Timed Writing

This morning I took a workshop on Timed Writing. At the end of the hour, we practiced. Here was the prompt:

Many of us enjoy reading, going to the movies or just listening to stories told to us by friends or relatives. Usually, our favorite stories or movies have a strong impact on us. Write about a book, fable, or movie that has affected you. Explain why it is important to you and how it changed your life or how you think.

Here's my response:

The Harry Potter series is important to me because it sparked my interest in reading in the fifth grade, causing me to pursue my current career goal as a writer.

When I began the fifth grade, I was like most eleven-year-old students in my school: energetic, impatient, and did not particularly enjoy reading. I never bothered to read very much, which is why I did not enjoy it. I hadn't found anything to love in it. So, when my teacher began to read Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets to our class, I was not eager to listen. Fortunately for me, however, something remarkable happened: I became enamored with the characters. Harry felt like a kid my age whom I could relate with; the Dursleys were despicable monsters that I didn't mind respecting--after all, they did raise Harry, for better or for worse; Hogwarts, Harry's scholastic home and sanctuary, was just as real as my own school. Once we finished Chamber of Secrets as a class, I returned on my own time to the beginning of the series--Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. I found more to love in books by reading it. By the time I finished, I had already started the third installment. Once I finished the fourth book (at that time there were only four published), I began to hunt for more literature. Spending lazy afternoons on my blue couch in my sunny living room, I devoured hours of books throughout middle school, and once I entered the ninth grade, I began to write my own.

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I don't want anyone to think I didn't read at all before fifth grade, because I did. But Harry Potter was the first time I read religiously. I owe many thanks to J.K. Rowling, as well to Jerry Spinelli, Louis Sachar, Franklin W. Dixon, etc.

For me, it is everything I read and love that inspires me to write.