I have been a storyteller for most of the 74 years of my life. I started writing poetry in grade school. In junior high, I was a member of the Vespers Club. We memorized poems and performed at the school assemblies. In high school, my favorite classes were English Lit and my three years of Journalism. I wrote poetry, news items, and short stories. The school paper and the local newspaper printed the articles I wrote every week during those three years. Throughout my life, I have also written sermons, newsletters, flyers, Policy and Procedure handbooks, and brochures for my jobs and for organizations where I volunteered. I still write and produce my own greeting cards and invitations and occasionally write articles for the newspaper.

I am an avid reader. I would get into trouble in class for reading a book during a lecture. As a child, my mom would tell me that I needed to go outside to “get the stink blown off of me.” The book I was reading inside would go outside with me. Walking to school was always done while reading. Any time I ride in the car, I am reading. Books open a new world, broaden our knowledge and interests, and keep us from being bored with life.

In my daycare center I would daily read to the children and recite the poems I had learned in seventh grade, like their favorite, “Little Orphan Annie”. They would not take their eyes off of me. They were enthralled, waiting to hear what would happen next, even though they had heard it enough times that they could have recited it themselves. That is how I want every one of my readers to feel, that they are close friends, waiting anxiously to hear what happens next.

My inspiration for wanting to talk to my readers as if they are sitting in front of me, is my mom. She would tell me “stories” of her day at work. I loved those special times. I was pulled into her daily life and all the friends and not-so-much friends she dealt with. Each day I eagerly waited for her to continue her on-going saga. I want my writing to be like that, an on-going saga that you don’t want to put down. And when you have finished reading it, you keep wondering what happened to the people next and want to reread it and share it with friends.