How Does Writing Influence My Writing

I love words. My mom always tells people that I “started talking at a young age and hasn’t stopped since.” From the time I was a nine month old baby exclaiming “see birdy!” to now, I have strung together many words to express my thoughts and opinions. In my early elementary school years, I was a big bookworm, fond of book series where I could follow the lives and journeys of characters and live vicariously through them, whether that be kids who rescued stray animals or brother and sister who explored the world in their time-traveling treehouse. By fourth grade, I had gravitated towards more mystical stories. Harry Potter was (and is) my all-time favorite series. In addition to reading, I dabbled in writing. My reading definitely influence my writing; I enjoyed modeling the styles of my

In newspaper, I learned a lot of lessons. At the beginning of my journalism career, I always gravitated towards assignments that had nothing to do with writing. If there was a photo that needed to be taken, or a page that needed designing, I was the first to volunteer. It wasn’t until the second-to-last issue that something dreadful happened: I got assigned a story. Despite the fact that I knew I was good with words, I hated the thought of writing something that the whole school could potentially read. What if I wrote something that was incorrect? What if there were obvious spelling errors? I fretted about this for a while but begrudgingly went through with the assignment. In the end, it turned out fine and I produced a nice, well-written article. When the next, and last, issue’s stories were being assigned, I was less apprehensive—until I was told that I was going to be writing a column. Superficially, that doesn’t sound too bad, but let me tell you, it is. The thing about columns is there is no limit to what you can write about; anything is fair game. Expressing opinions is not only accepted, but encouraged. I had so many ideas of what to write. Picking one would be