The Urge to Write

A Cambodian man was very poor in his youth. He had barely enough money for food, let alone paper on which to write. Problem was, he had fallen in love with a young woman from a neighboring village. He longed to be able to write to her and share his feelings.

Every morning he would get up before sunrise, sneak down to the riverbank and write love letters in the wet sand. When the young woman came down to the river to wash clothes later in the morning she would read his words of love.

A young girl from the Bronx in New York was given a writing assignment for homework. After school she walked home to her family’s apartment only to discover that the electricity supply had been cut off because the account had not been paid.

It was winter time in New York and darkness arrived early. The urge to write was strong and so the girl walked out into the street and sat under a street light to complete her homework as requested. The girl had the perfect excuse for not writing, but the writer within refused to be denied.

Writer’s write; in notebooks, on scraps of paper, in the wet sand if necessary.

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