I was in kindergarten when I wrote my first book. I was sitting at the kitchen table, and my mom was cooking lunch. I was drawing pictures of different objects: a flower, a dog, a TV. I then wrote the word underneath the picture. I turned around and asked my mom, “how do you spell ‘TV’?”

My mom laughed and said “It’s spelled ‘T’… ‘V’.” I did not understand, so I asked her how to spell “television” instead.

I brought my book to school and told my kindergarten teacher about it. I showed it to her, and she encouraged me to read the book out loud to the class. I sat at the chair in the front of the class and read aloud my book. The other kids clapped when it was over, despite it being a simple book. I felt so proud of myself.

I went to my speech therapy session, then returned to the classroom during nap time.  I put down my mat next to Wendy’s. While I was trying to nap, Wendy kept bothering me. She kept telling me to press the button of this little machine at the front of the class. I tried to ignore her, but she kept bothering me. It was quiet time, the TV was on, and I just wanted to close my eyes. She continued, up until the end of nap time. While everyone was putting their mats away, I decided to go to the front of the classroom and press the button.

The machine played music, and the teacher went, “okay, who pressed the button?” I got scared; she sounded annoyed. I could feel myself about to cry out of fear of getting in trouble, but a kid shouted that I was the one who pressed the button. The teacher’s tone changed, and she said she was happy that I pressed the button. She told me that I wrote such an amazing book, that they were going to throw a party for me in celebration. I was so happy. I don’t remember the party, but I do remember thinking to myself, “I am a writer.”