Boom Box Tim Blog 3017

Reflection

2009-12-10T12:16:00.000-08:00

Course Objectives

What I've learned, to be general and unspecific, is the concept of Creative Non Fiction. I had read different types of CNF but never grasped that for some writings there was an underlying message I read past. When I say the "concept of CNF" I mean the different methods of writing; and how each method has a specific purpose. CNF is not just some person rambling, it's a story with a purpose. What I learned about how to write CNF was taking my opinions and subjectivity out of my stories to better let something be said without me directly saying it.
If the course could spend more time on one thing it would be reading other essays. I know this is a bit conflicting since it's a writing course. But I personally haven't read too much CNF and when I started getting into what we were reading, we started to complete our own writings. I am definitely going to read more CNF because of this class.

Structure of Course/Assignments

I think if this class had the time of an entire school year, likehigh school, students might have an easier time not feeling as rushed to meet our deadlines. However, the class did run at a sufficient pace, I was able keep up with the assignments without sacrificing the content of my work. I enjoyed the readings, but as mentioned before, wanted to read more. The journal was different because of the tasks that we were asked to complete. The assignments here, really challenged my writing process because they all require different thought processes. In terms of the workload, the blogs did add up once I looked back to how much we actually wrote. However, it never seemed like a hassle. I liked the fact that we had a blog to do every class because writing all the time like that took me out of my comfort level of writing and I had to explore many different ideas.

Provisions for feedback

Most helpful feedback was the one on one conferences. Talking with you in your office helped me the best because it was intimate. Also, even though you are a professor, being in your office (one on one) didn't really feel like I was talking to a professor. You do a great job of listening and giving the feedback because your attention is focused solely on the one person with whom you are talking. The only, I guess "problem" I was with the grading. Specifically the blogs.

I didn't know whether my blogs were written well or if everyone received good grades but while I conversed with some of the class, lots of us received 8, 9 and 10 out of 10 for our blog grades. Those numbers never really mattered to me, I really concentrated on what you said about my blogs rather than what the grade number was.

General Response

I enjoyed the class. For it being my first formal CNf class, I feel that not many could have had the impact that this class had. It taught me how to write and read CNF, in addition to working extensively on blogs.

Working Out: A Reasonable Obligation

2009-12-09T16:24:00.000-08:00

I’m standing outside the weight room, contemplating how to spend the next hour of my day. Everyone inside is sweaty and smells like the inside of a shoe—at the tip where the toes stay; I can smell the room behind closed doors because the odor seeps through the glass windows. The room’s collective pungent scent reaches my ole factory senses and contorts my expression into the world’s first yoga position for the face. I can see the sweat leaking out of everyone’s pores and steam rises from their bodies, enveloping the room in a thick haze. No one looks happy; they might be, but the grunting and screaming are hard to argue against. They’re all either too tired to smile or too focused in their exercise for anything other than that next rep, next mile, or next breath to interrupt them.

Sometimes I arrive in an empty weight room when it opens at 8 a.m. Its vast emptiness makes the room feel cold. At this time of day the room is as cold as it is quite. When it’s empty, the dropping of the weights, the swooshing air of my jump rope, and the tiny patter of my footsteps all echo like voices inside a canyon. Rarely are there other people present than the regular morning athletes. We all walk around with sleep crust still in our eyes and not fully awake until our muscles are warmed and stretched. This is 8 a.m.—quite and subdued.
But noon is Black Friday. The dumbbells are on sale for half off, everyone has waitlisted a treadmill, and the one bench press has been reserved for three people (an argument waiting to happen). The music is always played too loud so everyone must talk above the radio and each other. The crowded room is like a busy train station with countless strangers walking around deciding where it is that they need to go. I’m also a stranger, who blends in with the rest of the people trying to workout without getting disturbed. The only people talking are those who are working out with a partner. Otherwise the only sound heard, despite the blasting radio, is the faint requests of weightlifters asking people to spot them.

I’ve grown into an inflexible schedule for my workouts: lifting four days a week, calisthenics twice a week, and twice a week after I lift I swim. I wake up early to arrive when it opens so the regulars and myself can exercise without the crowd. It’s always quieter at this time, less people are there, and I get through my workout quicker. Sometimes I give in to the alarm clock and sleep in, forsaking my empty room for a couple more hours of sleep. This results in waiting for people to finish using machines, being around more people than usual, and being subjected to watching the people drawn to the mirrors.
Still standing outside the crowded weight room, I see all the usual people doing all their usual routines. The man with the swollen arms always wears t-shirts that a stripper would say is too revealing. Two partners, who think they’re much stronger than they actually, constantly lift weights that are too heavy for them; their arms shake even before they complete the first repetition. Perpetually present are the women that wear the tightest of pants that leave nothing to the imagination. And they all stand in front of the mirror like observing themselves was a workout in itself. They think the more they look at themselves the bigger their muscles will get and the flatter their stomachs will become. I try not to notice them but it becomes difficult when their observation always leads them to stand next to a machine or bench that I use. To ignore them I push myself harder. It seems when there is more people in the weight room I always leave more tired and sore than when I workout in the morning.

Exhausted, I’m barely able to not only lift my arms to push open the doors, but too tired to even push the doors open. Every muscle after a workout turns into tight weathered rubber. My hands are covered with dead white skin from each shredded callous at the base of my middle and ring fingers on both hands. I relax after weightlifting by taking a dip in the cool, crisp water of the pool. One week I swam 10 laps, the week after I aimed for 11, and the following I sought to swim 12. Climbing out from the pool is near impossible when it feels like I’ve swam across the English Channel. When I return to the locker room from the pool I walk like a drunk participating in a sobriety test because my leg muscles become transformed into a thick, unsupportive Jell-O pudding. In between laps I notice that people who walk by the doors of the pool always feel the need to take a peak in when they see someone swimming. I smile whenever someone takes a quick look and continue my workout.
People exercising always looks like their violently having sex with whatever piece equipment their using. They have the most exhausting expressions on their face, disgustingly sweaty, and when they’re done, are always left panting for air. Now I understand ceiling mirrors. The cardio section of the weight room is for a different kind of person entirely. Here people push themselves past all kinds of muscle burning pain. The treadmill allows people to run from their problems, the bicycle lets people clear their minds and the elliptical is for people to take our their frustrations on themselves. The weights, dumbbells, and benches are lined like soldiers awaiting battle. Leaving the weight room at closing time always has me waiting in anticipation for some to yell, “Lights out”, and then the doors will be closed for the night.

