When I was six, I had to go to the hospital for several days, and what seemed, twice as many nights. It was an hour from my home, and my mom wasn’t allowed to stay over night with me. It was the first time my heart ever felt heavy and alone. That’s something you only know from experience. My mom made a book bag for me out of orange corduroy. It had one white button on the top flap. It held one book, The Little China Pig. I draped myself in orange and memorized that book. Out of all the gifts I have been given since, I will never forget, nor treasure one more than, that orange book bag that carried my heart…and still does.

From then on, my mom claims, that no matter what I was feeling, happy or sad, or anything in between, I would go in my room and write down my thoughts, come out, proclaim them as my feelings, and then let them go.

Words have always been a comfort to me. And then when I learned to mix them with color and form – a whole new world opened.

I am thankful for my education, both in school and out. I am more thankful that neither has made the words less magical, or the colors less bright.