Magic of words: Why I write
I’ve always been an observer—sensitive to the world, honest to a fault. I am like that child in the story Emperor has no pants on—the one who tells the truth. This blend of feeling things intensely—more than what a soft heart could handle—and sincerity don’t go well together. Not in a world that we have inherited. It’s like you are being pricked with needles every day, and you look on with melancholy when all you demanded was a little company.
Walking Away to Find My Voice
Slowly I moved away from the genius of the crowds, not understanding the days that hurt even the Mockingjay. I tried knocking on doors and saying the things that people wanted to hear, but the result was much the same. Slowly I walked away, protecting myself from these little meaness that add up and become deafening. In a world that felt so loud, slowly I came to paper and started whispering because there are things that need to be said.
The Spark of Narrative
I remember sitting in kindergarten and my friends talking about things they saw on TV. We didn’t have a cable back then, and the recollections of my friends were scattered things at best. That was my first encounter with the idea of narrative. Something resembling a tale. Seeing my want, my mother took to telling me bedtime stories. My favorite was about a boy who goes on adventure singing a song of himself. And ever since then, the words “once upon a time” have been imprinted on my soul. I soon found that I could make up stories myself.
Finding Friends Between the Pages
When I was eleven, my family took me to a bookstore, and the owner showed me in the fiction section, and I picked up Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne and Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens. I looked at their covers and the names of the authors underneath and understood that it all came from the imagination of a single person, that each word was put down with care and love. And I understood that there were people waiting for you in books, and all I wanted to do was set up my own stories and wait for you.
Writing for Courage, Connection, and Change
The heart of the world is so tiny and soft, and darkness is so complete. It is so easy to forget our noble dreams that every child is born with and get lost in big ambitions when we only have a moment together. A heart needs courage to forgive. Stories help us get there.
I write for a world where things can change: where friends are sorry for a day they don’t get to spend with you, every face in the crowd is waiting on someone, and when they look at you, they know. I write for days when longing is preserved for people, not things. I write because words are magic, and there are people waiting on a miracle.