The clocks always weigh heavier than any pressure put on my body. Time’s presence is with me when I wake up and contemplate whether or not to get out of bed. It’s with me on the drive to the gym, telling me that when I arrive I’ll have about an hour of muscle grinding exercises to complete. It’s there during my warm-up, which always lasts fifteen minutes. When I workout, I find myself glancing at the clock several times to estimate what time it will end considering how much further I have to do. A timed cardio exercise feels like trying to complete a homework assignment hours before it needs to be handed in. Some people spend hours exercising. Some days they arrive before me and are still pushing themselves when I leave. They only end their workout when they’ve made themselves sore enough that they can barely leave the gym on their own power.
When I swim I have to exhaust myself. Each days lap count has to at least meet the previous days total. But before I swim, the smell of chlorine brings me back to the summers of my childhood, when baseball teammates and I would visit our friends pool after a long day of playing games. When I wade I run my hands through the water and let in run through my fingers, feeling every hydrogen and oxygen molecule. Reminiscing makes the workouts seem shorter. Thinking about how refreshing the cool water is, even when I swallow a mouthful and start chocking, takes my mind off how many laps are left. Then I’m finished and it’s time to do something else.

I stand outside the weight room on another day. It hasn’t been opened yet; the regulars haven’t even showed. I can still smell the room from behind closed doors, only now it’s some Fantastic-like smelling cleaner that was used last night at closing time. The workers always make sure there is no sweat residue before they lock up. I look at the clock, the pools hasn’t opened either. I rub my eyes and stretch my muscles that are colder than the pool water, colder than the empty weight room. When I left my house I was the only one up. Some of my friends are probably hung over and only went to bed a few hours ago. They partied while I went to bed early to arrive at the gym with a clear head.
I woke up early to arrive at a gym that had no one in it, to workout by myself, after which I’ll hop into a pool that is also empty, with the exception of the lifeguard. I start exercising and my straining face resembles the other people that are soon to enter. My body sweats and starts to sink like that perpetual thick haze. I grunt. Soon I ignore everything other than that next repetition, breathing through the first mile to get to mile two, even the temperature of the pool water. I don’t want to be bothered by anything and I have the mirror to myself. The only other presence is the clock.

Whether leaving the gym exhausted or arriving tired and complaining to myself that I’d rather be sleeping, I know that without healthy, nothing is possible. In order to have the luxury to complain about waking up early, being healthy enough to wake is a necessity. To be lucky enough to feel sore after a workout or a run, one would have to be able to feel. The ability of enjoying life rests heavily on the health of an individual. It has been proven that individuals who lead an active lifestyle generally live a longer, healthier and more productive life than those who do not exercise. The only thing I love more than living, is the ability to live and being healthy makes that possible.

Publication Handout

2009-12-04T15:58:00.000-08:00

Background and Origination
Thoreau’s Rooster is run by Assumption College located in Worchester MA. Their publication is a journal of undergraduate creative nonfiction and designed specifically for college students nationwide. As stated on their website by Michael Land, advisor, “In his classic book Walden, Henry David Thoreau made a feisty declaration that, to me, seems like the ideal attitude for creative nonfiction writers, who must fearlessly use the first person in so many of their essays, daring to presume their story matters.” He then quotes Thoreau, I do not propose to write an ode to dejection, but to brag as lustily as chanticleer in the morning, standing on his roost, if only to wake my neighbours [sic] up.

Thoreau’s metaphorical rooster models an attitude to which collegiate writers must recognize if they are going to put their work out there in the world and also is the origin of this publication. However, the essays do not need to be about nature, as many of Thoreau’s essays do, but they do need to “operate out of the creative nonfiction genre, blending personal storytelling and scene-setting with an underlying psychological and/or thematic progression.”

The website states this form of writing isn’t often taught in workshop formats for undergraduates. Although, in six years of existence, their submissions have grown steadily in quantity with one year having to shave down 86 entries down to a dozen.

Getting Published
Selections for the publication are made by a team of student editors, plus the advisor, Michael Land—nature writing teacher and English professor Jim Lang, the founder of Assumption's creative nonfiction writing class. They style they look for is one that challenges writers to connect their lives to a broader history of experiences and ideas, and to make those connections in a way that intrigues an audience of strangers.

From reading several essays the editors are looking for personal essays that incorporate reflection and meaning. Much like our latest essay, where we aimed to “say something” without blatantly stating it, reflect that style in most of the submitted essays. The use of first person is encouraged because everyone speaks from an experience, feeling, mood, desire with which they try to capture the reader’s imagination and empathetic feelings.

Example Essays
An essay named “Baptism by Immersion” uses the same reflection techniques that Kindcaid incorporats in “Biography of a Dress.” Meaning, the writer reflected on memories stemming from a particular object and expanded on the ideas of what they were thinking about at a younger age compared to how they felt about that object as an adult. Also the essay uses a photograph and video camera to represent aspects of the writer’s life that was lost or unknown much in the same way Cofer uses her videotape in “Silent Dancing.”

Another essay that was similar to one we read in class was called “Remember to Remember Me.” This essay was somewhat segmented—and similar to the essay written by Schwartz. This writer’s focus was famous last words and the importance of saying something significant before you die. In between paragraphs where she changes her topics, she quotes famous one-liners of historical last words: Doc Holiday, Pope Alexander VI, and Julius Caesar. This segmented idea is similar to Schwartz because both writers describe one element to the reader, introduce a brief transition, and go back to the focus of their essay.

An essay that not only mirrors the ones we read in class but presents an inventive way of writing is titled, “Jason, Me, and the Honeysuckle.” This essay reminded me of Langston Hughes’ poem “This is Just to Say”, because the author turns a letter she wrote to her brother into an essay. In fact the essay is a letter itself. I found this to be innovative because although it is just a simple letter, it was not written with simplicity. She incorporates imagery through memoires of sucking nectar from honeysuckles with her older brother, sets a scene by enticing all five senses of the reader, and encompasses the human element at the end with an unexpected conclusion.

Some of the essays are lengthy, or at least much longer than our essays. However, this is not true for all of the submitted publications. The ratio for longer versus shorter essays, if out of 100, is probably about 70% longer and 30% shorter essays. The editors do not specify the length or a subject matter. They simply are looking for writings that merge imagery, scene setting, and personal reflections that make the readers ask questions, with an underlying message that is not an obvious statement.

Submission
They haven’t posted any updates on the website since their last publication in the spring of 2008. The guidelines for submitting your work are as follows: E-mail essay as attached document. In the e-mail, include your name, class, college affiliation, and writing teacher, plus both your e-mail and snail mail addresses. Also, to be included is an autobiographical blurb consisting of 30-50 words.

Revision/Reimaging

2009-12-03T09:28:00.000-08:00

Take your peice apart. Are there places where the story is thin? Are some chacters too flat? Are there places where the action lags? Does the sequence of scenes work? Do you get the feeling something might be missing? Does this story feel unfinished? Make notes of your criticisms.

Critiquing Essay 3

What I relaized is that there is too much of my personal opinion. I leave no wiggle room for the reader to interpet anything I say because I make everything so clear cut. In addition, I also wrote with more telling than showing.

