Why I write…because I need to!

I have been writing for as long as I can remember. I have always been writing stories, or poems, novels, screenplays, songs, and sometimes random thoughts. I never really thought about why I write; it’s just something that I did. It’s something that I have always felt like I needed to do. It’s like breathing; if you don’t do it you’ll die. Okay, well maybe not literally like breathing, but I needed to do it. I still need to do. Perhaps it’s my way of leaving my mark on this world to let someone know that I was here. Maybe it’s therapy. Maybe it’s because I love to tell a good story, and so I write the stories that I want to read. I write because I need to.

I remember that people in high school use to ask me to write poems for them when there were assignments in English class. They even told me that they would pay me twenty bucks to do it. I never did it of course. My English teacher in eleventh grade had read a number of poems that I would write just for fun. She knew my writing style. It’s something that you can’t miss. Writers always have a certain style. It’s like your finger print, you are the only one that has that print; those distinct lines and swirls. The way that a writer crafts their words tells people who they are. There is a certain style. The way in which we weave our words and put our phrases together. I knew that if I had written a poem for someone else, it would certainly be known that I had written it. So I simply could not pass out pages of my prose and attempt to pretend that they were the words penned by someone else. It didn’t really matter how much money someone was willing to put out. And I certainly didn’t want to get into trouble. I guess I was a bit of a goodie two shoes; at least in high school.

I can even remember the first time that I knew that my words had power. I had actually moved someone to tears with something I had written. It was the most amazing feeling that I’d ever had. It wasn’t because I made someone cry! It was because they understood what I was saying, what I was writing and it moved them so greatly that they cried. It’s strange to think that you can effect someone from things that you write. At least I thought so at that age.

It was my 7th grade advanced reading teacher, Miss Catello. I stayed in touch with her for a number of years after I had her as a teacher. In fact there were many times that she still read my poetry even after high school. I respected her opinion. And I remembered that she encouraged me a number of times to look into copywriting my work and getting published. She even went so far as to get me the address for the library of congress. She gave it to several times as I recall. “You really need to get published.” She would tell me.

I had been writing a story that I wanted her to read. Mind you I was in seventh grade. I guess that I was about 13 years old in 1985. I know, I’ve just aged myself! I spent a lot of time in libraries; hours upon hours in fact. I loved stories and researching topics I was interested in like, “Did Robin Hood really exist?” I’m sure that he did, by the way; but I digress. I did this for hours. I could spend an entire afternoon at the library. I was like a little sponge for knowledge. I did this all through college as well. It wasn’t because I had to be there. I just love libraries. I had already been reading things like Shakespeare’s King Lear and Edgar Allen Poe. And I understood what they were writing. I understood their words, no matter how big or sophisticated they sounded. I guess at the time, that was an odd thing for a seven grader to be reading. But I was never the typical student. I always connected better with adults then I did with kids my own age. I guess they call that being an old soul.

Anyway, she had always read my poetry, so why not my first “novel”? As I mentioned, I respected her, and I admired her. It was a story about world war three and a boy going out to search for his father that had been taken and held prisoner by the other side. It was sixty pages, handwritten, front and back. I had never written that much before, so I was impressed with myself. It was an entire five chapters long. I remember that the title was “The War that Never Ended.” or something like that. The young boy in the story finally finds his father, only to have his father sacrifice himself for the love of his son so that he could escape. It was a sad story. In fact, I remember the scene, it was heartbreaking.

But in Chapter four, when the young boy’s father died, I remember talking to my reading teacher and her saying, as she handed me back the chapter, “This made me cry.” I admit, I was thrilled! It’s a wonderful feeling to know that you can write something so power that people are moved by it. She’d always told me that I write in such a picturesque sort of way. She told me that she could picture everything that I was writing so perfectly. It’s amazing when you have the ability to make people feel what you feel, or see what you see. It amazing to have people understand what you are trying to say. After all, we all want to be heard, right? I remember that I ended up giving her that book. She deserved it after all. It was because of her that I would continue to write. It was because of a teacher’s encouragement that made me see how powerful the written word can be. So, Thank you Miss Catello for believing in my words and for believing in me. It’s something that I have never forgotten. I wish that she knew that I was still writing and publishing. I’ve written a lot more pages than 60 since then. The backstories alone sometimes are over three hundred pages!

I’ve had many people read various works that I’ve written, including professors that I would get into long conversations with about writing and poetry ;about life and the human experience. I’ve written many things again, everything from songs to screenplays. I can think of at least three different novels that I have in the works at any given time. Some are period pieces, some stories about detectives, or others that are gritty dramas, that I imagine seeing on a big screen. They would be epic films, I know that for sure! At least, I would love to see them! I’m quite sure that I know the actors that I would want in those roles.

Now many poems, songs, and stories later, I find myself working on a food blog of my very own. The blog has given me a chance to write more in a public forum, as this does I suppose. I still have unfinished novels, boxes and notebooks full of writings that probably will never see the light of day, but I will still write. I will still write because the world needs dreamers and story tellers. We need people to spin their tales of mystery and intrigue. We need writers to pen their innovative, imaginative and emotionally charged movies. So that we can be swept away, if only for two hours. We need writers and poets to makes us laugh, to make us cry, to let us get lost in their imagination and fantastical world from a world that too many times is filled with tragedy. We need writers to weave tales they get us lost in the pages of kings and queens, lovers and misfits and mystery of who did what to whom. Writers gives us the latest information, they make us laugh, they make us cry and then laugh some more. They tell their stories so that other’s can be inspired. And sometimes they tell their story to help someone else that might be struggling the same way in which they are. They helps us to understand ourselves better; to relate to one another, and to hopefully understand each other. I write because I need to. I need to tell my stories to the world so that perhaps I can inspired someone else, just like those that have inspired me.