I decided at an early age that I wanted to become a writer. This was, naturally, just after the consecutive dreams of becoming both the elusive voice drifting out of the intercom at a McDonald's drive-thru and a famous trumpeter had been played out and exhausted on the creative stage inside my little dreamy head. We are talking roughly age nine I'd say. Yet this is a dream that, however flippant and childish it and I was at the time, has not altered much since.

My inspiration was simple- books. I used to adore reading as a child. So much so, that I could never confine myself to a book at a time. My memories recall a stack of about 15 books piled up next to my bed, all of which I was devouring simultaneously. Re-reading the books of my childhood is not something I often do. However tempting those deliciously vivid memories are, I know that burying my thoughts in the pages of 'Flat Stanley' once again is only destined to disappoint. I remember the feelings evoked by those books pretty clearly though, and that's what is important to me. That experience of reading in such a young, impressionable and free mind cannot be recovered I don't think; maybe one day when I have children, and I can read to them, but not for myself at least.

Reading as a child is better than TV. Words and pictures come to life in your own way, however you choose to imagine them. If it wasn't for those first magical reading experiences I don't think the thought of becoming a writer would ever have crossed my mind. I am not a writer, and I may never be, but perhaps it is worth harking back to those flickers of our determined childish impulses upon occasion. Maybe sometimes our older (supposedly wiser) self needs to listen to that determined child to conquer the doubt that age often incites. Why- just because we have 'grown up', should we forget our first impressionable feelings in and of this world? Surely these are perhaps the most important after all. The only reason I do sometimes dig out Jill Tomlinson's 'The Owl Who Was Afraid of the Dark' is to remind myself, that if Plop the owl can overcome his fear of darkness, I can perhaps, with equal courage, hold onto my childhood ambition and one day make it a reality. And maybe Plop is just a bit adorable too.

Learn more about this author, Rose C.
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