If I omit the preciseness of my focus and make more general, but colorful, descriptions, I can make my essay better. For example, instead of just explaining that I hate working out even though I exercise so often, I can better describe certain situations within a weight room. Specifically, how people carry themselves, the smells I experiecnce, how often I see particular people, using their body language as evidence describe explain how I think they feel during their workouts.

I will also describe how I try to out perform myself each day. If I lifted a certain amount of weights, or swam a number of laps one day, I always try at least meet that amount and try to exceed it. A sense of never really accomplishing anything will be discussed as well.

Which Revision

2009-11-23T12:05:00.000-08:00

I will most likely be revising my exercise essay (number 3).

I feel that I have more information to talk about, opposed to my most recent essay, and that my message of what I'm trying to get across will not be as blatantly obvious as it was in my first draft. I want to try and say my message with a more subdued tone and not identify how I feel about what I am writing about.

My first draft was not open for interpretation. I stated what I felt and left no wiggle room for the reader to infer any ideas of their own. I also think that I was too vague in my descriptions and that I could have very easily drawn some specific images from a weight room instead of generalizing the way I did.

I look forward to reworking this essay because I left too many stones unturned in terms of how I can progress in my writing. I want to explore different methods in reaching my conclusions (more subtlety) and incorporate more deeper sensory imagery.

Draft 4

2009-11-22T12:48:00.000-08:00

I once grew my hair out for a year and nine months into a ponytail only to shave it off just to see the difference (I have also had the mushroom cut, short hair with a part in the middle, shaggy, and spiky hair with gel). The majority of my sophomore year of high school I spent wearing Hawaiian button down t-shirts—and neglected to recognize my attire’s awfulness. I can go through a hippie phase, a jock phase, a party phase, and tough guy phase in a matter of weeks. I don’t like reading a book more than once or wearing the same outfit in the same month. I grew out a beard for six months because “half a year” sounded like a good idea. Even when those who disliked my wiry strands told me to “shave that pubic hair of my face”, I remained unaffected.
If something needs to be accomplished with a simple action, I’ll forfeit the easy “plan A” for a more time consuming and arduous “plan B.” For obvious reasons, plan B is completed less often, and for that reason I am drawn to it. I dislike the act of keeping, and not just physical objects but feelings, mentalities, moods, desires that I categorize as insignificant. My theme song is Robert Frost’s “Nothing Gold Can Stay.”

My mother’s dining room table is a perpetual mass of paperwork. Sometimes I think she runs the post office and her table is everyone else’s mail. Everything in that room is important. The more she seems to be paying bills and sending them out, the quicker the pile seems to grow. I can’t touch anything because even though the table is an organizational disaster, she still knows where everything is because it is her mess. Her basement is littered with boxes coated with an inch thick of dust—aged two decades, and old Tupperware containers, children’s toys, and two work benches cluttered with unused tools have clotted the would be open space of the house’s foundation. The washer and dryer are given the only attention.
One of the many compacted closets in our house is filled with old jackets not worn in years, shoes that everyone in the family has outgrown or outworn, and a lifetime supply of hats that could cover the balding heads of the many old men living on our block. The layout of my parent’s bedroom has remained the same for mine and my brother’s lifetimes. My parents have had the same haircuts for as long as I’ve been alive, have kept the same respective job titles, and always comment on how the town in which we live now, is not the same town that we first moved into when I was a baby. My father told me that if he could choose he would prefer to live everyday the same as opposed to everyday being different, that way noting bad would come up. I think I should buy him Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart.

I have not kept the ticket stub for any event I have attended nor the playbills from the theaters I have visited. Once I rip the pay stub from a paycheck or a credit card bill I shred and dispose of it immediately. If I were to ever be audited I would not fare well as I can’t remember the last receipt I kept from a major purchase. I lose things and forget often, but have yet to try and improve that aspect of my life. I used to steal too much, but have recently grown out of that phase.
I don’t listen to the music I enjoyed in high school. Instead, I listen to music now that I had never previously liked. I spent the majority of my life playing baseball but once I stopped had no desire to pick up a glove and ball for a catch. It is no longer a part of me. I was even baptized and confirmed in the Catholic Church, but no longer believe in God. I wonder if I ever did because when I was introduced to the concept of religion I could have just welcomed it as something different in my life, something that I would give some attention to—until it bored me.

My girlfriend is another retainer all on her own. She has kept every ticket stub, every playbill, the little green pins you get from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, love letters from her first boyfriend, the decorations I smothered on and around her car that one Valentine’s Day, and notes from an Introduction to Logic class from college—she majored in Fine Arts. She finds significance in everything, making it impossible to separate herself from anything. As a result her concept of change consists of waiting to see who will be the next competitors on Dancing with the Stars.
Her reasoning for holding onto things is that there might be one day when something she has kept can be useful. For her, the waiting for the possibility of an object to become useful is worth keeping it. Even if she has kept something for years and all her logic and reason tell her that she’ll never use it again, she “knows” that as soon as she throws it out she would have been able to use it. This mentality, much like my mother’s, makes it hard for both of them to let go of anything—no matter how little value (sentimental or not) they represent.

I started playing baseball when I was 7 years old and continued through my twenty-first birthday. I have been dating my girlfriend for the past three years and I know I will marry her. I exercise regularly and try not to miss my four times a week workout schedule. I have retained every novel I have read, creating a personal library consisting of over fifty books. I have also kept a wide range of textbooks from my college courses including grammar, early British literature, modern poetry, styles of journalism, business writing, and several anthologies.
I do contemplate the importance of something before riding myself of it. I weigh the differences between the significance of something and my emotional attachment to it. I ask myself, if after I become separated from a particular object how I will fare if it turns out that I could have used it. If I feel indifferent about throwing it out, then out it goes. When I consider the phases I go in and out of there is always reflection on the pros and cons of my decision to be a new type of person. I measure the importance of ticket stubs as having little value—but the value of family photo albums is priceless. I recognize the magnitude of cell phones because of my bare-naked feelings when I forget to bring it with me.
I would be lost without the opinions of my family, relatives, and close friends. Often times I use their input to decipher what is important and what is not. It can be hard for me to disassociate myself with things that I come into contact with through these personal connections. However, my family and close friends are not the ones making the decisions for me; they are merely guides. Denis Waitley, an American motivational speaker and writer, said, “You must welcome change as the rule, but not as your ruler.”

My discussion with my father has strung a knot in my mind. He would rather have everyday be the same…so nothing bad can come up. Who is to say that everyday you live as the same, won’t be bad to begin with and no good will ever come up? My mother likes schedules and any outside influence that disrupts her routine affects her in such a negative way it is hard for her to regroup. My older brother watches the same news show every night from 6 to 7 p.m. while he eats his dinner. Not being able to watch Hardball with Chris Matthews because somebody else is using his television frustrates him because he is unable to get the news for the day.

