give me 26 soldiers of lead...

My Path to the Pen

(or keyboard)

I have something in me. An idea or a feeling or hope. I am a writer. It isn't something you grow up to be, not a profession. You are born a writer. I was born a writer.

I did not love books from the time I was born. In fact I actually hated to read and my mother would make me read to her just to get me to read for school. I don't know why, that seems strange to me now. (It was dormant.) However in the 2nd grade when asked what I wanted to be "when I grow up" I (in)famously said "A poetess." It was in me even then.

The first book I really read, like really read and felt my pulse race and eyes widen and got excited about, was in 9th grade. I'm a late bloomer. Lonesome Dove. This is humorous that I could go from hating to read to choosing to read a 1000+ page book. But it stirred and woke the something in me. I became changed by this book, characters died (sorry to ruin it) and there were flawed heros. That blew my mind. Up to then I was "reading" The Baby Sitters Club. The Hardy Boys and The Boxcar Children.

It only took me a moment to decide I had to write, I wanted to be a writer. It took reading Cormac McCarthy. His words, his style... I mean he didn't accept grammatical rules, he just wrote and chose words gracefully and so particular.

Ok, I could really go overboard here, but basically somewhere along the way, special writing courses in high school and college I knew that I was already a writer.

Part 2...