By Mikayla Bean

I’m a reader, I read things. I’m not talented enough to put words into sentences and punctuation in between to make anything make sense. I live for the good read — the story that lets you escape into a world and takes you away from the monotony of your life or inspires you to do new things.

What makes someone a writer anyway? Like now, I’m putting my thoughts onto this screen like I would tell someone if they were sitting right in front of me. Does that make me a writer?

I’m not a writer. I’ve never written a novel or short story. I haven’t said or thought something so profound that is has to be on paper. Nothing that’ll change people’s lives. How they think, how they live, how they present themselves.

Nope, you’ve got the wrong person. That’s not me.

I’m the person with their nose in a book, curled up under a soft blanket on the couch. I read the words to create a movie in my head. I see the characters and feel their emotions as if I’m standing right next to them, a ghost in their make believe world.

I don’t have the skill to plan a story or the words to convey the exact meaning of a character’s emotion. I just have the hundreds of stories from books of my past. The ones that I was reading before I could multiply, the ones that I would rather read than listen to the teacher drone on like in Charlie Brown’s classroom.

So maybe I’m a writer, but most likely not a good one. Or, maybe I’m a writer because I have the ability to put thoughts into sentences in the first place. I’m educated unlike most of the world. Maybe I’m a writer because I have the knowledge and courage to try.

Maybe, just maybe, I’m a writer because I want to learn to inspire the child who reminds me of myself. Ready to explore their imagination and float along on ideas that are never impossible. To be the next J.K. Rowling or Stephen King to another generation; to try and create a world to escape to. I’ll probably never get there, but the very least I can try to build a world worth visiting or fashion a story worth telling.

Because I’m a writer.