Everyday I wake up there is a new version of the iPod, new applications for the iPhone, smaller and more complicated laptops, a different artist that tops the Billboard charts, and even the billion year old planet we live on has recently been changing itself. Record players, VHS, and cassette players are less useful each year. Even newspapers—one of the oldest forms of communication—is becoming outdated. These tools and applications were once all gold and topped the technological advancements of their day, but no are longer.
Theodosius Dobzhansky, a Ukrainian evolutionary Biologist, states in his book Genetics of the Evolutionary Process that “Adaptation is the evolutionary process whereby an organism becomes better able to live in its habitat or habitats.” My lifestyle of tergiversation—changing repeatedly with respect to a cause—is my adaptation. Nothing gold can stay and Okonkwo will remain stubborn, rigid, and proud—but dead.

Ideas Draft 4 (blog 19)

2009-11-14T07:00:00.000-08:00

I think I have too many thoughts and not enough cohesion.

It's important to always be changing--or at least be ready for change. Also, retention is key for changing. I want to explore my experiences with a family that holds on everything clashing with my personality that retains few things.

Holding onto things, being a pack rat = insecurity. Be ready and able to rid yourself of everything. Try not to be connected to anything you can't let go. This is not to say that you have to distance yourself from everything that's material, but being able to move on if a possession is taken away from you or is misplaced is important to prepare for. Retaining more than you should or can is what I disagree with the most.

Retaining things correlates with fear of change and discomfort. Letting go to welcome new things, albeit frightening, is being more free than not changing. (nothing is new if you stay the same)

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I'm not saying that you should live your life like a burn out--as if you will die tomorrow--but the complete opposite. James Dean's quote, "Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die today," I believe is often misconstrued. Most people do "damaging" things thinking, "well, I could die tomorrow so lets live it up." Living it up does not mean smoking, drinking, and partying in excess. Instead, it should mean finding the utmost significance and importance in anything you do. To use a cliche, this is very carpe diem way of thinking.

Out with the old, in with the new. The memories are more important than the actual object.

Everyone has the right to hold on to whatever you want, but neglecting to throw anything out becomes a problem. You can keep anything, but prepare to lose everything.

Instances:
My basement has accumulated two decades worth of junk. My mother can't throw anything away.

My grandmother's house needs to be emptied to be put on the market. My mother can't part with a significant amount of objects--including her baby crib--there either.

My girlfriend also retains more than she throws away. (She argues that I lack being able to connect, and I argue that she is unable to separate herself.)

I change constantly and go in and out of phases. (Hair styles, clothes, things I read, music, etc.) I try to stay ahead of change, so I never feel uncomfortable. This is so because I force myself to throw out anything, once I get used to it or become tired of it.

Places (blog 18)

2009-11-11T17:52:00.000-08:00

Out of these places I visited my grandmother's house. Although on paper it physically still belongs to her, it is no longer her home--now it's just a house. She longer lives there because she can't take care of herself. The walls once holding framed photographs only posses rectangular clean spots, the rooms once filled with plump, comfortable furniture have been stripped, and a house that used to be filled with life is now empty and morose.

She has passed away yet, but because she can no longer take care of herself she has moved in with my aunt down in south Jersey. The house was big when I was a child, like most things, and even now, especially without household decorations, it seems even larger. More room for the loneliness, more room for the memories. Everything around the house has stayed the same. The same gravel driveway, broken front porch steps, old apple tree in the back yard that never produced apples for consumption in my lifetime, but gave my mother a childhood full of apple pies. The only exception now is no one lives there and the lights are never turned on at night.

Working out has worked out

2009-11-05T11:42:00.000-08:00

Engrossed in all weight rooms is the pungent smell of stale sweat with the lingering aftertaste of disinfectant. If you arrive early enough--before the mid-day crowds of tight shirted men, whose giant egos are rivaled only by their swollen muscles--you can turn on the empty lights and dust off the cold from the weights. Or you can arrive at rush hour and join the crowd of perspiring bodies in an already hot room made even hotter from everyone talking. The music is always played too loud so everyone must talk above the radio and each other. A gym is not a welcoming environment. If someone is an exercise novice they feel out of place with everyone else following their own agenda. In addition, if you're a workout junkie, you don't want anyone to interrupt you while you're exercising. But everyone is there for the same reason: healthiness.

But why do some people exercise as much as they do? Yes, it keeps you healthy and yes, you can get a great body from it, but it’s a painful experience. Running miles exhausts every muscle below your waist, often times blistering the soles of your feet. Weight lifting, by definition, is the microscopic tearing of muscle fibers. Though these tears are calculated as microscopic the screaming and grunting in weight rooms is evidence enough that they still hurt. A hard workout leaves an individual extremely sore the next day; this is the body healing itself from the tears. Exercise doesn’t feel good. In fact there is more pain involved than satisfaction. The strain of pushing and pulling weights, the muscle burning of calisthenics, and being constantly out of breath, are what make us dread exercise, yet keep us coming back for more. Your heart is affected the most. It beats with the up-tempo of a bass drum; a low and powerful rhythm. This beating makes your blood move faster and heats your body. Now you’re sweaty and hot in a room filled with other sweaty and hot people. A gym is unique because nowhere else can you be comfortable with dozens of smelly people around you and not mind it enough to leave.
***
I think we get obsessed with exercise once we see the impact it has on the body (I include myself). Being an athlete I have exercised all of my life, but it wasn’t until the past two years that I have taken working out seriously, maybe too seriously. I try to work out five days a week—lifting weights each day and swimming two of those days. I wouldn’t classify this exercise schedule as extreme because four to five days a week is typical for some enthusiasts. However, the obsession comes from my mentality when I miss an exercise day. For some reason I feel that working out helps me take one step forward, and not exercising is two steps back. This cannot be true because missing a day or two will barely affect my health negatively. Especially considering the amount of hours I put into the gym, it would be impossible for that one-step-forward-two-steps-back ratio to make sense.

It is all very confusing and what is most perplexing is how much I hate exercise. How much I hate the 6 a.m. alarm clock buzzing before the sun comes up and I unglue myself from my warm blankets. How much I abhor conjuring the energy when I am done lifting to start a new workout by swimming. How exhausted I feel in the middle of an exercise and forcing myself to push out another rep, and another, and another. The dread is always there: when I wake up and get ready, on the ride to the gym, warming my muscles before I start, and even during my workouts. When I grip the bar before I lift I think, “this is gonna suck.” As I press the buttons for the treadmill and type in 30 minutes, I become and remain petrified for the next half hour. And although the aquamarine blue pool water is refreshingly cool, the thought of completing those seemingly endless laps never escapes my mind. The only time I feel relieved is at the conclusion, but even then I’m so beat up, sore, and out of breath I can’t fully enjoy the fruits of my labor. I’m somewhat satisfied of my hard work, yet irritated and angry that as much as it hurt to workout, I’ll be back again tomorrow to go through it again.
***
But I keep going back, and so do other people. Most of them are young, muscular men, who spend more time ogling themselves in the mirror than working out. Some of them have gel in their hair, others wear tiny white undershirts so every vein sticks out like tree roots from a lawn without grass, and they all love the way they look. They show off by lifting more weights than their muscles can or should. They also put their bodies in all kinds of crazy positions thinking everyone will be impressed with their innovative lifting techniques; their showmanship is obvious.

