This is an IHeart podcast.

And we're back with our American stories.

And up next, you're going to hear from Rick Dunlap.

He'd never dreamed that his creative writing

will be featured on the biggest Christmas movie channel around.

Until, of course, it was.

My name is Rick Dunlap,

and I am the author behind Hallmarks Christmas Under the Stars.

I am also on the maintenance crew at a Chicago suburban high school.

We are charged with taking care of the grounds, anything that needs repairing inside the building,

from lights to plumbing to flooring, whatever the case may be, that's what we're there to

take care of.

I think from a very early age, I was really destined to be a writer.

We lived in Chicago Heights, Illinois. And the neighborhood that we

lived in, there weren't a lot of children there. I had my younger sister. She was a year younger than me.

Other than that, I had to create my friends and things for us to do.

So I think writing was really just a natural progression from me.

Like most authors, I always had that real active imagination,

and I liked writing little stories and pictures to go along with them.

It wasn't until April of 1991 when I got into recovery.

My life had pretty much fallen apart at that time,

and I was faced with this decision of either moving on with life or basically just giving up.

...