Wilma R. Forester
“Wilma you are going to get an A on the story you wrote in your High School English Class” said my teacher. Wow I didn’t get many A’s so I was surprised and pleased. “Maybe some day you will become a writer,” she continued. I didn’t think so I was too much into riding and training my horse and chasing boys.
I was born in Los Angeles, California in 1933 and we had NO books at home to read. Most books were very expensive and our family just could not afford any thing like that. Then one day my father bought a new set of encyclopedias’ called The Book of Knowledge. There were at least ten books and even at five years old I loved every one of them. I would spend hours going through the pages and studying the pictures and enjoying the Aesop Fables.
We, (the Anderson family, mom, dad and three kids plus our dog Boogie) move to Chico, California in 1940 or so. We lived in several different places and finally settled in the barren wastelands of a part of town called Pleasant Valley. Ours was the only house on the left side of Cactus Avenue. My older brother and sister (Clinton, and Barbara,) and I walked the two miles to the one room school Pleasant Valley on East Avenue. It was great horse country and easy access to Bidwell Park. I am still writing stories about my many adventures in the Park.
I married young and had two sons and a daughter, James Steven, (deceased) Gene Jeffery and Brenda Jean. Our family moved to forest Ranch, California in 1964. My name is now Wilma Rae Forester. I have trophies and ribbons from riding a painting but being a Christian: To you O Lord, I lift up my soul: in you I trust, O my God. Psalms. 25:1-2, and my children, grandchildren and great grand children are the things I boast about the most.
I am an artist first but I love to write, whether it is Fiction or Non-fiction. Of course I get to illustrate all of my stories. Sometimes when I am deep into telling a tale it feels liked I have stepped into another world and it is a wonderful world of privacy and freedom where I alone am in control. I truly enjoy writing and painting.