Camp NaNoWriMo - Day 12 Musings

In Camp, they send out "Care Packages" daily, just little thoughts and sayings from "counselors". On Day 12, I received this -

Camp Care Package:

I hear people use the phrase “aspiring writer” a lot. But writing isn’t something you aspire to; if you write, you’re a writer, pure and simple! Remind yourself of that, and take your work seriously.

--- Author Adib Khorram

Any writers, or aspiring writers, reading this that want to weigh in?

As a whatever-the-fuck-I-am, I totally disagree with with the statement.

I write, now, but I don't consider myself a writer. Hell, for nearly 2 months I haven't called my writing anything other than a story. I still have trouble calling it a book now, even though that's what it is. Writing doesn't make me, personally, a writer. For a writer, I think agents and book deals and published works. Does that mean I think people unpublished aren't writers? No, I suppose not, as they could chose not to publish, or write for other reasons.

Perhaps in my mind writers = author and that's where a difference lies? Authors are published, while writers simply write? Where is the line drawn?

Will I *become* a writer? I don't know.
Do I think I *am* a writer? Definitely not.

Am I wrong? I really don't know, it's just how I feel about it. "Aspiring" sounds truer to me, if I had to label it. For now, "Writer" with a capital W, I am not.