March 24, 2025
My first dream was to be a writer.
I spent my childhood scribbling words on notebooks and drawing imaginary characters. I was more interested in creating stories than talking, studying, and other forms of living. People often forgot I was there. At home, my nickname became “ghost” because I would silently work on my makeshift fiction in the midst of family chatter. At school, I also happily disappeared into my own world, daydreaming stories instead of focusing on lunchroom conversations. My grades weren't the best, and I was one of the least popular kids in school. But I didn’t mind it. I had worlds of my own.
That dream lasted until I was ten. That was when it was decided for me to leave my hometown of Seoul, Korea. I was to fly across the Pacific Ocean and move to a small town in Washington state. The United States of America. What a grandiose name. My parents told me we were moving for a “better life”. To fulfill their American dreams, the struggle of immigration began. That’s when I had to wake up from my own dream.
When I arrived in the States, I felt like I was robbed of my dream. I was so focused on fitting in and decoding this alien language called “English”, I had no energy for much else. It was not an easy time. As the only foreigner in my class, I was no longer the happy ghost who blended into the background–I was a sad and conspicuous outcast. Worse, I wrote less and less. Words in English didn’t flow the same way it had in Korean. Naturally, my Korean began to fade as my chances to practice it diminished. Alas, my main joy in life–writing stories–slowly slipped away out of reach.
For the next decade of my life, I acquired just enough English to get by in my humanities classes. I still remember the F I got in my U.S. History class in middle school. On top of the paper was a scary red scrawl: “see me after class”. That note is forever burned into my brain. So I turned to art, math, and science–anything that didn’t require me to write. And for another ten years after that, I lived my life as an artist, musician, and programmer. I shied away from words. Words intimidated me.
Now, as I near thirty, I finally feel somewhat comfortable writing in English–in fact, almost as comfortable as I was in Korean when I was ten. There is a voice inside me telling me that it’s too late to start writing now, that I’m already too old. That I missed my chance. But now I say that’s a lie. Writing is less about mastery and more about what I want to say. As long as I have something worth sharing, I can write it, even inbroken English.
It took me twenty years to come to this point, to step past the shame. But no need to regret. It’s time to pick up my pen again and get back into dreaming…