I think I’ve always wanted to write. I remember as a small girl, of perhaps six or seven, taking thin pieces of pink paper, tearing them in half and folding them together to make a small booklet. With as much precision as I could muster I would number each page before proceeding to write a short story of one, or possibly two sentences that concluded with the dramatic words, “The End.”

Thrilled with my efforts, I felt like I was a storyteller.

Growing up in rural Worcestershire in the 1970s I thought there was a lot to write about. We lived in a house with huge windows and my bedroom looked out on to the common land behind our house as well as into our neighbours gardens. I remember trying to write what I saw from that window into my stories.

When I was ten my father brought home a discarded typewriter. It was big and heavy and sat on the desk in my bedroom. The keys were hard to push down but as my chubby fingers stamped each one a printed letter appeared on the page, which, to my young eye, looked very professional. I was proud to be the owner of a grown-ups typewriter and loved nothing more than hearing the clack of the keys on the paper as a new literary work flowed from my fingertips.

Little did I know what I was writing was nonsense. At school I loved lessons but struggled to transfer the information I was learning to the page in an ordered or understandable manner. As time went on I began to understand that I had learning difficulties and was labelled as one who had ‘word blindness’.

Naturally, my confidence and desire to write waned. And it wasn’t until I was in my early thirties, living and working in Mongolia from where I was writing a monthly newsletter badly, that my desire to tell stories remerged. With some good, solid advice from a school teacher friend I began discovering techniques that helped me overcome my difficulties.

I still make mistakes but, with the help of friends, I’m learning to tell the stories of people we live amongst. I am thankful for the wise counsel of friends and of course to the Lord, who enables us all, to overcome our difficulties and fulfil the desires of our hearts.