This is an Opinion piece written by Tanya Davis, a writer and interdisciplinary artist living in rural Epekwitk and P.E.I.’s new poet laureate. For more information about Opinion stories, see the FAQ.
Growing up in a small town before the internet, I took some of my earliest assumptions about work and adulthood from illustrated children’s books. In the classic (and colonial and misogynistic) volume Fun With Words, Richard Scarry featured a lot of teachers, doctors, and firefighters. There were no poets.
By the time I was set to graduate high school, writing was clearly an interest and a strength of mine, but
