Aju Mathew

I wrote long before I ever imagined becoming an author.

Back in school, whenever I wrote a poem or a thought, my brother and some of my closest friends would invariably end up hearing it.

They were my first readers. And quite often, my first listeners too.

Looking back, perhaps there were already two parts of me taking shape.

One wanted to write things down.
The other wanted to tell them.

Both stayed.

I have always enjoyed people and conversations that are allowed to take their time. I enjoy speaking, but listening comes just as naturally.

Maybe because I have always believed there is more to a person than what we first see.

There are parts of ourselves we share easily, and others we hold closer. Some thoughts remain private. Some find their way only into conversations with people we trust.

And sometimes, they become stories.

For me, a story has never been only about what happened. It is about the person inside what happened. What they felt, what they showed, what they kept to themselves, and sometimes, what we understood only much later.

Life, of course, moved on.

There was work, family, friendships, journeys, celebrations, difficult days and everything else the years brought with them.

For periods, I wrote less.

But I never really stopped telling stories.

Eventually, some of them began finding their way back onto the page.

Years after those first poems, I wrote my first book. And somewhere in that journey, two words finally found their place beside my name.

Author | Storyteller

For me, they don't quite mean the same thing.

Author is something I became.
The storyteller, I think, was always there.