What if...

The words swirled around my head as I stared up at the imposing building before me, a sculpture of beautifully-warped metal and glass and a testament to mankind's advancements.

What if this were the future?

People moved and walked around me, an ever-moving mass of humanity, oblivious to my twelve-year-old self as I stared in awe at the Deconstructivist work of architecture once known as Beekman Tower.

It was my first trip to New York City, my first trip above the Mason Dixon line-my first big trip ever, really. And all throughout the car ride, as we passed golden fields and old buildings while listening to an audiobook about the brutality of the gulag system of the USSR, I'd had snippets of a story floating through my mind.

I'd been making up stories in my head for as long as I could remember. Fan-fictions of my favorite movies, pretend adventures for my siblings and I-such as in my story, A Divorce and A Commission-and all manner of little imaginary happenings.

But, this was different somehow.

A homeschooled girl from a small town in South Carolina, I had never seen a city as large as New York. But there I was, in the middle of one of the largest cities on earth, surrounded by buildings that seemed almost like mountains and millions of people.

It set my imagination on fire.

What if the world as we knew it was destroyed?

What if a new, advanced society emerged, based on a tiered class system?

What if a girl from a small town was suddenly sent to the capital city?

What if she discovered the dark secret behind her world?

And so on.

The story grew, snippets of ideas growing into fleshed-out characters and a world vastly different and somehow similar to our own. And, unlike my other stories, I stuck with this one, writing it down and chasing down the various details.

It was along this journey that I made the decision to become a writer. Not someone who simply has ideas, but someone who chases them down and develops their skill.

That original story, about a world called Kazaan, has changed drastically since its conception-so much, in fact, that most wouldn't be able to identify the first draft and current product as the same story. But, along the way, it has become a part of a bigger story about maturing as a writer and a person. It has taught me how to let go of elements that I really like in order to better my work, how to consistently edit, and so, so many other lessons that have aided not only my writing, but my life.

What trip, idea, or story has shaped the course of your life?