The Spark for Writing

My father took on side jobs to make ends meet. I recall hearing the clickity-clack of his first small, IBM Selectric typewriter and later his larger, wide-carriage Selectric as he types the handwritten notes of other aspiring authors to prepare their manuscript for submission to an agent or publisher.

About that time, I received what seemed to me to be an overwhelming history assignment in ninth grade. The difficult part was selecting a topic. While moping around the house complaining about the assignment, he gave me some sage advice.

“Write about what you know or enjoy.”

As a typical young teenager, I was fascinated by the machines of war (I’m not that guy today). He wasn’t thrilled about the idea of writing about the machines of war, but it was a history assignment after all. To help inspire me for the assignment, he gave me his small IBM Selectric. The spark ignited resulting in a twenty-two-page typewritten report on the European front of WW II. I haven’t looked back.

In this journal, I will share the process of how I got from there to where I am today.