I’m reading Phyllis Theroux’s The Journal Keeper and — as usual when I read a book that stirs my imagination — am marking pages where there are thoughts I want to ponder. Once an English major always an English major, I guess.

Whatever the reason, I often can’t read a book without a pen and paper in hand. When it’s a library book, as this one is, I content myself to mark the pages with little sticky notes. Re-reading some of these marked pages this morning, I came upon this one:

“Rereading an earlier part of my journal, I came across the lines where I say that Emerson chose his life early. I have chosen to be a writer and must be willing to do what it takes. It is like drilling for oil, having the faith that it is down there. But beyond or beneath that faith is the commitment to dig, whether the oil is there or not.”