When I was in sixth grade, my English teacher had an assignment. We had to write our own short story.

It had to be at least one page long.

My classmates all wrote stories about cool cars, or their dogs, stuff like that.

Mine was a story about a child of divorce who is kidnapped, blindfolded and kept in a basement, the twist? He discovers it was his heartbroken father.

He convinces him to let him go. There was an epilogue set in a family court and everything.

It was six pages long, front and back. I cringe at the idea of ever reading it today. I will cling to the vague memory that I believed it was in par with Hemingway or someone of the sort.

My teacher held me after class where I thought I would be admonished.

Instead she marveled at what I wrote when finding out I was not myself a child of divorce. She shook the assignment at me and on each shake, she empasized a different word.

Don’t.

Ever.

Stop.

Writing.

I am a writer, and my daughter comes home from Kindergarten and this was on her report card.

My heart is about to explode.