Crisscross apple sauce upon the bed, elbows drawn to the knees, paper rests in lap, and a pen ever so gently pressed at my lips. My mind churns and processes different phrases, and tries to put the words together to create harmony. Suddenly it clicks, my pen hits the page and off I go again on a tangent. Once inspiration hits, nothing can stop me. With my pen in hand, my mind is my most powerful weapon; I am a force to be reckoned with. I am a girl on a mission to unleash bold, daring work.

I discovered my gift for writing in fifth grade through poetry, but I rarely took up the rhyming style, I never favored it. That year I wrote a children’s book full of short poems modeled after Shel Silverstein’s book A Light in the Attic. A favorite topic of mine is nature. I feel that it is impossible to grasp and capture that sort of beauty but the challenge is worth it. Quickly after that I moved on to song writing, like many songs of today, the main topic was love. Depending on my mood, I would jump back and forth from poem to song. In seventh grade I had to write a memoir for English. I had chosen something near and dear to my heart, my dog’s death. The emotional toll that memoir spoke with surprised me. Every time someone reads it they start to tear up. I never realized how much my writing could affect someone until that day. During portfolio night that year the comments I received warmed my heart and excited me as they first took notice of my hundred and then commented on how my memoir was their favorite piece. I have written some short stories since but I mainly stick to poetry and songs. When I hear of my work inspiring others, or being able to help them through a rough patch in their lives it puts a smile on my face.

My most challenging long term writing piece is the book that I’m writing, Dangerous Dreams. Coming up with ideas for the book is not the difficult part it’s keeping up with it; that’s a challenge. I’ve been writing my book since seventh grade but with a full schedule there’re times that I have to put it down and set it aside for long periods of time. Over the summer I had a surge of energy, I became addicted to writing my book. When I wasn’t writing it I would be thinking about writing it or I would go into great detail on different character developments. I found myself thinking about another part of the book as I was writing an earlier chapter. Even my dreams were consumed by my book. I would wake up after having a dream of one of the characters wearing an outfit and I would immediately sketch it out so not to forget it. I read so much that I want to give back to the world of literature and be able to take people away to a different world to escape the one that they’re in now.

I love the feel of a pen in my hand soaring across my paper. The way it lays so loose and free in my grasp. The feeling of freedom, power, individuality, is enveloped within a small tool that I have mastered. I constantly wish to enhance my ability to write I wish to challenge myself daily and look at things in ways myself and others haven’t before. I want to give back to people the way people gave to me. I wish to feed the minds and souls of people everywhere to inspire them to be the best that they can be and never give up. There is no better feeling in the world than to know that something you wrote inspired someone or gave them the strength to get up in the morning and move on with their lives. I can promise that no matter how bad things may be now, there is always going to be a better day around the corner, it‘s just a matter of getting there. The fresh smear of ink on my hands and a paper being filled with my ideas; that’s where I belong no amount of emotions can ever describe it better than that because it’s the simple truth.