Welcome to Gaia! ::

I started writing when I was in fourth grade. My aunt and four cousins died in an apartment fire that year, my dad got remarried to what I considered a wicked stepmother straight out of the Brothers Grimm fairy tales, and I was in a new school. I took to diving into my own world. It was my teacher that began introducing me to the world of writing my own fiction as opposed to simply reading it. Any time something would upset, I would dive into that world of fantasy: writing pages full of unicorns, princesses and happy endings. When I moved schools again two years later, I met an English teacher that read my work. I would write stories for my journal work and she would comment on it, correcting grammar, drawing attention to plot holes, and giving better words to use in sentences I had said “good” over three times in. Eventually we started a poetry section. She suggested I try my hand at one or two. What came out were simple, poorly rhyming, inelegant ideas slashed onto the page. She sat with me and we edited them until they were clear, maybe even beautiful for an eleven-year-old’s first attempts. I began to write more often, until one day I brought a poem into class that she proclaimed as good as Dickinson. High praise to give to a sixth grader, and maybe a bit exaggerated, but it convinced me that I could write; even better that I could write well. I was thrilled. I continued writing, even beginning a few novels that ended up getting sent to the trash bin when, once again, two years later, I moved schools. In my freshman year of high school though, I joined a creative writing class. It was wonderful. Once again I wrote stories of princesses, enchanted bears, and now I mimicked the poetic style of Shakespeare, and eventually began to write poems of my own. One day she announced we would begin a section on slam poetry. It meant writing a poem straight from my heart and then reading it with the most powerful emotion in front of the entire class. The next week I spent hours pouring my heart and soul into a piece of paper and then memorizing it. When I stood in front of the class, nerves shaking my hands and the words of my poem racing through my head, I knew my poem wasn't perfect, wasn't anywhere near it. I also knew it was one of the best I had written. I read it and the class was dead silent until one boy announced that he had goose bumps. That acceptance gave me the confidence to continue with my writing and publish it. The world of fantasy became not only my refuge but my home.