LEXA BOBENIC
When I was young, I experienced grief that a lot of kids my age couldn’t understand. I felt like trying to explain was useless, so, I talked to those I’d lost through letters. I filled journals and journals with letters to my loved ones. I knew they’d never be read, but writing them got my emotions and thoughts out and made me feel connected to the people who had been taken from me. At about 14, I started writing stories. Mostly, they were a way for me to live out a world that wasn’t my reality. They were short and they were poorly written, but they were mine and writing them brought me happiness.
When I found acting to be my favourite thing to do, writing took a back seat. On stage, I could take a script writer’s art, become that character and help tell their story. I adore that about acting, showing an audience a different perspective than what they might have originally had. When I was 17, I performed an excerpt of a one act play in my acting class. It was an emotional piece and spoke of sensitive content. After I’d performed, a classmate told me something I will never forget; they explained that after seeing my performance they understood something they didn’t before and it would forever change the way they lived life. I’ve held on to those comments because in that moment I truly understood the enormous power of words. While I believe my performance helped the audience understand the gravity of the topic, it would have been nothing without the script.
In my adult life, completely unprepared, I just started writing. My first many edits were less than publishable, but every new edit got better and every time I went back to chapter one I became more and more determined. It took years for Beautifully Damned and Unfinished to be written the way I wanted it, but I got there. A younger version of me dreamed of publishing a novel; I was not going to let her down. As time has gone by I think my appreciation for books, scripts, and all forms of literature has only grown. I used to watch movies and dream of being the actor, now I watch them and dream of writing them as well.
Headshot Photographer: Crystal Tsang