Friday Five — I Regret Nothing

It’s Friday, so it must be time for The Friday Five writing prompt! Five different words each week to get the creative juices flowing. To visit the other participants, click here.
This week’s words are: oven, cave, brave, painter, list

I Regret Nothing

I am a painter of words.
Each day, as I retreat into my writer’s cave, I glance at my plot chart, my slightly outside-the-box ideas and prompts, and my character list and sink slowly back into the story I left hours before to seek the comfort of my bed, recharging my imagination as I slept.  I allow the words to flow from the oven of my mind, where they’ve roasted, becoming a meal for me to share with my readers, as I slept.
Two years ago, I pretended I was brave and resigned from the steady paycheck provided by a monotonous job where I sat, day after day, confined alone in a cubicle and going slowly blind beneath the incessant buzz and glow of fluorescent lights. Now, staring out the window beside my scratched antique desk, only half seeing the lake, the loons, the hummingbirds at the feeder, I gave thanks for the words, the stories, the characters who lived in my head, nagging me until I put them on paper, painting their lives into the reality of this world.