The Thing I Most Love (Day 1 - What got you here?)

When I first read Robert Lee Brewer's prompt this morning, "What got you here?" all that came to mind was that 80s "Talking Heads" song: Once in a Lifetime ("You may ask yourself, well...how did I get here?") but then I started thinking about how I started writing....

The Thing I Most Love

When I was only a little girl

I loved to play and pretend

I took my mom's umbrella once

Convinced I could fly in the wind.

I made up silly songs to sing

And performed them in the dark

Imagining I was a famous star

Doing live concerts in the park.

Then I was at school one day

And my teacher stood up and said

Today's assignment is to write a poem!

My friends all groaned with dread.

I sat at my desk without a sound

Looked out the window and smiled

My #2 pencil twitched in my hand

And my imagination went wild.

Since then I've tried other things

Music, Drama, Ballet,

Paleontology (yes really) and Art

But I always had something to say.

So journals got filled and boxes got full

With sheets of the stuff I would write:

Essays and stories, poems and plays

As I scribbled them all day and night.

Years later it seems kind of funny to me

All my life what I'd never thought of

Was maybe I should be a writer because

Writing's the thing I most love.

Caren E. Salas