In the midst of publishing my book I have had the opportunity to think a long time about how I could have possibly achieved such a feat. How did I, as normal everyday person, achieve such a wonderful thing? What made it possible? I know you will say I did it, that I worked hard and focused and dreamed and wrote a book but it’s more than that. It’s a million little things that add up to having the courage to even pick up a pen and start a story.
It’s coming from a mom who took the time to read to me and took me to the library to get my OWN library card as soon as I could sign my name on the back. It was watching my dad pick through his stack of western books to choose the next one he would read, and paging through the his auto body books in his garage researching the perfect part to make a repair to his GTO. They may have been young, but they were nothing short of amazing to me.
It’s knowing that no one would work as closely with me as my sister Sarah to get just the right phrasing for AMP, and no one would put up with my “creative” ideas with more patience that my brother Ed. It’s having an extended family (aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends) who know I am a little odd but love me anyway.
It’s elementary teachers who read to us every day, expanding my vocabulary and piquing my interest. It’s high school teachers who gave me a chance to be in honors English, and classmates who despite my differences (yes I was the chubby girl, the smart girl, the nerdy girl, the band girl,) never treated me like I was anything other than Leslie. It’s for all those people who had to listen to me read my writing because the teachers always called on me and you never made fun of the stuff I wrote about.
For all those little things you did that let me just be me, Thank You!
