Over the weekend I re-read
Bridge to Terabithia, which was one of my favorite books as a kid because it made me feel less alone. I was a terrible dork in elementary school, but when I rolled around in the pages of books like this one I could escape the cold, hard facts: I was unhappy and chubby and not included on the invite lists to the cool kids' pool parties. Mostly, I was suffering from my parents' divorce. But books like
Bridge to Terabithia made a real difference, fitting into a place in my heart where something badly needed to be fit.
The book is about a lonely, bummed-out fifth-grader named Jess Aarons whose life is upended when smarty pants city girl Leslie Burke moves to his rural town and teaches him how to escape his grim family life with his imagination. It's every bit as powerful and beautiful and tragic a book as I'd remembered.
Inside the front cover of my copy, I found an inscription written out by author Katherine Paterson.
It says:
For Ellen Mallernee with best wishes for your writing. - Katherine Paterson, 4/21/93
I was 10 years old in April of '93. I don't remember the circumstances of meeting Katherine Paterson. I wonder if my mom nudged me forward to the table where she was dashing off signatures. I wonder how I told her. Was it,
Excuse me, Mrs. Paterson? My name is Ellen Mallernee. One of these days I want to be a writer just like you.
I have always, always known what I wanted to be when I grew up. There was never any grappling with what to major in during college or what to do with my free time.
In high school I made sure to be editor-in-chief of the school paper, writing articles objecting to whomever was hocking loogies in the water fountains; in college I acted as entertainment editor for UT's
Daily Beacon, writing flowery concert reviews that make me blush now. I was also editor-in-chief of the university's literary magazine,
The Phoenix, for which I had the undeserved honor of selecting the poems and short stories that would make the cut. I majored in creative writing and was mentored by my insanely gorgeous, insanely married writing professor (but, woefully, never got the chance to engage him in an extramarital affair). Right out of college I started working for the alternative weekly that I'd interned with the year prior. Then came more writing jobs, until finally I've realized another writing-related dream, one that I used to speak of casually.
One of these days I want to be a freelance writer.
I sometimes get annoyed with myself for being so indecisive, but there are three things I've felt very sure about in life -- being a writer, being with Nekos, and being a mom -- and I'm grateful to have felt so steady on my feet as I started down each of these paths. Thank God I was given the tools to funnel my dorkiness and sadness into something that's brought me great satisfaction in my life. I owe that to my English teacher mom who supplied me with piles of terrific books but I also owe it to the books themselves and to the tenacious little girl who devoured them.
Revisiting
Bridge to Terabithia has made me want to re-read more of my pre-teen favorites. Here are a few that I can think of offhand.
Which were your favorite books growing up?
