Little to big
In a small town, located on the western side of a big state, northwards in a vast country, lives a little-not so little really, about a medium size-elderly person.
This not-so-little-medium-size elderly person, who poses as a columnist, spends a portion of her days tapping the keys of her computer to make small words. The small words form sentences. The sentences grow into paragraphs. The paragraphs expand into a story. After the final tiny period is punched, she walks down a steep hill with her story to the office of the local small town newspaper, The Bigfork Eagle.
When the not-so-little-medium-size-elderly person, who is a grandmother, disguised behind her facade of a columnist was a tot, she didn't like to read. The little words, that grew into sentences and then into big paragraphs and expanded into stories, were confusing to her. Little words became jumbled in her tiny-tot brain. Her father read her portions of the daily newspaper. Her mother read aloud short stories and poems on cold winter evenings, while rain drops splattered on the small window panes of their not very big cottage, situated on the outskirts of London-a big city.
The tot, who eventually became a great-grandmother, had older brothers and sisters, who often read their homework aloud. The words of Milton, Shakespeare, Shelly, Keats and Longfellow became familiar to the tot, though she didn't read their printed words. To learn an assigned poem for English class, a speaking part in a school play or multiplication tables, the words and numbers were read aloud by one member of her family and repeated by the tot until the assignment was learned. The tot's reluctance to read also hampered her spelling. Double whammy. She skimmed through the twice-yearly math and English exams with barely a passing grade. Triple whammy. Luck was with her when she left behind the subjects her mind couldn't grasp for a career as a dancer which suited her well as all of the instructions were verbal and visual.
The aging great grand-mother who wears her columnist cloak with pride has learned over her years to seek and find, first on a typewriter that also couldn't spell, and on to a computer that can spell, to adjust to her malady, known today as Dyslexia.
Back when her aim was high this, muddle-brained grown-up tot who didn't like to read, couldn't spell, had trouble learning which words are pronouns, adjectives and adverbs, tapping out small words that grow into stories for her column had aspirations of branching out into the big time, like selling a story to a really big magazine in a big city for big bucks.
This not-so-little great-grandmother submitted her stories about babes of the forest, little children, small western towns, big cities; humorous and sad tales of planting her roots in the wild west, long trips and short trips to new places to big city magazines.
Montana Magazine accepted and published a few of her stories, which was a big step in the right direction-99 percent were returned in big manila envelopes with rejections from big city editors. The polite responses thanked her for submitting her work and thinking about them.
Well, if they only knew. She wasn't thinking of them. She was thinking about breaking into the big time.
The aging great-grandmother clothed in her columnist suit, eventually threw her goal out of a window where a strong wind took it to the unknown, and she settled down in contentment to continue writing a bi-weekly column for our award-winning small town newspaper.
Did you catch that, about the award-winning newspaper? Have you read about the numerous awards the Bigfork Eagle receives yearly at the Montana's Newspaper Association's annual contest that is held every year in June?
A few years back the not-so little-medium size person, who poses as a columnist received the First Place Award for her feature story with pictures of Hubby and his Canadian buddy, who returned, unscathed, to their birth countries after four years of military service in England during World War II.
Who needs small words to form sentences and on into paragraphs for their stories to be published in big city magazines when an award such as that inflates ones ego to the size of a zeppelin? Now THAT IS BIG. THAT IS REALLY BIG.