By Jillian Ward
My name is Jillian Elise Ward, and my life, like every life, has had its challenges, triumphs, and reasons. And, as with each life, there is a story to tell. But my journey began a little differently than most.
When I was in grade school, attending an elementary in Utah, learning was difficult for me. In Kindergarten my teacher became frustrated with my inability to read, and not knowing how to tie my shoes, and she wondered if I would ever be able to.... By the middle of my second grade I was falling well behind my class. The advice to my parents was not to worry, I was a sweet girl, and would meet and marry a nice boy in church who would take care of me when I grew up.
Frustrated and upset, my parents pulled me out of the public school system and enrolled me into a parochial school. They had learned that the third grade teacher at this parochial school was amazing, and would be able to help me. And she did make some progress.
All of these things weren’t the answer, though. My grades were barely passing, and everyone in my classes seemed so much smarter. By the fifth grade my parents knew I was in serious trouble. Fortunately, I had a teacher that candidly asked my mom and dad, “Have you had her tested yet?” At that point my parents had me tested, and it turned out I had a significant disability. That seemed pretty obvious when I entered the sixth grade with the reading ability of a third grader, as well as poor math and science skills.
My mother found another program that took me to a summer camp. She was told it could “help” my situation.
My sister and I arrived uneventfully at Ranch Camp. There, the owners of the ranch, who were educated doctors, created a program to help children become fast readers, and hone the skill of comprehending to a point of perfection. It worked. In one week I raised to the fifth grade level. I returned for the next two summers, and each time I reached new heights in my reading and comprehension, exceeding to the tenth grade level.
One day, during the seventh grade at school, my English and Literature teacher assigned a short story assignment. There were no rules on what the story had to be about, it just had to be something that would interest the teacher.
I hadn’t, at first, taken the assignment seriously. I drew characters from short stories I had already written at the top of the page by my name, realized what I had done in pen, and drew a line beneath it in hopes they looked to be on purpose, as an add onto the story assignment. I began the paper with a single name—rather a title.
Dragon Slayers.
“Dragon Slayers” appeared on the page and I took off writing a completely new story, a new idea. I fell in love with it and had my closest friend read it so I could hear what she thought. She loved it too.
I picked it up. I took this book seriously. It owned a notebook of its own, like my other short stories did, with the title written on the front in permanent marker. But this time I promised to fill every page with a new adventure, unlike my other short stories that took up only half a notebook.
The story faded as new ones emerged, and I got older and read more books. And the stories saved me from the realities of life, of being teased for my tutoring in math, for being taller than every boy in class, and skinnier than them too, and for being a different religion than anyone else in the school.
I never stopped creating stories as my closest friend moved to another state, and when people around me changed, but I did loose speed on my writing when I graduated from parochial school and returned to the public system. At the end of October, in the ninth grade, my father was diagnosed with lung cancer in the fourth stage.
As I sat on the floor in my room crying one night, wondering what would happen, I flipped through a few old story notebooks and found the one that had begun with a short story assignment. I brought it to school the next day and gave it to my friends to read, apologizing for the odd wording since I had written it so long ago. But, if they were lying to me or not I’ll never know, they said they enjoyed it. I picked it up for a second time, and rewrote the beginning. I started the story again.
When I entered high school as a sophomore, my father passed away on November the fourth, 2004. He and I had been so close, and the loss almost destroyed my mother, and perhaps my sister, but I can’t say for sure. Emily always held her emotions close, no matter what face she made to give herself away. At that time she sat unusually quiet, and I noticed it everyday. I wonder now if she had only been so solid in her passive, and “deal with it” attitude, just to give my mom, and I, something else besides our religion to hang on to.
But, for me at that time, the days seemed darker. I wrote unhappy things in the tale from the short story assignment, and escaped through many lives, and in a place that I could control. Where I could see every ending, and make what I wanted to happen...happen. And by the summer of that year the story had taken a new turn, the story had begun writing itself.
I finished the novel on August the seventeenth; it was a Wednesday morning . . . two a.m., to be exact. My friend read the ending, and made me tell her about the second book that was set to follow it. She loved it.
But in July, before I completed my story, my mother and I searched the internet for an editor, or a publisher, to see what would be the next step toward publishing. After an hour I left to work on my book, and an hour following my mom came in my room with a deadline to a writer’s contest. The deadline said to be the next day.
I sent out my prologue and first chapter, and three days later I received a phone call. At first I sat confused on my couch in the basement, I realized it wasn’t just another of my friends on the other line, it was the best-
Bonnie Hearn Hill had been the judge over the student division in the writer’s contest I had entered with my book, and praised my writing. She told me that there weren’t enough entries in my division of the contest, but she asked if I was going to be at the writer’s conference where the contest had originated. I honestly didn’t have an answer to that.
We did end up going. The Yosemite Writer’s Conference outside Yosemite Valley, California, was where I felt an adventure had begun. I met Bonnie Hearn Hill and she introduced me to many people, letting me sit with her and use her name to those I pitched my novel to. She encouraged me and taught me so much in just the weekend I was there.
The conference taught me enough to bring me to tears the first day. I sat in my room at the lodge where the conference was held, and cried with fear. I had no idea that the industry was so cut-throat, so intimidating. I cried to my mom and my sister. My sister told me to “deal with it,” and my mom told me that if I wanted to do this bad enough, nothing would scare me.
I took both pieces of advice to heart.
For the next year, my junior year at high school, Bonnie Hearn Hill mentored me, encouraged me, and taught me things I will never forget as I cut my book in half, edited it, polished it and polished it, and watched it bleed and scream as I worked it into shape. My Creative Writing teacher helped me with the edits to my novel, as did friends. My mom and sister read it, edited it, and I learned more and more each day and week.
I entered the contest again for the Yosemite Writer’s Conference. The conference also had added onto their program a sponsorship for the attendees. Tony and Sharon Chivers emailed me and told me the great news that they were going to sponsor me for that year’s conference, as well as my mom.
My sister came along, for another relaxing weekend as I stressed over my two one-on-one meetings with agents. I did not cry this August when I went, but I did shake, and my hands did sweat with nerves, but I did not cry. I would not be scared of my future.
The meetings with the agents went beautifully, and I also won first place in the student division, with my book, at the Yosemite Writer’s Conference. My sponsors for the conference, who are very honest and kind people, told a friend of theirs about me. Her name is Sandy Guderyon, and is the owner of this website. And as you can tell, she gave me an amazing opportunity to write for her website, and explain how I have come to where I am now.
Things are happening quickly, swiftly almost, toward a future a second grade teacher never saw. And because of that teacher’s example, I never give up. And because of my classmates constant teasing, and calling me stupid, I will never suppose anyone can’t be smarter than they are now, and will prove to everyone that if you believe in yourself – anything can happen. Then there is my sister’s “deal with it” attitude; and my mother’s guidance and spur of the moment dares, and also my father’s teachings and strength. I am better for having all of these experiences, and influences, now, than I was yesterday. And with each day, and realities constant battering, I get better and more confident. I have learned to take chances, and because of the decision to be this way, everyday is different.
My hope, and dream, is to share with whomever I meet my attitude of “deal with it” and take a chance.
My Creative Writing teacher told me that a goal is just a dream unless you write it down. I have a growing list of goals I will achieve; consisting of so many outlandish things I will spare you the laughs and doubts of them all by keeping them on another file of my computer. But, if I did tell you what even one of them was, you would see that anything is possible, and not to laugh, and by no means doubt. The future is never known, and should never be assumed. And if it was, I would be sitting in a corner dreaming of stories I did not know how to write, as I watched someone tie my shoes.