The gym is individualistic. It is a place where someone pushes their body to its limits, where you better your long-term health by damaging it in the short-term. The typical person working out is self-motivating, determined, and extremely healthy. They’re at least physically healthy because most people who do not exercise think there is something mental about putting such an enormous stress on the body. However crazy it is or isn’t, exercise—in combination with healthy eating—is best for self-preservation.
***
I might hate the schedule I have created for myself and the mentality that pushes me further than normal people, but I’m young and resilient, and know full-well that I won’t be able to do it my entire life. I will continue to enjoy being able to lift weights for over an hour and follow that with a 40-minute swim. I will remain persistent in working out when I don’t have the energy and would rather hit the snooze. At the same time I will go forth in hating every 6 a.m. wake up and muscle-burning run, but I won’t let it deter my self-preservation. I want to look back when I’m a feeble, old man, with barely enough energy to breathe and know that I once had the raw, sugar energy of youth and made the best of what I had.

Next Essay Topic (blog 16)

2009-11-03T05:36:00.000-08:00

I will be describing a place for my next essay. The place is a weight room and I will be focusing on how much I exercise and at the same time how much I hate working out; combining the amount of time I work out (borderline obsession) with my near hatred for it, I am in a dilemma.

Details:
I'll describe the process I go through each time I work out: convincing myself I have to go, conjuring the energy, the act of exercise, and being tired (but satisfied) for the rest of the day. I hate going through a work out, but am relieved when I finished.

Also, what the room smells like (stale sweat), how they feel (cold and rough), and how I feel when I'm there (happy and pissed). I'm thinking what will be segmented is my back and forth mentality of deciding whether or not to exercise each day. The back and forth, if not segmented, will at least be a motif.

Each description will further explain my dilemma becasue it creates a can't live with it, can't live without it message. I hate tearing my muscles, waking up early, tiring myself out--yet I go back for more week in and week out.

Request for feedback:
As a reader what would be most interested to read about? Why I continue to exercise? How I feel before, during, after it? Or even why I feel this is significant enough to devot an entire essay to it?

The Good, The Bad, and The True (blog 15)

2009-10-31T05:13:00.000-07:00

Photograph Phindings (blog 14)

2009-10-28T07:32:00.000-07:00

The picture I came across was of my parents before they had a family. I'm not sure if they were married yet. What's important about this photograph is that I had to write about my experience looking at it in a previous class. It's one I keep going back to because they were a little bit older than me and I can easily switch our positions. Meaning I can see them in my shoes, being young with an entire life ahead of them. At the same time I can put myself in their shoes, as being somewhat care free and in a relationship with someone I will most likely spend the rest of my life with.

I previously "analyzed" this photo in an English before reading "The Fifth Child." The class was told to bring in a picture of your parents before we were born. We were then told to picture our parents as they were in our photographs and ask ourselves if we thought that our parents are were happy the way their lives turned out. It's one of the oldest photographs I have of my parents being together, sans a family.

Closet Findings (blog 13)

2009-10-26T12:14:00.000-07:00

My common findings revolve around things I kept as a child but haven't paid much attention to as an adult. I don't use my closet as much now, so it's full of shirts that I don't wear anymore. In my drawers, which are mostly empty, I keep books in one and money and random savings in another. This doesn't surprise me because I knew that I don't keep many things so my slim findings were unexpected.

The newest of the items I've kept over the years are the cards from birthdays, holidays, and anniversaries with my girlfriend. I know I would find them there because every couple months I update my collection due to some sort of celebration throughout the year.

A Narrative Rambling (blog 12)

2009-10-26T12:09:00.000-07:00

How I chose the essay I want to revise is the one that I have less of an understanding of, but at the same time, it has more of a significance in my life. Therefore I will be revising my essay about being a nice guy.

This is a topic that has effected me in both good and bad ways, and although there has been more good experiences, the importance the bad things have had on me out-weighs the good. What my point is that the quality of the bad is more significant then the quantity of the good.

I want to focus on this because I've got some issues I want to work out to better understand myself, and maybe have a better concept of who I am.

draft 2 (blog 11)

2009-10-15T20:07:00.000-07:00

If stress kills, I think I will live forever. I have a fairly stress free life, sans the typical problems a college student: a daily commute, finding time for a paycheck during the semester, mid-terms, and finals. And I think it is because of this lack of pressure in my life that I hardly ever get angry. This has been a constant aspect of my life. I have been lucky enough for my parents to remain married in a society where half of the population's couples are divorced. I didn't start working until I graduated high school, so my parents did their best to help me in my needs. However, I grew up humble, modest, and without the materialistic attitudes that most teens live with.
This lifestyle groomed me into the person I am today, which is a "nice guy." But this nice guy has two parts. The first, is one everyone see's on the surface level. My attitude, views, charm, and personality, in fact I was voted Best Personality in my high school. But people who come into contact with me and think they know me, only see me making my life easier and not how I truly feel. This nice guy is everything a parent would want in a son, a girlfriend needs in a boyfriend, and what a friend expects out of a friend.
Usually this side of me is exempt from confrontation, is liked by everyone, and has minimal problems in social environments, but these instances are the problem. Meaning I rarely stand up to people or myself and I work so hard to make everyone like me that when it's my turn to not like them I have a hard time playing "bad cop." It has come to a point that if someone wrongs me, I don't get angry with them because I don't want them to have a negative opinion about me. I have played the nice guy for such a long time that being fair for me, means being rude, which is illogical and only helps those that shouldn't be helped. Only recently have I (with the help of my girlfriend) realized this as being detrimental to my mental wellness. Too many times have passed where my voiced opinion could have saved me the arguments and self-deprecation that ensued if I had reacted fairly and honestly.
For example, on both high school and college baseball teams I never got a chance to play as a starter. Junior and senior year of high school was spent riding the bent while an underclassmen was given a chance. For college, my freshman through junior years were spent watching an upperclassmen for two years and a freshman during my junior year. It was more than possible that the players who started over me were more athletically capable, but that shouldn't have prevented me from getting just on chance. I felt that if I continued to work hard and never asked the coaches about playing time, they would see my humble work ethic. So I played it quite and kept my mouth shut. I did what was asked of me without question and followed directions. This was done in a futile attempt to play, which ended with no starts. Looking back, if I had challenged the coaches, just one time, that could have given them the ability to see past my pushover personality. Maybe, just one voiced opinion could have made the difference between five years of watching games to at least playing in one.
Another incident came in the summer of 2008. At a party where I consumed a decent amount of drinks, I had been talking to several friends of mine, who were females, and without the presence of my girlfriend, they talked freely about their feelings for me (one in particular). They weren't looking for any commitments, just the night to end with some sexual aspect to it. My first mistake was not walking away and ignoring them. But being nice and a bit drunk, I kept coming back to their conversations and led them on further than I should have, although every time I did say that I wouldn't cheat on my girlfriend. My mentality was to keep them as happy as I could--to not make them angry at me for ignoring them--which is what I should have done. By the end of the night and after many refusals, one of these girls, who hadn't been drinking, pleaded after I vehemently said no, "well, can I at least have a kiss?" I kissed. I kissed and without passion, without lust, but with full regret. Regret for my girlfriend, for myself, and for not being stronger.
I did become angry at her and started to build the foundation for an angry and fair, side of me. The next time I saw her, she acted as if nothing had happened, because for her nothing did. I told her that she disrespected my relationship and that if she was really my friend she would have not pursued me that night (although I take full responsibility). It felt good to express that, but even as angry as I was, there was a minute portion of me that did not want to lose her as a friend. That is what I need to challenge and overcome and what angers me. However, I did not acquiesce to those feelings of keeping her as a friend. It's still a process, but I'm slowly speaking out and being verbal about things that I normally kept to myself, especially being angry.
What angers me now is not having this new side of me earlier in life. I've let people get their way because I've feared their negative opinions, because getting along with someone while gritting my teeth feels better than expressing how I really feel about them. My biggest problem is relying too much (almost completely) on people's perceptions of me. I need to care less about things that don't matter, while establishing a true version of myself, and not something that I want people to perceive.

