shame-us hay-knee

As a kid, I grew up a reader. My mom read to me. I read to myself. Reading was a big thing.

And I never thought about the author of the book. For all I knew, they were dead. I grew up thinking most important people were dead.

Then, when I started reading Harry Potter, authors became very important. J.K. Rowling was essentially my hero. For one, we have the same birthday. For two, she wrote the most awesome books ever. I wanted to become the chubby American Mormon version of her.

So, thirteen years later, I have spent a lot of hours reading and writing and becoming an author and studying authors. A lot of them are still alive. And they are great.

When Maurice Sendak died last summer, a part of my childhood became a ghost. Maurice's dark imagination was one of my favorite escapes in the fifth grade. It was not so much his written stories, but his illustrations, that led me to dream of minor keys and unexplainable sadness. I was not depressed, but he was, and it fascinated me. He died last summer and I remembered how he changed my world and I felt a sadness that was deeper than most of my normal sadnesses. I decided it affected me that way because he was a creator, and I was a creator, and he had influenced my creativity and a very pivotal point in becoming Madi.

Today, Seamus Heaney passed away in Dublin, and I feel a similar sadness. I remember first hearing his name in Mr. Showen's classroom (a very important place), I remember thinking he was cool after I finished reading Beowulf. I remember looking up his poems for fun, when I remembered to. And then I read one of his "most Irish" collections this summer, North, while I was in Northern Ireland, and I felt tied to him. He had always spoken to Irish, story-loving, digging Madi. And today part of this period of my life became a ghost.

Creators are so important. Both of these men, but especially Heaney, have inspired me to not stop creating. I will miss seeing his silver mop of hair in literary news. I will miss his (written) voice.

But I guess that's the great thing about writers. Their voice never really dies.