Sara

“song came on the radio that made me screech with joy.”
― Atheneum Books for Young Readers, Out of My Mind

“She talked to me like I was just like any other student, not a kid in a wheelchair.”
― Sharon M. Draper, Out of My Mind

“Words.

I’m surrounded by thousands of words. Maybe millions.

Cathedral. Mayonnaise. Pomegranate.
Mississippi. Neapolitan. Hippopotamus.
Silky. Terrifying. Iridescent.
Tickle. Sneeze. Wish. Worry.

Words have always swirled around me like snowflakes—each one delicate and different, each one melting untouched in my hands.

Deep within me, words pile up in huge drifts. Mountains of phrases and sentences and connected ideas. Clever expressions. Jokes. Love songs.

From the time I was really little—maybe just a few months old—words were like sweet, liquid gifts, and I drank them like lemonade. I could almost taste them. They made my jumbled thoughts and feelings have substance. My parents have always blanketed me with conversation. They chattered and babbled. They verbalized and vocalized. My father sang to me. My mother whispered her strength into my ear.

Every word my parents spoke to me or about me I absorbed and kept and remembered. All of them.

I have no idea how I untangled the complicated process of words and thought, but it happened quickly and naturally. By the time I was two, all my memories had words, and all my words had meanings.

But only in my head.

I have never spoken one single word. I am almost eleven years old.”
― Sharon M. Draper, Out of My Mind

“What would you do if you could fly?" Mrs. V asks as she glances from the bird to me.
"Is that on the quiz?" I ask, grinning as I type.
"I think we've studied just about everything else." Mrs. V chuckles.
"I'd be scared to let go," I type.
"Afraid you'd fall?" she asks.
"No. Afraid it would feel so good, I'd just fly away.”
― Sharon M. Draper, Out of My Mind