Ideas for second essay

2009-10-10T08:52:00.000-07:00

(I don't think this blog flows coherently. I diverged into tangents and as I typed it out I realized that I am entering a complicated part of my life I have yet to venture in to.

Focus: Having a care free attitude and a nice personality hinders my ability to be angry when I need to stand up for myself.

-Not given a chance to play for two baseball teams
-letting people take advantage of me in seeking their acceptance (doing extra work, going out of my way)
-drunk kissing incident (should have had more anger)
-always the friend in high school (even though I was voted Best Personality, which means nice guy)

I've always found it easier to let things slide. I don't get angry often and when I do, it always feels forced. When people wrong me and I have every reason to be pissed off, for some reason I don't get angry in fear of them not liking me. I know this is illogical and I try my best to combat my fearfulness with stubbornness, but it doesn't come.

However, there is another side of me that negates this previous characteristic. I don't care what other people think of me, and I know that doesn't work with what I just said but I think it's true. I feel that the closer I am to someone the harder I try to be friendly with them, but complete strangers I could care less about. Although, I am a very friendly person and am always opening up to meet new and different kinds of people. (This is going to be tricky)

Looking back of everything I just wrote, I don't think I've made any sense, but hopefully when we collaborate in class we can collectively work out these differing views I have about myself.

The good, the bad, and the first essay

2009-10-07T07:36:00.000-07:00

I was happy that I was able to make my reflections coherent. Trying to tie together the actual event of my story and the detailed feelings was what I was concerned about before writing and while I was writing the essay. But as a first draft, and not receiving any criticism yet, I think that the essay is comprehensible in the sense that readers understand my feelings.

What I'll be working on for my next essay is the language and whether I write specific enough or too general. I have a tendency to leave out crucial details, or if I do include them I do not spend enough time on explaining their significance. After reading it aloud to myself so many times it's getting hard to find errors (though I'm not saying it's perfect), but until I get some feedback on what to improve I'm sure sure what else I need to work on.

I look forward to writing another story with a different topic, because I'd like a change of tone and voice--another example of something I'd like to work on.

First Personal Essay (blog 8)

2009-10-03T09:03:00.000-07:00

The Annual Photograph

It was tradition before I was born. All the grandchildren lined up by sections of smallest to tallest in front of the Christmas tree at my aunt’s house. For as long as we did it, I knew it as routine. We would arrive, eat dinner, open gifts and someone would say that it was time we get all the kids together. I always frowned at the phrasing of the word “kids” because even though only my younger brother trailed me as the youngest grandchild, I was never treated like a child when I was around family. Then I would look up at my cousins, some older than me by a decade, and immediately knew my place as one of “the kids.” This procedure did not take much effort, but as I child I felt that it required the utmost concentration in preparing myself for something that required so little exertion.

It was a hassle when I was young and immature to take those pictures because I had better things to do. Being a child on Christmas was a party and those presents from family members were all that I could think about throughout the duration of the picture taking. It was hard forcing myself to keep that smile, to not complain about wanting to play with my brand new hot wheels or Ninja Turtle figurines. It was hard—for those five to seven minutes—to not be a child.

But I never gave in and complained about being part of the photographs, and I never knew why I didn’t.

However, the evidence of importance of these photos was blatant. When my mother saw I became frustrated with the amount of time the photos took, she would calm me down and say, “It’ll be worth it, we’re almost done.” That always worked, but not for the right reasons because when she said that, I always thought it was a blessing to be “almost done.” I always thought that “almost done” meant going back to presents, food, and the camaraderie of Christmas. But the blessing was the photographs and the photographs were what made the fake, forced smiles and time away from my gifts worth it—but I still didn’t know that.

So thinking it would be worth it, I continued to stretch my cheek muscles convincing myself that if my family members saw me smiling with such intensity, they would excuse me from further photograph punishment. The punishment now is not taking the photos.

As my relatives concluded, the last flashes would flicker from the cameras, we would blink out those intangible camera flash spots, and continue to celebrate Christmas. My cousins and I did it to appease our parents, which made life easier for us to just sit still for the extent of the session and not be yelled at. It never meant more to me than five minutes of being photographed with my cousins. It never meant more than an interruption from gifts. It never meant what it was supposed to mean.

It was 2001 and I was 13 years-old for what today is still the last time these families were together: my two aunt’s (my mother’s older sisters), their seven children, and my family. Our routine was full of the stereotypical clichés written for the script of a TV Christmas movie: the hugging and kissing, traditional family stories, etc. Only this Christmas would have an addition of an unwelcomed ad lib.

Not many aspects of this family gathering changed over time: we arrived, we ate, we opened gifts, and then the kids were called. We were all getting older but I no longer seethed at still being considered one of the kids. Nor did I mind being asked to put down my presents (which now consisted of CD’s and cologne), and I was not forced to smile because, without realizing, I was now looking forward to taking pictures. But some things had not changed.

