I actually remember the exact moment that I decided that I wanted to be a writer. I was ten years old, and I was worried about my future. Here I was, getting older, double digits now, and I didn’t have a career plan. So I asked my dad, “What should I be when I grow up?” He took me seriously and said, “Well, you’re creative. You could be an architect or an interior designer or a writer or an investment banker…”
I stopped listening at the word “writer.” I had always loved books — that’s thanks to my mom, who introduced me to Charlotte the spider and Faun Tumnus and Taran the Assistant Pig-Keeper — but I had always thought of writers as these magical, mythical beings who cast these spells that enchanted me. Until my practical father listed it out as if it were an ordinary career, it simply hadn’t occurred to me that an ordinary person could become a writer.
After that, I latched onto the idea. I raided the library for every how-to-write book that I could find. I drew maps of imaginary places. I created lists of superpowers and magical objects. I even read the phone book in search of perfect character names. (Probably the only middle schooler for hundreds of miles to do that.) And of course, I wrote and wrote and wrote. And I never stopped.
Hee. I didn’t read the phone book for character names, but as a middle schooler I did look through baby name books for the same reason…
What an awesome defining moment! And what a great dad. :)
I read somewhere that writers tend to make excellent interior decorators…
(My own home isn’t proof, but hey, it still might be true!)
Ha-ha! I’ve also read through the phone book (and baby name books, which for some reason raises a lot of eyebrows) in search of perfect character names!
Your dad sounds like an awesome guy.
Stephanie: I looked through them too! But secretly in the library, as if they were forbidden torrid romances.
Becca: My home is also not proof of that, but I could believe it… I do like decorating characters’ homes. A lot less word involved in decorating imaginary homes.
Colleen: Yay! I’m not alone! And yes, my dad is awesome.
My elementary school threw us all of by letting us write little books, binding them (with those plastic, instruction manuel type bindings) and putting them in the library so we all thought we could be authors…I swear it knocked me off course back in second grade ;)