I’ve been telling stories since I was a child. Then, it was stories about fairies and mermaids, told to my sisters when we were supposed to be sleeping. As a teenager, I wrote long diary entries and I wrote short pieces of fiction—that no one but me ever read.

Don’t get me wrong, I was not a total recluse. I did lots of “real world” things too. I became a nurse, I spent time with friends, I traveled a lot. And I always wrote.

Sometimes after a difficult day at work, I would recreate the day in a story that had a better ending. That’s still what I do—I create stories with happy, hopeful endings.