What writing means to me

As a college student, there are plenty of nights (or early mornings) where I wish no one had ever written anything. Wouldn't it just be that much better if we all sat around fires and cooked our most recent wooly mammoth before retiring to a nice damp cave every evening? Then again, nothing quite gets me as excited as breaking open a new chapter of Aquinas come the beginning of a new semester.

I can't understand people who don't like to read. I don't read outside of my coursework on a nightly basis, and I certainly don't think that people should necessarily (I like a good hour of TV just as much as the next person). However, a good writer can touch the soul in such a way that television simply can't. Just think of how much time it takes to read a book and yet we've all suggested to our friends that they read something you've just read. It's such a time commitment that I impose when I do it- yet there is no way I would ask my friends to watch a 6 hour miniseries and then get back to me. There must be something special about reading someone else's thoughts that inspires.

Writing is an investment of the heart, an opening into the mind of the greatest thinkers. To be perfectly honest, thinking about it right now makes me wonder why I have been given such a gift as to even know how. Either way, when it comes down to it, more and more people are taking up writing, I just hope that the quality doesn't become less and less with the advent of blogging taking over traditional journalism.