On writing...

I have been writing ever since I learned how to hold a pencil properly.

I used to write during school when I was supposed to be doing my work and teachers had to repeatedly take my notebooks away until the close of class. Sometimes they would take my notebooks home and read my stories. The next morning, they'd hand my notebooks back with a knowing smile and a slight shake of the head as if to say, "I can't believe I liked what I read." While the stories I wrote were probably full of cliches and probably had not-so-very-memorable characters, plot or dialogue, my teachers saw something there, and so they encouraged me to write.

In my teenage years, full of angst and mis-placed emotions, I wrote a lot of poetry, mostly about whatever current boy was giving me heartache or about the daily traumas of being a confused, teenage girl in a divided household. My writing got better, and I found that I was able to express myself more clearly via that medium than anything else. I continued to find solace in the quiet moments of my writing, and it may have been one of the things that got me through the rough years I experienced.

Once I graduated high-school, though, and moved out of my childhood home and into a home with my first really serious boyfriend, I lost interest in writing anything but love letters. I became caught up in finding a "real" career and in spending time with my boyfriend and our families that my writing was almost entirely put on the back-burner. A year later, I had the opportunity, thanks to my dad and step-mom, to go to college for free, and so I took it. I declared my major in Communications and soon changed it to English.

I took various writing classes in college, from English Composition to Literature to Creative Writing. It was thanks to my Creative Writing professor, Prof. Denson, that I wrote and completed my very first novella - a Fantasy story about a child changeling. Once I finished that novella and received his critique and feedback, I was officially hooked. I knew then that writing was something I wanted to do forever.

Since then, I've had my ups and downs in pursuing my love of writing and my desire to become a published author, but I've pressed through the dull moments only to shine in the bright moments. I have a re-newed passion for writing and have learned that, as a writer, I can only put out what I put in, and so I am going forward with my whole heart.

After all, my stories write themselves.