When I was a little girl, my favorite thing in the world was to sit in the bed with my grandfather, Papa, and his big German Shepherd dog, Wolf, and listen to stories he would tell. He would tell the classics like "The Three Little Pigs" and use a different voice for each character. But what I liked best was when he would tell me stories about when he was in the Army and on the beaches of Hawaii, or in the jungles of the Pacific. I would beg for a new story everytime I stayed with him.
One night, he asked me to tell him a story. I wanted to tell him a facinating story that he had never heard. But I was just little girl of 5, what did I know about the world that he didn't? I was looking down, trying desperately to know where to begin, and then I spotted an unusual piece of fabric on the quilt covering the bed. It depicted a woman with a fruit basket on her head. I used that character as my focus, and started out with "Once upon a time..." Everything after that I just made up as I went along. I don't remember anything except that when I was finished, Papa told me that it was about the best story he had ever heard. And the storyteller in me was born! From then on, we would swap stories, and it was almost a competition to see who could come up with the most exciting tale.
When I was about 9 or 10 years old, I branched out into writting poetry. I have written at least 100 different poems, mostly when I was a love sick teen. And my heros were Elizabeth B. Browning, and Edna St. Vincent Milay. In high school, Literature was my favorite class, and I always looked forward to writing assignments. To write a great American novel has been a dream of my ever since I can remember. So, here I am almost 44 years old, and I have yet to accomplish my goal. I'm praying that blogging will be my jump start to my dream.
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