u2026 It never crossed my mind.<\/p>\n

Instead, I went to college and got a degree in Elementary Education. As my grandma used to say, \u201cA woman can always teach.\u201d It was the perfect job. After a couple years of teaching, she could have a family, and then when her children were old enough to start school, she could go back to work again. Her teaching job would always be there, waiting for her.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s the way it was in the Sixties; jobs were easy to find. I didn\u2019t even apply for my first teaching job; the principal called me and asked if I was available.<\/p>\n

A bump in the road.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"new<\/a>But life is always more complicated than we expect. After teaching for two years\u2014kindergarten and then ninth-grade Spanish\u2014marrying, giving birth to three daughters in a little over three years, and moving to the Philippines, suddenly I found myself unable to find a teaching job.<\/p>\n

It seems that, like the United States, other countries have a host of pesky laws about immigration and work permits. Even the Manila International School<\/a>, which could have negotiated to hire foreigners, was stymied in those days by the powerful Filipino teachers\u2019 union.<\/p>\n

So did I give up on my Plan A? Not on your life. I enrolled one daughter and then the second and the third in a cooperative nursery school where the mothers formed the administration and took turns helping out in the classroom. I taught free English classes to the wives of my husband\u2019s colleagues. In an attempt to keep my finger in the educational pool, I campaigned and was elected to the School Board of the International School. I was determined not to be totally out of touch when we moved back to the United States.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>

The Women’s Club visits Imelda Marcos<\/p><\/div>\n

Time to think about a Plan B.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Years passed, and we were still in the Philippines. My degree and professional teaching experience had become so stale they might as well have turned to dust and blown away. I\u2019d been spending more time learning Chinese brush painting <\/a>and batik, planning birthday parties and attending women\u2019s club meetings. Wasn\u2019t it time to declare Plan A dead?<\/p>\n

\"birthday<\/a>And so, finally I came up with a Plan B. I would earn an MBA. Ateneo University\u2019s Business School was nearby, and the program they offered was in partnership with Harvard. Certainly an MBA with such a prestigious backer would help me start a new career as soon as we moved back to the United States.<\/p>\n

But after completing two years of classes, we were still in the Philippines, and I still had to contend with the limited job prospects available to \u201ctrailing spouses.\u201d<\/p>\n

Expat trailing spouses. <\/strong><\/p>\n

When I lived overseas, we didn\u2019t use the currently favored term: \u201ctrailing spouse.\u201d We were just \u201cwives.\u201d But we faced the same issues that concern trailing spouses today<\/a>. Chief among them for anyone with career aspirations was the difficulty in finding meaningful work.<\/p>\n

I fumbled around for more years than I care to admit, but eventually I came up with a Plan C. (Or maybe it was Plan D.) I\u2019ll tell you about it next week.<\/p>\n

\"my<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 Here\u2019s a smart plan: Get a teaching certificate. I ask you: Who in her right mind would choose to work for years writing a novel that might never earn a single penny? Not I. Nope. Back in the days when I was choosing a career, I was far too practical for that. I liked […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[148,4],"tags":[490,488,484,486,487,323,485,489,924],"class_list":["post-2207","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-philippines","category-writing","tag-expat-wife","tag-imelda-marcos","tag-kindergarten-teacher","tag-manila-international-school","tag-plan-b","tag-the-philippines","tag-the-sixties","tag-trailing-spouse","tag-writing"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3Kn1e-zB","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2245,"url":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/writing\/how-i-got-my-start-as-a-writer\/","url_meta":{"origin":2207,"position":0},"title":"How I Got My Start as a Writer, Part 2","author":"Nicki Chen","date":"August 17, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0Slowly, accidentally. You hear about writers who swear they were born to write\u2014who filled notebooks with stories from the time they could hold a pencil and dreamed that one day they would publish a novel \u2026 or many novels. Well, that wasn\u2019t me. I came to fiction writing slowly and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Philippines"","block_context":{"text":"Philippines","link":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/category\/philippines\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"EDSA-Shaw Overpass, photo by Elmer B. 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I eat soups and salads for lunch, stews and stir fries for dinner, yogurt, cookies, and chocolate candy\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "books"","block_context":{"text":"books","link":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/category\/books\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/001_1-e1636585334285.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/001_1-e1636585334285.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/001_1-e1636585334285.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/001_1-e1636585334285.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":9294,"url":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/writing\/my-new-website\/","url_meta":{"origin":2207,"position":2},"title":"My New Website","author":"Nicki Chen","date":"November 8, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"For the past couple of months, I've been working on a new website. And now it's done. I think the finished product is quite nice. I hope you'll take a look. I've had this website since 2013, but for some reason, when the publisher of my first novel went out\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "books"","block_context":{"text":"books","link":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/category\/books\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/BG4-web-e1604609466473.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/BG4-web-e1604609466473.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/BG4-web-e1604609466473.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":6639,"url":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/writing\/6639\/","url_meta":{"origin":2207,"position":3},"title":"Stories to Go with My Paintings","author":"Nicki Chen","date":"December 3, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0Three weeks after we moved to the Philippines I started taking Chinese brush painting classes from Professor Chen Bing Sun. Four years later, I could pretty well handle the basics. I\u2019d learned to paint bamboo and plum blossoms, chrysanthemums and orchids. I\u2019d moved on to animals, people, and landscapes. I\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Chinese brush painting"","block_context":{"text":"Chinese brush painting","link":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/category\/chinese-brush-painting\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/TTS-goats-e1392353441140.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5365,"url":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/philippines\/two-maids-really\/","url_meta":{"origin":2207,"position":4},"title":"Two Maids? 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