A few years after I had been out of High School, I had started to learn how to write poetry. I was about 23 years old at the time. I was learning how to write and at the same time I was helping around the family farm. While growing up on the farm, we had a prime example to follow because our Grandmother, Agnes Just Reid, was a well-known local author. She had written and published a book about her mother’s life along with three volumes of poetry. I am the fifth of seven children with an older sister, three older brothers and two younger sisters. Early in my experimental writing stage, I had one of my first pieces of poetry published. My grandmother was still alive at the time. Of all of my family members, I am the only one who cared about carrying on the writing tradition that our grandmother started. Writing has been a life-long interest of mine and the thing I cared about most in my whole life.