A Walk in the Words Flashcards
Drawing always came naturally to me.
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I drew all the time
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I just did it, like breathing.
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Every day, after playing with my friends, I’d come home and draw stories that I made up.
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It was like diving into my own world.
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I liked words, too - one at a time.
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When I was reading, I had to picture every single WORD.
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But long sentences?
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I would start a long sentence and then my mind began to wander.
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ANT. AUNT.
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TALL. SMALL.
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MIRROR.
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HORSE.
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BIRDS.
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I was the slowest reader in my class.
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When everybody was turning to the next page, I was still on the first sentence.
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Nobody knew.
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But the books knew!
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And they were coming for me!
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So many words! So many pages!
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Books weren’t always scary.
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The first ones were friendly, with big pictures and only a few words.
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Howdy!
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But little by little, the pictures got smaller and the text got longer.
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ME EAT PICTURES!
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You read!
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I could pick out the words that I knew but the rest looked like squiggles.
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It was a rain of terror.
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My drawing pad was my safe place.
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A whole page of text looked like a wall - keeping me out.
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By now, everyone in my class was reading book after book, except for me.
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What if they found out that I couldn’t keep up?
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Everywhere I looked, there were Big words! Strange words! Scary words!
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One big word was stalking me - overwhelm.
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It described the feeling of too many words coming at me at the same time.
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It made me want to give up.
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But I loved stories too much to quit.
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I was good at picturing stuff.
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Maybe I could try picturing a way out.
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I grabbed overwhelm and broke off over so it just said whelm.
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It meant the same thing but was more my size.
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I’d just read at my own pace.
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I took time to look for words that I knew.
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There they were!
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Like stepping-stones leading me onward.
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I jumped over words I didn’t know, and let the words I knew lead me into the story.
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After a while, I wasn’t thinking about reading.
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I just wanted to know what happened next.
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We come in peace.
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The war between my fear of reading and my curiosity was over.
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Curiosity won.
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Books weren’t so scary, once I got to know them.
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And now that I was beginning to like words, why rush past them?
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Read at your own speed.
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I realized that just because I was slow at reading didn’t mean that I had to fear it.
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I also learned that many great people were slow readers.
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I honored them all in my Slow Readers Hall of Fame
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And I tore down that terrible…Wall of Shame
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Slow readers savor the story!
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I experimented with ways to tell my stories.
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I could still tell a story with pictures.
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Or I could tell it with words.
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The monster cornered me.
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My gun jammed!
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I had to think fast or Earth was doomed!
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My favorite way was using both.
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The monster attacked the space station!
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People ran for their lives!
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I had to stop the monster before he reached Earth!
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I remembered how my horses got better the more I drew them.
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My writing would improve too, if I wrote every day.
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A drawing could show what a horse looked like.
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But with words, I could bring them to life.
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Now they could breathe and snort and carry me on adventures.
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I read every day, in search of new words for my stories.
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It was like finding new colors for my art, but now I was learning to paint with words.
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There were still times when I felt lost in a sea of words.
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My drawing pad was still my safe place.
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Others found music, sports, math and science.
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Words had always scared me.
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But once I felt free to read at my own speed, they became my friends.
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I could unlock the magic of stories and even become a storyteller myself, turning that sea of words into an ocean of possibilities.
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Now all I have to do is enjoy the ride!
