[if it doesn’t come bursting out of you in spite of everything, don’t do it] Ever since I first learned how to write I wanted to create stories. Growing up as an only child to a single mom constantly on the move without friends or family, building new worlds and characters and entangling them in the drama and joy and tragedy of each other’s lives became my form of catharsis and escape. My way of processing traumatic experiences and the subsequent emotions that, at the time, I lacked full comprehension of. Like Bastian in The Neverending Story, I wanted to answer some awesome call to adventure and become lost in worlds that felt more magical and wondrous than my own reality. Storytelling is all I’ve ever wanted to do...and that’s all I’m going to do from now on.