If you have about 5 minutes to spare, go read this story: Forgotten Strings Recall Holocaust Horror

I love violins. I have since I was a little girl listening to Kelsey Willis play. I've long dreamed of learning how to play. And while I feel silly, now 24-years-old, it looks as though this may very well be the year that dream starts to come true.

Even if you don't love violins though, the story above is remarkable. I've read a number of books on the Holocaust, and looking back after reading this article, it is strange to me to recognize the subtle role of violins in several of the stories. You all know I want to write- and be a writer. However, as I've shared with several of you, I find it hard. Because, my strength in writing is not so much creative story telling, as it is close reading and analyzation. Several of my professors pointed this out to me across my years at UW. I owe much of that simply to the training at CCA through Rhetoric. But I say all this for the sake of saying something more, I love looking across history and finding trends that have been unnoticed, specifically in literature. I love finding things that are less talked about in books and literary period, or studying the influence of culture and crisis on literature and then the influence of the literature on those people, and those who followed. I love finding something more meaningful than expected in a small detail of a great story. This type of writing is hard to do, in a setting other than academic. And I do still want to write a creative story- I just find it so hard to start, because I don't care to just write an entertaining story.

Last night, I had the opportunity to attend a Princeton Alumni event with Kim Rankin. The President of the University, as well as one of the Creative Writing Professors (also an author of 5 books and was recently the head of the Creative Writing program) shared. It was a remarkable well done event (of course), and much of what the President shared was mind-blowing. One of my favorites is a new program they've begun called "Bridge-Year" where incoming freshmen are given the choice to postpone attendance for one year, and instead be sent to some country to serve. Just serve. The video they showed of one of these young 18-year-old girls was hugely impacting! She'd spent her year in India, helping at a school in the Red-Line Disctrict, composed of the children of the pimps and sex-trade workers. Returning, her whole focus at Princeton was now to become someone who can make a difference in these childrens lives. She's said work service has become a part of who I am, and I can't ever leave it. To watch someone, just about to begin school at one of the greatest Universities in America, suddenly undergo a year that turns her life completely to being not about herself, was amazing. And the whole point of the program, according to the President last night, is to serve, and to give young adults this experience before college (as opposed to the end as is more common), so that it can impact all their college experience.

But the greatest part of the night for me, was the Creative Writing Professor, Weng Ghui Young. I don't even know if I can recount any specific quotes, or that I want to try. He was one of the best public speakers I've seen in person. And it doesn't hurt that he was speaking directly about my core passion. At the end, I literally had tears in my eyes as he talked about creating not great writers, but great readers who have the capacity to always engage a new book or piece of information and make the connections necessary to create new thought. See, I really am doing a terrible job of it. But, he was funny and deep all at the same time. I left, remembering the power of a book and why we even give Nobels to authors. And wanting to have that story for me to begin to write.