I had been doubting about my writing skills for quite a while when I thought about quitting it alltogether. I hadn't put pen to paper in weeks and as summer left, so did my creativity. My mind, once full of wonderful stories, was blank and boring, the thoughts coming out of it dull and  My blog was affected by it too: my posts were uninspired, writing them was like a chore.
I was about to do something I'd sworn I'd never do: give up on writing.

I was not exactly in a good place when I started to think about giving up on writing. I came really close to doing it, but then I found motivation to keep doing what I love in a most unexpected place. I found motivation in a college class about German grammar.

I didn't like today's assignment. My teacher had told us about it as if it was a lot of fun. I suppose it was a lot of fun for people who've loved and been loved before. They were all busy, describing their perfect husbands and wives in German. I, however, was still staring at a blank piece of paper.
'Why arfen't you writing?' the girl next to me asked.
I swallowed the lump in my throath and whispered: 'I feel very comfortable writing about this topic. I don't like it...' I looked back at the paper. How did my teacher expect me to write about my dream husband in flawless German, while I'd clearly been labelled 'Forever Alone' and still wasn't sure if it's actually possible for any guy to like someone like me? Beggars can't be choosers, right?
Staring at the snow white paper didn't help much. If anything, it made me feel worse.
'Come on, Envy. Only five minutes left, then you'll all have to read your pieces out loud,' my teacher said.
I didn't want to read anything out loud, least of all my preferences when it comes to guys, but I finally picked my pen up and just wrote whatever came to mind.

One by one my classmates read their pieces. Some had written dating profiles, others a list of things they look for in a partner, one had even written a diary entry.
Much too soon it was my turn. My head turned red with shame long before I'd spoken the first word out loud. My classmates' stares made me nervous. I focused on the small, ridiculously straight letters of my handwriting and read out loud:

"Until today I've never thought about my dream perfect husband, because I think I'll be alone forever. But if I do meet him, I hope he's athletic, so I finally have someone with whom I can talk about sports. If he's not intelligent, there's going to be a problem: I can't stand people who only make stupid remarks. He shouldn't be lazy or egoistic, because I want to know he's there when I need him. Apart from that I hope he's creative and patient, because one needs a lot of patience to get to know me. If I ever meet a man like that, I would barely care about the way he looks.

The silence when I finished reading was deafening. The giggles that erupted when I mentioned intelligence had died down long ago. I didn't look up, but felt everyone's eyes on me. I didn't dare look up, not until I heard a few whispered wows.
Reluctantly I tore my gaze away from the paper as the silence continued. My teacher was looking at me, just like everyone else. As usual her face didn't reveal anything, but her eyes told me everything I needed to know. Half a second later, her voice told me what I'd already seen in her eyes: 'Perfect. Flawless German. And Envy, if that's the way you write, you've got nothing to be ashamed of when you have to read something out loud. Absolutely nothing.'
My head couldn't possibly turn a brighter shade of red. 'Okay thanks' I whispered. I was on the verge of tears on the outside, but glowing with happiness on the inside. Maybe my teacher didn't understand that I was ashamed of what I'd written, not how I'd written it, okay. But that didn't matter to me at that moment. Not at all. She was the first person in a long time to tell me face to face that my writing was good. That, those few small words, made me decide not to put my pen down and keep blogging a little longer.

Stay Awesome!