This week my daughter came home with an assignment for her 8th grade English Language Arts class. They are studying suspense (go figure) and they are charged with writing a story. She’d written the beginning in class and was dying to have me listen to it. And, let’s face it, I was dying to hear it!
As she read, my grin grew wider and wider. To the point she asked me what was so funny (it is supposed to be a suspense story, after all). I was at a loss for words. I couldn’t explain my reaction to the story my daughter had penned. I was floored. My little girl, who has struggled in school since Kindergarten, who never liked to read “for fun,” captured my attention from the moment she started reading. Listening to her unveil these characters, conjured from her own imagination, made me realize why I commit so much time and energy to writing. I do it to create another world. To find enough magic in words to breathe life into characters that feel like friends. To find connections where there once were none. The possibility that Jillian is now starting to understand the draw of such creation gives me a warm fuzzy feeling that is hard to explain.
I can’t wait to hear what happens to Jillian’s character of Rachel as she leaves Denver to open a bookstore in Dublin, Ireland with her family. I sense a peculiar magic developing in Jillian’s story and can’t wait to read more.Who knows? Maybe one day we can write a book together!
How’s that for a dose of inspiration?