Beginnings
I've always found it telling that I've ended up working as a proofreader and editor when my relationship with words got off to a very shaky start.
Do you remember spelling tests when you were small? They were my kryptonite. Well, to be honest, generally at school I was what my mum described as a 'slow starter' - I struggled with maths, handwriting and spellings especially. I just couldn't learn the patterns that made up words and I had a teacher who made the whole thing a lot worse. If you did well at one of his spelling tests, you got to stand on the table; quite well, you'd stand on the chair...and down it went until you got to me, who did badly, lying on my belly on the floor. I'd often be in tears. And the thought of the humiliation made me panic more each week until I couldn't learn my spellings because I was too afraid and I just got a humming in my ears so couldn't hear the words my teacher read out.
The label 'bad speller' stuck with me - my family all knew it - and throughout my school career it's what I believed of myself. It was an illustrated book of The Little Matchstick Girl that started turning things around - a series of words that made me cry, but not because I was failing at getting them right - but because together they made a beautifully sad story. Then later Nina Bawden's The Witch's Daughter moved me and suddenly I was inhaling every story that came my way. And as I read I picked up how to spell and then I realised that I was helping my friends when they asked 'how do you spell...?' And I loved it. And...I felt a little bit like I was sticking it to the man. So I did a journalism masters, wrote for magazines, proofread some national publications and thus writing and words became my career.
I still love reading and I've become one of those annoying people who will pick out every flaw and inconsistency in every article, shop sign and menu. My colleague Lizzie, who is exactly the same, also had an inauspicious start with her reading career - she has vivid memories of being forced to stay inside and practise reading during her summer holidays as a child while all her friends played in the sunshine. She was terrible at it and she hated it - but has learnt to love it - and we would never have met if we'd both given up on reading.
So, what is my point here? That you should never give up - that even the most unpromising starts can produce something special - a love of reading, a discovery of new worlds in books, a career, a friendship.