About 10 days ago, a close friend told me about a book he was reading — one he suggested I pick up and read myself as soon as I could.

Since the friend hadn’t read too many books himself of late — when I gave him one last spring he told me it was the first he’d read for pleasure in years — I immediately downloaded the book and dove in.

The book he suggested, “Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear,” was written by Elizabeth Gilbert, who also wrote “Eat Pray Love,” the iconic New York Times bestseller.

“Big Magic” challenges readers to explore the creativity locked inside of each of us. In Gilbert’s words, creativity “is a crushing chore and a glorious mystery. The work wants to be made, and it wants to be made through you.”

So, here I am, ready to start making that work again.

When I was growing up, I was a voracious reader and absolutely loved to write. It was no surprise, then, when I dove into my high school journalism courses head first — despite having four different journalism advisers in four years at Salina Central High.

And it was also no surprise that I majored in journalism in college and started to chase my dream of reporting on sports for a major metropolitan newspaper.

What happened in the 23 years between 1987 and 2010, however, was an unscripted detour — a left turn of sorts.

Though I loved every minute of the preparation to be a high school journalism teacher and the subsequent 18 years of advising high school newspapers and yearbooks, there was nothing — there is still nothing — as fulfilling for me as writing my own “stuff.”

That’s why I’ve dabbled with writing a blog off and on since leaving teaching in 2010, and am back again today.

I’m back this time, however, with a firm commitment to myself to write every Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday — whether I’m creating my own “Big Magic,” or just grinding away in search of that unfulfilled dream.

I’ll share my work with you, and we’ll see — together — where it takes us. Don’t worry, though: I don’t expect every one of you will enjoy everything I write.

That’s OK. Because as was the case with Gilbert in “Big Magic,” I’m doing this for ME. If it’s something you enjoy as well — that’s all the better.

Here we go: Once more…with feeling.