Dis Lex E A

Even though I have been reading and writing since I was a child, it never occurred to me that Writer was something I could be. Because even though I always did well in school, I couldn't spell to save my life. The English majors I knew in college were prolific, words would come easily to them falling flawlessly in order on the page in neat lines. They were what writers looked like. My notes were a chaotic scribbling of shorthand only I could understand with arrows pointing in all directions to string all my thoughts together. No one ever asked to borrow my notes.

I can't hold a sequence of letters in my head long enough to understand words that are being spelled out loud or tell someone how to spell something out loud. Not that anyone asks that twice. I have to write them down, see them. It is the only way I can get them to stay put. Even then letters, and words, didn't always make it down in the right order. Numbers are worse. Not having any way of connecting meaning to the shapes that sequences of numbers make, digits fleet around like butterflies until they can be glued to paper with ink.

It wasn't until later in life that I realized there was a reason that letters and numbers are unruly when I try to put them in order. I am dyslexic.

What? Not me! I knew that I processed information differently than most but someone with dyslexia struggles to read. I, who had a 12th-grade reading level when I was 9 years old couldn't be dyslexic! When learning to read I remember my teachers telling me "What does it look like?" instead of "Sound it out" when I came across a word I didn't know. Turns out, I am very good at pattern recognition. Words took on shapes that my brain could connect to an object or experience. This is probably why when I read a book it is much like watching a movie. I still see a slice of apple PIE every time I write the word 'piece'.

Numbers, groups of them, make no such connections. One group of numbers looks much like another to me. I still hate math. Even now when doing calculations I obsessively check and recheck to make sure I have done them correctly. I was better at word problems, I could turn numbers into objects, but I was hopeless at algebra.

I have no idea how I would manage in a world without spell check and autocorrect. Writing, even now, I use the backspace as often as I use any other key. But I still love to write. Well, to be more accurate, I love to tell stories, and words are my favorite media with which to tell them. But I'm not going to lie, first drafts are hard. That first attempt to get the words down on the page is work. I love second drafts. Like a puzzle, once all the pieces (slice of pie) are on the table, I can start to sort them and stack them and rearrange them in ways that convey the story I want to tell. But oh, those first drafts will be the death of me.