WRITER

Ruffled blond hair, sandals, faded jeans and sunglasses. It’s all about comfort and expressing your voice.  That was Mr. Lynch, the coolest high school English teacher there ever lived!  Mr. Lynch taught me how to appeal to the human senses to “truly show not tell” during our daily quick-writes.  His confidence in my writing ability served as a catapult for me to see myself as a writer.  The more competent I felt, the better my writing became. 

English is my second language, and upon entering high school, I was still hesitant about my command of the English language with all its grammatical rules and exceptions.  By the end of ninth grade, under Mr. Lynch’s guidance, writing was no longer an intimidating ordeal.  In fact, I developed an affinity for journaling.

Towards the end of high school and all through college, I kept in touch with many friends through letter writing. I learned to write more purposefully and to be more selective in my word choices to encapsulate my exact thoughts. Through these correspondences, I developed a relationship with the act of writing itself.  A simple sound of pencil scratched on paper became the catalyst to many personal journeys.  If I needed to vent frustration or to clear my mind in order to work on solving a problem, I would immediately pick up a pencil and begin scribbling.  By the end of a page of writing, I would have found a renewed sense of peace or equanimity.  Writing became my lifeline in so many ways back then.