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The Gifts She Gave
Nonna’s Gifts
When I announced in high school that I wanted to write, that I needed to write and someday get published, Nonna supported me as usual. It was Nonna’s who drew me to that ambition, words were always a part of my life at Nonna, books were never short, we could get lost in stories everything from autobiographies to teen novels the Pinballs. More than that, she taught us that if we exercise our creative muscles, we don’t have to live in a constant state of boredom.
Some people would laugh at my ambitions, others would tell me I was being impractical, and others would tell me writing wasn’t a real job, but I was blessed with family support. I still had people who laughed at me, who thought I was ridiculous, because in Elementary School, they discovered that I was dyslexic, but that didn’t stop me from reading at three years old, and it certainly wasn’t gonna stop me from my dream.
My Nonna was the first to buy my first poetry collection, but not just one. She bought several to give as gifts. By the time my second book came out, my grandmother had passed away. She’s been gone for twenty years, but still she lives on in every word I write. I feel a little closer to her, I remember the days when she let me type up stories and poems on her 1930's typewriter, which allowed me to tell the stories I wanted to tell. Most of those stories, except a few, have…
