"So you want to be a writer?" I often ask myself.Yeah. I think so.
It’s a weird decision because it is actually not a decision. Writing is something I cannot help but do. It is like a birthmark never to be removed, like a fire in my bones. When I write it is absolutely satisfying and terrifying all in the same instance. But I want to do it. I feel called to do it. And that pushes me to continue even when each word is a tangled web of thorns I must unravel to procure beauty.
From a very early age I remember loving journals. Books filled with lined, empty pages craving to be filled with the curious and perhaps creative scribbles of an ink pen. I wanted to fill them, but not with just anything. I wanted the words to be good and edifying. I remember visiting my older brother’s college when I was in first grade. As I walked down the halls of the study areas, I watched as hundreds of people shuffled back and forth with stacks of books and papers as they read and wrote with purpose -- and I recall the feeling I had as I observed them: I want to do this too.
Various movies and books also inspired this desire. Characters from beloved stories like Jo March in Little Women, Anne of Green Gables, and any character who simply desired to write from their soul in hopes of changing the world, absolutely inspired me. And they still do.
That same childhood impulse rises again whenever I walk into a Barnes and Nobles bookstore. The smell. The items. The paper. The atmosphere. It all permeates of the writing life that I desire to be a part of. And maybe I will one day. Maybe…
