While I stare at this blinking cursor on my computer screen, I start to think of my journey as a writer. I am not in the end of it, for I am too young and I have not reached success. I cannot be in the middle for I am sure that I still have a lot to learn. For sure, I am at the beginning.

For a while, I stopped writing and read and read and read. I swallowed up every word in the Nancy Drew series and digested every phrase in the Harry Potter books. While reading these books, I realized I wanted to be a writer. I realized I wanted to be read, to entertain, and simply, to express myself. I started writing when I was in elementary school. At the vigor of the night, I would write stories and poems and hide them in a drawer in my closet. I never showed my work to anyone. Years later, I took them out and read them. I couldn't believe I wrote them. They were so bad that I think you'd need a translator and a C.I.A agent to decipher them.

I have also tried writing novels. I have started about six of them, and until now I haven't finished a single one. I have been discouraged from writing novels though. I read from many articles in the Internet that writers should write at least fifty short stories and writing exercises before writing a novel. So, my goal now is to write fifty short stories and maybe then, I'll be able to finish a novel.

I think that I have improved greatly and I can see the changes between my past and present writing projects. I have changed, and so has my writing, but I never lost my passion for it. At night, when I'm lying in bed and can't sleep, I stare at the ceiling and think, "What would I write tomorrow?" while listening to the small droplets fall from my bathroom faucet. Then, the next day I'll have fresh to write about, a new story idea, perhaps.

I love expressing myself through words. I love the fact that I can create characters and do whatever I want with them in my story. I can model a character after an enemy and give it a dreadful end (In my anger, I do that sometimes). I love the fact that just by my words I can create a world, make people fall in love, or make them cry or laugh. It gives me a sense of power in a world full of chaos.

Not only that. I also love it that I can play around with words and try to be profound. Through words, I can change myself. Not physically, but I can create an impression on my reader's minds of who I am. I can make them believe that I'm an award-winning gymnast, when I can hardly split. I can make them believe that I'm an intelligent scholar when I'm just an average student. I can do all of that simply through writing.

In this world, I firmly believe that all those beautiful places, and all those wonderful memories will be nothing without the thoughts that describe them and writing deals with putting those thoughts on paper. I have been enamored and captured by it, and through time I have become a willing prisoner.