©2019 Thinking-Silence
The Night Before Christmas I can’t remember specifically how old I was, maybe four or five. I remember that it was the year we got our Dell computer. You know, the big bulky screen with the old keyboard that either annoys or satisfies the user’s ears when the keys were hit consistently? We got it in the early 2000s, after our last computer died out on us, I believe. My grandma bought it for us for Christmas, since my dad could see how computers, and technology in general, were being integrated into our lives (thanks dad for being one of the good ones and catching on). That really isn’t the point right now. Anyways, I remember that Microsoft Word 2000 was downloaded onto our computer. My dad also put on the large encyclopedia thing, or maybe it was a website, I’m not sure. But I loved using the computer. I loved having all of the knowledge and the world at my fingertips. Crazy how we have that now, but even faster, isn’t it? I loved using Word most though. I remember writing all types of things on there. I loved using all of the WordArt that they had, and honestly the new WordArt doesn’t even compare to what we had back then. I just loved typing on the keys and watching the words appear on the screen, and if I spelled something wrong, then it would be corrected by just right-clicking on it. The thing I remember most about it was a story I was working on. It wasn’t anything crazy or special, we all have to remember I’m young here; kindergarten or preschool age. I specifically remember that the story was about seven kittens who were waiting in their bed, unable to fall asleep on Christmas Eve. One kitten, I think the name was Madison or something, decided to sneak downstairs after hearing a noise; and the noise came from the Grinch. Think about this for a second, the Grinch, who starred Jim Carey, came out right before Christmas, so it made a pretty big impact on me. I don’t know why this has always impacted me so much. I know I never finished the story (RIP I never know how to), but it’s still floating around in that big tower in storage. I guess it started my take off as a writer, especially since I was encouraged by my parents to continue writing. I never let them read my things once I hit middle school or so (ugh teen hormones), but I’ve always thought of them as the people who helped start me on the journey of writing and creating pieces of work.
Poetry While my love for reading and writing poetry started in middle school, one of the prime memories I have is my freshman year of high school. During our poetry segment, Ms. Mushbach gave us the freedom to write whatever we wished to. However, it had to be created into a portfolio, and they had to be different types of poems. We also could share them with the rest of the class, but during that time I just decided not to because it seemed like too much work and effort. Anyways, we had to turn in our portfolios and we started working on something else (I can’t remember what it was, but we were in the library on their computers) when suddenly my teacher sits down next to me. Now normally this isn’t a big deal because teachers like knowing what you’re doing and if you need any help, but she has this look of concern on her face that tells me it’s not going to be one of those conversations. She then starts discussing how much she loves my writing and that it’s very powerful, but there are some concerns she has to address as a teacher. She asks if my home life is okay and everything like that. Which I have a great home life, just sometimes that’s just how you express yourself and your feelings (you know, angst teen things-not really). But she of course understands and leaves it at that; with me, at least. Something else that should be stated is that various times in my K-12 education, my parents would get various calls from schools about “something is wrong with your child”. One was in first grade because the lunch teachers were concerned that I had an eating disorder because I wouldn’t eat the lunch at the school. In 4th grade my mom received a call from my art teacher because my grade was very low. It’s not my fault that I can’t do art like the rest of my friends (literally all of them are artists in some way, shape or form. One of them is becoming an art teacher). So at least in this case, I was able to give my mom a heads up that she was probably gonna get a call from my English teacher, which she did. I think this was when I noticed that my writing can have an impact on other people. It can move people in various of ways, for both good and bad. I was always moved by other people’s, especially since I read so much, but this was the first time I’ve noticed that people would be moved by mine. I think it was a powerful thing, because it shows how much words can move people and effect people in different ways. It was exciting, but also terrifying; how much should I share with people if they are going to react in this way?
Sociology: So this is the story on why I dropped my class. This is also when I realized that not everyone can enhance your writing ability, but inhibit it. So I was in my sophomore year of college. I was in my community college at the time taking a sociology class (obviously). Anyways the class didn’t seem too hard at first, but with the professor we had she made the class practically miserable. Our first assignment was a three page paper on our own social classes, our town’s social class, etc. We had to discuss what it was like being in our own social class and what it was like living in a town of that social class, things like that if it makes sense. Basically we were talking about how society works based on social classes and we down-scaled it do it would make sense to us. It seemed like a pretty simple assignment, and something that all of could relate to in some way. Well it was turned in and it had taken her a couple of weeks to grade them all. Honestly it’s not that long; she had a few classes and the class size averages out to about thirty people or so. I mean, she could have probably been faster but it’s whatever. Anyways we got our papers back, and I was feeling fairly confident on my paper. I went over it a few times and checked it with other people to see if it flowed well and to see if it fit all of the criteria with the assignment. It seemed like it did, to me anyways, so when she handed me back a paper with a D on it, I was pretty shocked honestly. I’ve never failed a paper in my life (like I honestly think the lowest grade I’ve ever received on a paper was a B). Glancing over it, the comments were pretty short and most of the things were minor grammar issues. The person I am, I know that the massive grade drop could not have been because of grammar issues. On the rubric it wasn’t worth very many points, so it had to be the content of the paper. So I went into her office hours. I figured she could explain to me better about what I could improve on for next time, because obviously this grade is not acceptable. When I went in to talk to her, the only things she would say was that “it didn’t sound right” and that “it was just wrong”. Now I know my writing skills aren’t perfect. I know that maybe I could have added in more to certain sections (except I couldn’t because of the page limit), but telling someone the paper is just wrong is not the way to go about things. I can’t do any better in that class if you can’t give me any better feedback than it’s wrong. Like yes obviously it’s wrong. I can see by the grade this wasn’t the type of paper that you wanted. When she couldn’t give me any better feedback, I decided that for my best interest, it was best to drop the class. I would not be able to better myself if those were the types of comments I would receive. I tried to reach out to her, but it felt like I wasn’t worth her time and I didn’t need a better explanation beyond it was wrong. What’s funny is that now my girlfriend’s little sister is taking her class. I hope she does better than I did, but by her begging for me to do her homework last night, it sounds like she is in the same vote I was. RIP Darc. Regardless, I still think this incident was a learning moment for me. For years I always have had teachers that would support my writing, give great feedback, and if I had any other questions that they would help me the best way that they can. As someone who wants to be a future educator, it definitely showed me that I NEVER want to be a teacher like her. I want my future students to succeed, and I have to be able to help them in any way I can for them to do so. This wasn’t the way to do it.
My grandma always said “if you can read and write, you can do anything”, and that is something I take very dear to heart. That’s why slaves weren’t taught, that’s why books were burned, and it’s how people kept those in the lower class in the lower class. Reading and writing is so important in all societies, that it should be nurtured and taught so we can all flourish together. That’s how we advance to become better. Lmao that was a doozy, sorry y’all. If you read the entire thing, let me know what was your best or worst writing experience. It doesn’t have to be an insane story but we all come from different backgrounds and I think it would be interesting to see how similar, or different, we all are.
Comments