Everyone has a story to
tell about why they fell in love with books and when they first knew they
wanted to be a writer. This is my story.
A shy, young, only child, always the youngest and the smallest, quiet and sensitive, adults loved me, and I loved them because they were more interesting to talk to than other children. Adults called me an old soul and commented when I got older people would appreciate me more. A tomboy, I climbed the tallest trees and caught crawfish in the
Milwaukee River with the older kids, though I preferred to be by myself with my cats and reading. And while I wore my cousins' hand-me-downs when getting dirty, I wanted to wear only the prettiest dresses to school. Books were my constant friends; especially, since I had asthma, and back in the late 70s and 80s, asthma medicine wasn't that great, so an asthma attack meant serious time spent indoors in bed resting. And that meant more time to read. I was sick a lot as a little kid, but I didn't complain much because I could go on adventures with my story friends. (If I'm truthful, I had an awful lot of imaginary friends that were waaaaay more entertaining than some of the kids I knew, anyway.)
When I was seven, my mom and dad decided it was time to move to another area because we lived on a dead end street and worried about my safety as I grew into a teenager. Gangs were starting to become a concern, and break-ins were happening more frequently, so we moved further out into the burbs. If I hadn't already been the odd kid in the neighborhood and groomed for bullies, I certainly was when I got into my new grade school. By this time, I'd entered my
Punky Brewster phase, wearing one side of my hair long and the other short and mismatched, colorful socks. Almost everybody else dressed the same. They’d known each other since kindergarten too. Not only was I new, but I was quiet, always had my nose in a book, never got sent to the principal's office, still carried a lunchbox when everyone was using paper bags. I had coordinated trapper keepers, pencils, erasers, pencil boxes, and lunchboxes; my favorites were Strawberry Shortcake and Garfield. I ate peanut butter and jelly for lunch every day with a thermos of Kool-Aid, which wasn't grownup enough for the popular crowd. I was still a tomboy, but I played with Barbie; she just was in a biker gang and a punk rocker, etc. I was artsy, creative, and spent a lot of time outdoors using my imagination. I got picked on a lot. It hurt a lot. I couldn't understand why the other kids were so mean and why they didn't like me. I hadn't done anything nasty to them and I thought I was a pretty nice kid. I knew I was different, but I didn't care. I usually had a good book, when I wasn't playing with my best friend who was also a tomboy. I still got sick a lot and spent a lot of time in bed reading. Books were my safe place.
When I read a story, I could be anyone or go anywhere. While my parents moved to a more affluent neighborhood, we by no means had the money of other families. In fact, I'd venture to say we were probably one of the poorer families in the area, though we weren’t really poor, just living very tight from paycheck to paycheck. My parents bought a ranch home and worked really hard to make it nice; it had a pool that needed a lot of work, and they fixed it up so we had that in to look forward to in the summer months. Even though we couldn't afford to go on fancy cruises and vacations like everyone at school, I didn't care. I never even noticed because mom always took me to the library and the park. I wasn't starving. I had clothes and toys. My mother worked hard to stretch their money and make sure we always had what we needed, even if that meant she only had one pair of tennis shoes. She always made sure we never knew money was tight. Mostly all my clothes and my toys were secondhand, but I never knew until I got older. Mom worked at a nice resale shop and she always brought home the best selection for my brother and me.
In third grade, I had the most wonderful teacher, Mrs. Krahn. Mrs. Krahn wasn't one of the popular teachers; she was a rather large, awkward, middlaged woman with an out of date curly helmet of hair, a receding hairline, and big glasses. She wore sensible, orthopedic loafers and long print skirts with matching solid colored blouses in earth tones. If you saw her at the supermarket, you'd likely forget her because she was so simple, but to me, she was magical. When she assigned us to write a short story, it was gold falling from heaven right into my lap! For the first time I realized people could actually make a living writing the books I loved and I could be one of those people, if I worked very hard. I was hooked. I wrote a story about my trusty stuffed animal, Dog and my brother's Bunny, an adventure where Dog rescued Bunny on water skis. Mrs. Krahn loved it so much, she had me record it on tape and presented it at The National Teacher's Conference that year. I was so excited! My parents were so proud. My father kept the tape and for years, I'd not thought about it, until I came back home from the southwest. When I asked him where it was, he said he didn't know. I searched and searched and resigned myself to never finding it, thinking maybe, he accidentally recorded one of his mixed jazz tapes over it. After he passed in 2014, I grieved hard. One day I opened up his stereo cabinet just to touch his pens and run my fingers over his mixed tapes, to smell the wood the cabinet itself, to feel the smooth wood underneath my fingertips, seeking comfort in happy memories from my childhood, and there, right in front of his reel to reel recording equipment, was the tape I'd been searching for all those years! I think it my father was letting me know he was okay. That tape is now safely tucked away in my desk. I haven't listened to it, but someday, when I'm ready, I know I will.
By sixth grade, I'd almost finished reading the youth section at the library. That's how much I read. In fact, I used to skip gym class and hang out in the library reading. The librarian never snitched on me and I think my gym teacher knew where I was, at least I hope she knew. I skipped because it was embarrassing always being picked last and being forced to run and then getting sick in front of the entire class when my asthma acted up. Puking in front of your classmates doesn't exactly win you popularity awards in middle school.
Because of the bullying and how unhappy I was, my mom pulled me out of my school and sent me to a Chapter 220 program. I went to
Roosevelt Middle School Of The Arts and I thrived in seventh and eighth grade. In eighth grade I had a Creative Writing teacher I loved so much. Literally, Mr. Silver was one of my first crushes. The man is an old hippie with a wild, silver mane of hair. He reminds me to this day of a cross between
Walt Whitman,
Einstein, and
John Muir. Mr. Silver challenged me to interpret the meaning of words, stories, and poems. He introduced me to ideas I'd never thought about before and I imagined myself grownup, sitting at a table with a cup of tea in Paris, wearing a beret and being recognized as a famous poet like
Robert Frost.
In high school, I was totally bored in English class. Nobody challenged me until I got to take Creative Writing with Mr. Young and English my junior year with Ms. Pearson. This was in the mid to late 90s and a friend of mine introduced me to
Stephen King. She leant me
Pet Semetary and I didn't sleep for a week. Every time I went to bed and my cat, Patches, hopped up to join me, I'd freak out, reminded of the lurching Church back from the dead. I'd fling poor Patches off the bed, but my loyal childhood buddy came right back, though he did question why he kept being catapulted into the garbage can every night. Then I read
It. And I couldn't sit down on the toilet for a week without thinking It was going to drag me into the plumbing and I'd be lost in the sewers with the red balloon and the creepy clown. An entire new world opened for me. I started writing darker imagery and I remember my dad asking me why I wasn't writing happy poems any more about kittens and rainbows, to which I just rolled my eyes and replied in my teenage angst voice, "Because dad. I want to write about real emotions. Not everything is happy." And I've never looked back. To this day, I don't write about rainbows and kittens. I have written a story about a cat, but it's a taxidermy pet and a story I'm still hoping to publish, so I'll leave you in suspense. And that's my story. That's how I fell in love with books and writing.
How did you fall in love with writing? Leave me a comment and let me know. I'd love to hear from you.
