The first early writing memory that comes to mind is when I owned that do-it-yourself Diary of a Wimpy Kid book. The book was filled with loads of activities that you could do, and towards the back of the book, there were empty pages that you could write on so it could be like your very own Diary. When I saw that, it inspired me to be the next Diary of a Wimpy kid but an in-real-life version.

How I Went About With My Diary

I thought to be the next wimpy kid I needed to write down everything that happened in my day into my diary. So everyday I would write into my diary and try to mimic the pages like the wimpy kid books, which I thought could help potential readers get into my diary. I tried to copy even the cover of the wimpy kid books with a picture at the bottom being held up by tape. The title of the diary was also based on the book series, with mine being called “Diary of a Wimpy Ryley: My Dog’s Rule.” The wimpy kid books inspired my writing back then, and they can show. By doing this, maybe one day, my experiences would be shared around the world like the Wimpy Kid novels. 

Now, I was not a very good drawer. To this day, my drawing is still not the best, but back then, it was horrendous. I mean, it does make sense cause I was a kid, but I have seen kids who were about my age back then drawing masterpieces, so I am just going to say I was a bad drawer. I did the journal entries for a couple of days, describing the events that had occurred to me at elementary school, which were small things like tests, hanging out with friends, and just random events that went on.

The End of my Diary

After about a week or so, I started to break away with keeping up with the journal entries until I inevitably stopped altogether with writing. I reasoned that I was getting bored of it, and some of the days were not interesting enough for me to write down. Also, I was not fond of drawing, for I was never really happy with how each came out. Overall, that was one of the earliest memories of my writing that I could think about. I did write before that, but it was mainly because of schoolwork. So, this was the first instant outside of school where I wrote independently. I still have the do-it-yourself book in my locker and occasionally, I look back at it, and see the cringe that is me attempting to become the next Diary of a Wimpy Kid.

Ryley Curry

Student Writer - Spring 2022