I was still one of the youngest grandchildren and our photographs were still being taken. I remember being perplexed, even at 13, that I once found the picture taking to be such an arduous task but now had an idea of what it meant and would mean. Maybe I realized that some cousins were not much older than me and found them more relatable, maybe the 9/11 attacks had grounded me and I could not find the reason in getting upset over such an insignificance, or maybe I grew up.

There was no need for me to give in anymore because I understood the concept of why the photographs were taken.

The cameras flashed and it was the same process, the same relatives confused by their cameras, our same postures, and the same family members. But then a cousin spoke out. Our aunts and uncles had taken up too much of her time and she decided that she was done. Unexpected but wholly intentional, she stormed off to the bewilderment of our elders. Reacting as we thought we should, the grandchildren celebrated and commented that we had rebelled. I don’t think we believed that, I know I didn’t, but I celebrated our victory anyway.

I cannot recall the atmosphere of the house for the rest of the day, though I am sure it was awkward. I know my mother felt disrespected and spent the rest of the day biting her tongue, wanting to tell her niece how insulted she felt. I also remember thinking that when I was a child, I had more patience than a woman in her twenties; how it was easier for my parents to control a seven year old for five minutes to take his picture than it was for my middle-aged aunt and uncle to scold their collegiate daughter for disrupting a family portrait. However, nothing was said to my cousin, not by her parents or my mother, and it has had a lasting affect. We don’t spend Christmas with that family any more and all the grandchildren have yet to be under the same roof for any holiday.

I felt proud to withstand the years of seemingly torturous photographs without acting in such a way as did my cousin. I was also happy to still be able to see the consequences if I did storm out of the photograph without doing it myself.

***

My mother is the proud owner of dozens of photo albums spanning three decades; photo albums which every picture she has taken. Enveloped between the bindings are the memories that became more than photographs, and the photographs that became a tradition. She started this tradition before I was born with a photograph of my two oldest cousins, brothers seated in front of a Christmas tree when they were three and four years old; it ended 23 years later with eight additional children.

I went through the decades and dusted off each album and realized that the ages of those photographs are their significance. In each picture, I saw in the eyes of my cousins a child yearning to open more gifts, itching in boredom, straining from smiling, yet all immobile. Before I was born, my cousins tried their best to not give in to the temptations of presents, and did so without knowing the importance of the photographs.

As a child I always thought that the photographs were wasting my time and that a present of socks would be more entertaining than sitting there, impatiently waiting for it to be over. But it was never the photographs that I hated because I always anticipated getting them printed. It was the process that wore me, but looking back it was also the process that made the photographs fun.

***

The separation of the families wasn’t an extremity, though the existing tension makes it seem that way. It was, however, only the mere frustration of one person to be the origin of this family dilemma. We did have our normal family disagreements, but this last incident proved to be the most significant. My mother felt disrespected because not only was she the one who started the tradition, but because her sister would not confront her daughter for acting so childish. Now they speak only when it is necessary.

As a child I was told to do something that I felt was boring and time consuming, but as an adult I have realized that life is full of boring and time consuming tasks, which are only proved to be worth doing after their completion. Even after certain tasks are completed and prove to be pointless, that process was a learning experience. I am not looking forward to doing things that are pointless, but I am eager to learn from those experiences because they could have significance later in life, significance that I would later understand.

The Truth of War and the War about Truth (blog 7)

2009-09-29T12:32:00.000-07:00

O'brien's story impacts me becuse of it's frankness about death, war, love, and, of course, the truth.

O'brien's truth in the story is that a true war story is never about the truth. That telling a true war story does not rely on making sure every little detail actually happened or in a particular way. He states that it's hard to tell a true war story because, "there is always that surreal seemingness...which...in fact represents the hard and exact truth as it seemed." True war stories are things that are developed and because you can never relive it (or would want to) you're stuck with the memories you have to establish a new one.

I believe that my answer for truth is very similar to what O'brien tries to convery. Something being true doesn't mean it was/is the truth. Truth doesn't mean something is correct. The impact of truth and what it really means (being something that actually happened or made up) is what your stomach tells you or makes you feel. Truth is ambiguous becasue I believe that telling the truth does not necessarily mean you're being truthful.

Hopefully I am making some sort of sense here and not rambling like a "philosophical" lunatic.

I also gained from reading the story that truth has nothing to do with being moral and it is without meaning. It's hard to back up these ideas with examples becasue most of what I've written is what I feel. So I guess what I am writing is the truth as well.

Reviewing Readings for my own Writing (blog 6)

2009-09-26T16:20:00.000-07:00

My initial thoughts as to what styles I could model my essay after brought me to "A Biography of A Dress" and "My Father Always Said."

I think I can use Kincaid's style because her story is related to a photograph of herself. Why I find this significant is because I am developing a draft for an essay on the same premise (except that my inspiration comes from a series of photographs--but all related to the same idea). What will aid me most is Kincaid's voice repeating that she didn't understand then, but she does now. I think using this concept of hers will help me to meet the requirements of this assignment.

Kincaid's entire story revolves around her experience of looking back at herself wearing that dress, on that day, for that photo, much in the same way I'll be describing my thoughts during and after my photos were taken. I take literal aspects from Kincaid's essay, but relate more to the significance and meaning of Schwartz's "My Father Always Said."

I will reflect on my thoughts while/after these pictures were taken. How I never understood the concept of why or what made it important will be my focus and reflection. This is so because it wasn't until I experienced not taking the photographs and feeling a sense of loss knowing that I won't be able to be part of that process again. This notion is somewhat relative to Schwartz's idea of not realizing her father's temper or why he acted the way he did: I never understood why these pictures were such a necessity at the time, but looking back I do.

Being "Alive" in "Westbury Court" (blog 5)

2009-09-23T10:08:00.000-07:00

Our latest pieces of literature are two of the more personal experiences we've read thus far. The level of first hand accounts help establish the theme, focus, or point of the stories.

Beginning with Alive, a story about a woman traveling through Southern town where a serial killer lurks, Drummond creates an environment where the reader feels the emotion she experienced during the encounter. She does this by stating she is an ex-cop, does not have the security of her gun, and is a plain citizen--as are most of us. Why this is important is the two interpretations I took from it. One being obvious that we live in a tumultuously dangerous world; everyone is vulnerable. The ending left me feeling uneasy about the world in which I live from both the humanitarian perspective and as being a writer.

I took her experience, to be a metaphor as living as a writer. When she concludes, "I am vulnerable, simply, because I am alive," I interpreted that to say I am vulnerable, simply, because I write. Meaning that, as writers, we put our ideas on the page and make ourselves out to be vulnerable, just because we write. The building of suspense in the story makes the reader anxious to know if the speaker makes it out of the town all right, much in the same way we want the speaker of Westbury Court to get out alive as well.

