When I was a kid I was scared of a lot of things, but mostly I was petrified of heights. I have memories of clinging to the railings of lighthouses, of bird- watching platforms, of bridges and cliffs. I would get goose bumps in the heat of a North Carolina summer. I would tremble. This was probably why my mother was surprised when I asked to try parasailing. “Really?” she asked. I shrugged. Why not? Unbeknownst to her, I’d...

I’ve always had a bit of trouble with the question “what do you want to be when you grow up?” In kindergarten, I had my heart set on someday becoming a dinosaur, but after the differences between a career and a species were explained to me I’ve remained much less certain. On the one hand, I’ve always been happiest within a story¬– I grew up reading anything I could get my hands on and writing whenever I...