My Writing Origin Story

When I was in fifth grade, a writing assessment led me to discover I had a "talent" for writing. My prompt was to describe a butterfly, and I remember being so proud that I knew how to spell "magenta." After all, my teacher had made it clear "pink" would no longer be enough for descriptions, and I was (still am) a proud teacher's pet. The grading for the assessment wasn't the usual out of 100, but out of 5. Even though I was a good student, I was still stunned to discover my essay bore a solid red 5/5 at the top. Was I maybe good at writing?

Reading comprehension tests were my only experience with writing up until this point in my life - and I struggled. It wasn't that I didn't remember what happened in the stories - I could almost recite dialogue from memory - but I couldn't explain to you the meaning behind the words, why this character had to make that decision, where the climax started and ended. I could sometimes explain it out loud, but on paper, my brain stopped forming words, and my answers were vague and rambled down dirt roads to nowhere. It didn't make sense.

You see, I have been a reader for so long that my own mother struggles to remember a time when a book wasn't in my hands. By fifth grade, I already had the start of my hoard, a bookshelf in my bedroom filled with books, and I cherished each and every one of them. As an only child, they were my best friends once playing pretend with Barbies and Beanie Babies was no longer "cool" and my imagination was forced to live inside my brain. When I was in trouble, my mom often had to make books off limits or else I wouldn't truly care to be sent to my room. I was reading at a college level before sixth grade. So imagine being my teacher: You have a child who is reading at advanced levels but can't explain the purpose of a book in written words. I was embarrassed at what I perceived to be a failure.

Then I was asked to describe a butterfly.

I don't remember how long I wrote for. I don't know if I was finished before time or if I wrote until time was called. All I remember is seeing the big red 5/5 on the top of my paper when my teacher returned it two days later. Somehow, it validated something inside me I didn't even know was there, and a little writer was born.

I completed my first novel by 13. Before you ask what it was about, let me provide just a tiny bit of background on where my imagination was during this time, and I'll let yours do the rest. In fifth grade and well into sixth grade, I was obsessed with wolves. I watched Balto and Balto II religiously, and I loved learning about wolves in the wild. One day, my school librarian recommended Julie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead George. If you don't recognize the title, the simple summary is this: An Inuit girl gets lost in the wilderness and is adopted by a pack of wolves. It was this wolf-crazy girl's dream come true! On top of that, my cousin had a new German Shepard puppy who didn't look like the ones on TV, and, in my child mind, that meant she was special. Her name was Peaches, and I adored her. So, take everything I just told you and combine it into the mind of an 11-, 12-, and 13-year-old and you get "Peaches," my first novel. Sadly or blessedly, that story has been lost to time. I'm sure it would be flagged for copyright infringement and roasted alive for being terribly written, but I remember being so proud to have finished something I had come up with on my own.

"Peaches" led to more and more stories and ideas being jotted down, hours spent on my home computer and eventually first laptop typing away as I let my imagination lead me down endless paths. I hadn't felt that kind of freedom before. There were no limits, and I loved crafting characters in worlds no one else knew. My whole family encouraged me, too, and I settled into the idea of being a writer when I grew up. Then, came middle school and high school and college and adulthood.

I discovered a knack for grammar and editing in seventh grade, and I grew into a harsh editor - of myself. I no longer found as much joy in writing, and to be honest, high school was such hell that I didn't want to put pen to paper in case it would remind me. I have a few ideas and short stories tucked away from those days, but I can't read them without thinking about how awful I was to myself and allowed others to be. Somehow, I still went into college with plans to be an English major with a focus on creative writing, but the plan was derailed by a simple question: What are you going to do with that degree when you graduate? Be a teacher? I didn't want to be a teacher, and I definitely didn't know how to write a novel. I decided to jump to a parallel track and try my hand at journalism. I don't regret taking that path despite no longer being a journalist today because it made me who I am, and there has been so much joy in my life despite the unhappiness I felt at being in my 20s and completely lost. Besides, it forced me to keep flexing those writing and editing muscles. I even found a way to make editing a career for a brief time. But things always felt off. There was something missing, and when COVID sent me to my little condo hundreds of miles away from any family, friends, and human contact, I decided to return to my old dream of being a writer.

I started an online master's program on genre fiction and took in a fantasy series idea that I seriously believe saved my life when I was in my first bout with depression. Needless to say, I learned quickly how painful critiques can be for what you love, but you also learn what you do well and what needs work. My favorite note from a professor during that time was that I did "people talking in a room" well. Apparently, George R.R. Martin did know what he was doing when he made some of his best scenes between people in "elegant rooms," and I had learned from reading his books. That was the best realization of the entire program: Reading was the partner I didn't realize I needed. Without realizing it, I was soaking up different styles and tropes and flows; dialogue and character voices; love on an emotional level, not physical. I had developed my own writing by never giving up my cherished friends. Books had been with me from the beginning, and they helped me finally say, "I am a writer, and one day, one of you will bear my name on your cover."

I wrote all of this down in this extremely long post to give you some insight into who Mackenzie, the Writer is. In truth, my old friends are more fun to talk about. They bring people together. They teach us, and, in the way only stories can, they love us. I promise to do my best to share my actual writing with you and the often hard process of crafting a story without letting the editor on my shoulder get me down. Also, know that as a writer also claiming the title of voracious reader, everything I write will be with you, my reader, in mind. I know firsthand how words can change your life or simply make you laugh when you want to scream or cry when you didn't even realize you needed to. I hope my passion for everything I craft comes through. I hope you catch a glimpse of that little girl who was asked to describe a butterfly and inadvertently opened a door into a whole new world she never imagined possible.