Danicat's story is similarly structured to Drummond's due to the level of increasing suspense. Why this is an effective way of writing is that the reader is not forced to wonder what the speaker is trying to say; they don't feel forced to read on to the conclusion. These stories are blatant in that visceral emotions and reactions are designed to be experienced by the reader without forcing them to feel that way. Both narratives compel the reader to think differently about the world in which they live and the way in which they think, by making all who read them, vulnerable.

Schwartz Says what Her Father Always Said (blog 4)

2009-09-19T05:38:00.000-07:00

The focus of this essay is Schwartz's attempt to help the reader better understand the roles and ideas of our parents. It is the story of a Jewish family that were lucky enough to leave Europe before the start of WWII and not being subjected to the horrors of the Holocaust. She accomplishes her task in a back and forward style of writing. (Back and forth meaning her numerous trips from childhood through adulthood to and from Rindheim)

Her first section is written in a reflective voice, but less conclusive as is her last section. Schwartz explains that her father would feel uneasy about how freely his Americanized daughters lived their lives. You can hear the confusion in her voice in this part of the essay because she did not fully understand why her father always said, "In Rindheim, you didn't do such things." At this point she doesn't dismiss her fathers comments, yet, she doesn't recognize their significance--as she will later.

Schwartz breaks up the essay with gaps that represent a change in tone. The first gap is the relation between Schwartz's aforementioned feeling and her first visit to her father's homeland. Here the story becomes for reflective, but still not to the extent at the end. She uses the gaps to establish her progression in better understanding from where her father's idea are established.

Her father's stories from page 220 until the end exemplify how and why Schwartz reflects. Also, the experience in the graveyard coalesces the immaturity of the young girl that began the story and the grown woman at the end who has realized the extent of her father's thinking

The Difference in Stories (blog 3)

2009-09-16T07:10:00.000-07:00

What sets Montaigne's and Orwell's stories apart from contemporary stories is their writings are much more narrative. Although it can be classified as non-fiction, the voices in these two stories vary greatly in contemporary work more so than in similarity.

Montaigne does not incorporate as much "I" as others writers have whom we have discussed thus far. The motif for most of the stories we have read have contained some element of the first person either doing the action or having something being done to them. Montaigne's archaic language makes the narrative resemble some sort of Biblical story. More importantly is this writing isn't necessarily creative non-fiction, just non-fiction in general. While I read it, I thought about century old anecdotes passed down form generations--not creative non-ficiton.

However, Orwell enables the reader to put themselves in the situation because it only takes him six words before he uses "I". The tension rises throughout the story and I felt as if I was in the moment (being in Burma and shooting the elephant myself.)

Again, Orwell's writing can be classified as creative non-fiction (more so than Montaigne) but because it being a narrative, the voice that was created with "Biography of a Dress" is lost in "Shooting an Elephant." This is the only difference between older narratives and contemporary creative non-fiction. You can feel the emotion in Kincaid's story--you knew she wore that dress for her birhtday. However, Orwell just explains the experience of shooting an elephant, and wasn't able to convince me that he was, in fact, the one who did the shooting.

A "Lott" of Information (blog 2)

2009-09-12T09:05:00.000-07:00

Bret Lott's example of moving toward a definition of creative non-fiction helped me in further establishing my own definition because he was unable to creative one that satisfied himself (giving the reader several from which to work). Throughout his essay, he kept adding more definitions and each one was something that I agreed with--previous to reading his essay--but was unable to say in my own words.

I had tried to find my own description of creative non-fiction but it wasn't until I read Lott's essay that I was able to rely my thoughts into words. For example, one of his definitions is "its way of looking again and again at itself from all angles...to see itself most fully." When I read that it occurred to me that that was the same way I read and interpret poetry. By taking numerous angles and reading from a different perspective, a reader will be able to acknowledge the possibilities of vast interpretations.

Lott puts it simply and says a reason for creative non-fiction is to "see." As basic and fundamental as that first sounded, I now feel it to be true and important. If something is written without the intention of understanding it, or even looking at it, then there would be no point in writing it. The statement is supported when Lott mentions, "Writing is...reactive and proactive." We write because we have a reaction to something, good or bad, and it has struck a chord in us--writing is the exercise best used in forever remembering that feeling. It is also a way we try to capture ourselves; writing is how we try not to forget.

The conclusion of the essay helped direct me toward my personal definition the most. He says, "To understand, and nothing more, and that is everything." I have kept, do keep, and will continue to keep journals--a log of my personal thoughts and experiences--and I always ask why I feel such an impulse to write; I know now that it is to understand, and nothing more.

A Dress and A Photo (blog 2)

2009-09-12T08:14:00.000-07:00

The impressiveness of Kinkaid's essay is the amount of detail, which pertains to a dress worn on a photo shoot when she was an infant, relayed throughout her story. These details, which I will discuss later in this blog, nearly sum up the entire life of the author because the description of the dress relates to her social and economic status.

This piece of literature sets itself apart from the other stories we have read thus far, by the incorporation of the dozens of anecdotes branching from "Biography of a Dress", (where the dress came from, how much did it cost, which clerk attended to her mother in the store, etc). The story could simply be about the day she wore a yellow dress in which to be photographed, but if it was written or interpreted that way it would have lacked the significance of the dress the author felt, and the impact on which it had on her, later on in her life. Kinkaid invites the reader to share in the experience, even if their own life shows no semblance, because her description of that day allows the reader to live it as their own.

There is a phrase Kinkaid repeats numerous times, often changing it's syntax: I did not know that at the time, but I know it now. I interpreted this line as Kinkaid's reflection of, not only the knowledge of the woman who wrote the story, but also, the lack of information and innocense of the two-year old she wrote about. We had discussed in our previous class that creative non-fiction is the establishment of the self and the reflection of that created self. How Kinkaid adds to this notion is that her entire story--a reflection on an event in her early childhood--is centrally focused on a yellow dress made out of cotton poplin; this is how she adds to the idea of what is creative non-fiction.

The significance of wearing a particular outfit for a photo will not have the same meaning for all, or even for most, but Kinkaid's detailed description of her experience allows her readers to understand why a seemingly unimportant facet of her life affected her adulthood to such an extent. Yes, it was just a dress, and yes, it was the only time she wore it, but the purchasing of the dress, her second birthday, her pierced ears, the photo itself, and even Mr. Walker's popped pimple are what make the experience significant.

Creative Non-Fiction: A Definition (blog 1)

2009-09-05T07:43:00.000-07:00

Creative non-fiction is a type of writing where the writer converts experiences, feelings, and thoughts into language. Usually in the form of essays, creative non-fiction allows the writer to expand past the structure of research and informative papers, which aids the artistic flow. This structureless form does not confine the writer, making it easier to experiment with the style, content, and syntax of an essay. I believe at the heart of creative non-fiction is the author's attempt to bring out of themselves, their inner world, by the use of descriptive language and insightful diction.

2009-09-03T11:47:00.000-07:00

First Blog CNF Fall 2009