Reflection time part deux

I sometimes find it hard to actually have the urge to open up my macbook pro from its sleep mode and begin typing about my day, because it is very unproductive at the moment. I have only finals to think about.

But as I am procrastinating again on three edits that are due tomorrow in the morning, along with revision narratives one page each, I decided to reflect a bit and look back on my years.

My freshman year was less exciting than most. Where many were having fun and trying to get out, I was lucky enough to get a ride that first quarter because I didn't get my license over the summer. I luckily received it in october and began driving the car left and right. That habit died very quickly, as my parents constantly remind me.

On top of being in classes, I was unsure of the major that I was pursuing. I didn't know that I wanted to be a social worker. And the remedial English classes were deterring me from doing anything special with English. But I got good grades in my research papers, and teachers were praising me for the work I put into my English papers. And even more so, when it came to identifying the premise behind the story and not being corrected like I used to back in high gave me more incentive to venture into the world of English. By the end of my freshman year, I was getting enrolled in English.

Sophomore year had to have been the most dull that I can remember, because I was focusing a ton on my religious studies as well as a bit of writing classes. I took a religion class that both my advisor and I thought would help me but in the end I had to take a few additional religion classes, to which I am thankful for, because it helped me figure out where my true beliefs lie. I am not saying that I was converted. But I did feel more at ease with my spiritual and religious philosophies. I no longer stood petrified at the thought of life after death, and I simply just began living out what I have been calling life.

Junior year was a butt load of writing and English lit classes. I felt as though my popping out of story after story was proving to be uninterested, and started making me want to challenge my writing, and begin an outlet for creative non-fiction, which I loved. I still decided to write some fiction pieces, but without a thought I would have careless tossed in the trash bin where they belong. By junior year was also the time that I found a stable job that had specific hours to comply with, and I had people working under me and also working with me. Plus, it was on campus so that was also nice; I was saving up the gas.

Until finally, my senior year. I recall good memories and bad. I recall changing my position as a tutor towards an office assistant. I watched plays with friends and laughed when we talked about our stories in humor writing. I wrote with purpose again because I wanted to go for a humorous appeal while also contemplating what I would want to publish later on in my life. I studied an epic poem that further made me philosophically question my position in this world. I started a writing group which I intend to follow through in the summer as we collaborate and critique works. I have a checklist of books that are waiting for me to hop into bed with them, while the drawer light encompasses and gives me eyes I need due to my lack of night vision. I want to camp, go to the beach, run again, build up my knee strength to have it work again. But most importantly...

I need to find a job to pay my phone bill. *sigh*

A fictitious piece deserves a better title than this...

I am recently working on my story and am noticing that I am just putting together ideas. And although I have the concept of the idea intact, I still don't know how to begin this story.

From the authors that I have read countless times, they always start it at the middle of their life in time to begin the conflict, and others do it at the end and chronicle their past up until that point from which they are writing it.

I feel like doing it one way and then feel myself trying to do it another. I want to begin at the end when I haven't even started at the beginning.

I have to constantly remind myself, these pages that I am going to send out are only 25 pages. If I want to start at the beginning, I have to be able to point out the conflict as well as the beginning. But no climax would feel too much like a tease that didn't want to start the foreplay in the first place.

Still, I believe that starting from the beginning of her journey (or maybe somewhere in between) can prove it to be a better read. That way, the reader is already beginning to suspect that something is going on. A book that reminds me of this was Summer Sisters by Judy Blume, and how she began from the middle of the book and began from the very beginning. If anything, that should bring about an interest as well as a way to tell my story.

It's just these types of thoughts that stop me from going further. Where to begin?

I should begin where I feel the best way to begin.

The end of paper...

Yesterday night as everyone was getting ready for bed my niece asked me if I still write in my journals. I told her yes and made a mental note to hide them (my family comes from a long line of meddling in affairs that aren't their own; it's their way of looking out as they like to call it). She told me happily that she too still writes, just not on an actual paper journal, like this purple one imprinted with stars an a moon and an inspirational quote. She writes on her electronic device.

I know I am preaching to the choir when I talk about writing on electronic devices, but I also like to point out that I still write in my actual journals, like I mentioned before.

But here are the differences in writing in my journal vs writing on the computer.

My journal is influenced by certain feelings that relate on a more personal level, and I am not one to release certain things online like so many others. Many people will say, "that's because you aren't showing your true self; you are ashamed of who you are," to which I say no. If you wish to recount every tiny little thing that has ever happened to you and put it online for the whole world to see, that is and forever will be your business.

I feel that everyone needs that barrier of protection; to hide away some part of you is half the fun for the rest of society. They don't truly know everything there is about you to claim whether you are this person. But only when they get to know you on a more personal level, the relationship can change to where you have either common interests or your surprised by them.

What I post here are more for fun, and to practice writing. My other blog on tumblr is more or less the same thing, only for pictures.

But it is something when I write on paper and when I write about myself that I truly feel those layers deteriorate. Just like I said, it's a more personal level with yourself because you aren't going to show what you have written, it's your own handwriting, and if you make a mistake, it's not as simple as clicking the delete button anymore. It's a permanent mark, just like every decision you have made up until the end of it all.

That's why I was saddened to hear the fact that my niece is writing on her iPod touch. Sure there is still that sense of privacy, but it is no longer something that is delicate or your mistakes to be shown. It is simply monotone in characteristic. There is no more hand writing.

And that is what truly makes me sad. But again, I am preaching to the choir, but I still hope you that read this take this post into consideration, and think about how much you depend on your technology to help you out with your feelings.