Hey, hey Bloodlings!

There's only about an hour left before this campaign ends, so this is your last chance to back this project before we close out of Booktopia. So, here's a list of the gifts that we've unlocked.

As we complete this campaign, please share the link one last time!

Again, thank you sooooo much for supporting me this far! We're down to the last two hours of the campaign, so I thought it was fitting that we end it with a bang!  And by bang, I mean a story. So, I'm going to tell you all about:

🩸That Time I Became Inspired to Become a Writer🩸

🩸All creatives have that defining moment: The day someone encourages them to follow their dream for the first time, and the day they decide to follow through. 

🩸For me, the former occurred in the third grade, and the latter happened in sixth grade. But, let's focus on the former for now.

🩸When I was in elementary and middle school, I almost always finished my work early because the assignments came easily to me. Which meant I had two options: Talk or read. My instructors hated it when I talked, always marking my progress reports as "Talkative" or "Talks too much during class" and getting me in trouble at home--now, I realize the issue was just that I was bored and the work wasn't challenging enough, but I digress. So, the only other option was to read books. 

🩸But, eventually, I no longer just wanted to read about the places in the fictional universes that shaped my young mine. Instead, I wanted to create them. So, I began writing fiction stories in class during our writing time. 

🩸In the third grade, my teacher--Mrs. Weinstein--came across one of the stories I wrote during our free write assignment. I'm not sure what happened in the story, but I do remember it being about a little swamp girl. 

🩸Mrs. Weinstein read it, looked at me, and--I swear--said, "Great job, Jaleesa. You should be a writer some day." 

🩸I beamed with happiness because, while I've always had a supportive family, this was the first person outside my home who thought I had real potential. Twenty-three years later and I'm living my best life as a writer. 

🩸To this day, I'm not sure why Mrs. Weinstein thought to say those words to me. Was she predicting the future? Was she just being polite? Or, did she really think I had potential to hack it in the writing industry? I may never know since I haven't seen her since then, but I do know this: Her words of encouragement shaped me into who I am. WIthout her, I don't think I'd be here now, celebrating the funding of this BackerKit project!

XOXO

J.S. Living