Heather Sellers and her blog

We set up our Christmas tree tonight. As I type the tree towers some 8 feet high, covered in blotches of winking white light. It is most pleasant to do homework on the living room couch with Mr. Tree. What makes the experience more beautiful is that although the tree is fake, my intelligent mother hung a pine-scented thingy from the fake trees' branches, and voila. Fresh-outta-the-woods smell and a happy girl.

After the tree was up, my mom and I chatted, and somehow Heather Sellers came up. Heather Sellers is a professor at Hope. I will have her next semester for my Intro to Creative Writing class, for which I am beyond excited and also a bit apprehensive. I caught a glimpse of Heather (Professor Sellers?) at the opera last weekend. She was wearing a warm looking cape, a cute skirt, tights, and a hat, as well as a big smile - the most noticeable of all her features besides her rather large, long wavy black hair. I immediately fell in love with the woman. From what I hear, she is rather fascinating and a wonderful teacher of creative writing.

We googled Heather because I was trying to describe to my mom the condition Heather has, which is called "face blindness" a.k.a prosopagnosia (look it up, it's beyond interesting). After reading some of her blog posts in "Psychology Today" and learning a little about her life, I stumbled across her own personal blog. Oh, what joy! The personal blog of a real writer who's published a real book. Of course, there are millions of these out there; ignorant as I am, I have not taken the time to find them. Scratch that, I read Beth Moore's blog. But Heather Sellers is in a different category... she is literature, and she is Hope.

So after reading a handful of her blog entries about cycling, writing, and her ecstasy upon reading The New York Times review of her book, my inspiration hit the ceiling and my ambition grew. She has such an easy, familiar way of writing. Her words are carefully chosen, but they don't seem forced. What a talent!

I am looking forward to learning from this little celebrity a bit more about the art of writing.