I've always loved to write stories. I really began writing when I was in second grade. My stories then were mostly about me and my friends being the principals of schools.

In junior high, I really began writing in earnest with my SRE Text Series, based on the online game "Solar Realms Elite." This was, and still is, the longest story concept I have ever developed. The original series had around fifteen installments. I also wrote lots of sci-fi, including several Star Trek stories.

By tenth grade, I had stopped writing series, and began writing a lot of individual short, short stories. I wrote alot in my Writing II class, as we had to keep a daily writing journal, and the focus of my stories was to be weird. (That's always kinda been my theme)

In eleventh grade I took Creative Writing, and there I wrote much longer short stories, some of them a little more serious than usual, but I tended to focus on comedy.

My senior year, I wrote a lot of articles for the newspaper. I also wrote more poetry in my senior year than I ever had before. I experimented with lyric writing, doing one song that I recorded with a friend.

My freshman year at UMSL, I joined The Current, the student newspaper as a reporter. I wrote one news story a week, and I really enjoyed the work. In other classes, I wrote speeches and different types of papers.

During Year Two of UMSL, I wrote a couple news stories, guest commentaries, and music reviews for the newspaper. I also took an excellent short story class and a great feature writing class, so I learned a lot. I've continued to write poems every so often.

I became the editor-in-chief of The Current during Year Three. I wrote a weekly column, which I enjoyed, as well as a slew of news stories. I also did a lot of "business" writing--memos, detailed proposals, business plans, letters, etc. I wrote a Production Manual and a Staff Policy Manual for The Current, as well. (The 85 articles I wrote during my three years at The Current are now online! Click the links at the left to check them out.)

I read some of these old stories and poems here and laugh or feel a bit embarassed, but I keep them here because they are a part of me and my life. They reflect the various ways I have felt or thought over time, and I can see how I have grown, changed, and matured. What I once considered excellent work, I can now see really isn't as great as I thought it was. But it's all me, and because of that, I will continue reading them and using them to remember the past. That, I think, is what writing is about for me.

I'm convinced that whatever I do in the future, writing will be a part of it. I'm just waiting for God to show me what that is.