Ah, so sad. Our last blog post. I believe this is past due, however, i will submit it anyways. My favorite thing about the Orchid Thief was the underlying passion Susan Orleans kept in her writing. She claimed to not feel at all passionate about anything. As Landon brought up in class the other day, how can she not be passionate about writing? I mean, one must be to be able to write 3 hundred or so pages about flowers right? I think Susan is passionate about her writing but, i don't think she considers it a passion. That seems odd i'm sure. Hear me out, though. A professor of mine (who just so happened to be a grad student also, which goes with my theory that grad students make the best teachers because they are in the middle of being taught) told me that writers do not write because they want to. Writers write because they physically feel that they have to. They write because without writing their head might explode or they might start screaming and never stop. I like it. I think that's why i write. It helps if i feel passionate about what i am writing about. Sometimes though, i'm not. That's why i feel Susans Orleans passion more than i read about it. I think everyone felt it. She couldn't help the control these orchids had over her. I don't think it was about the orchids. I think it was about finding a really great story.
I was frustrated at the end of the book. As i believe most of us were. I wanted passion, guts, glory...something. But she didn't give it to us. Which is lovely when you think about it. It's more like life than anything i have ever read. Most days nothing happens to me either. Well actually nothing happens to me at all. It was like life.
I don't really wish to talk much about the book. It was a good read, slow at some points, but i feel brighter for having ingesting ingested it.
The movie was absolutely kick ass. It is a WAY creative interpretation of the novel. I like Nicholas Cage's lines in it. The whole thing about being so egotistical he wrote himself into his own script. That line made me laugh. My little brother asked to read some of my writing the other day. I showed his something i wrote for this class. He's a profound little asshole and when he finished he looked at me and said "damn Alex aren't you vain." I think i prefer to call myself funnily self-deprecating. He's right. I mean all writers are pretty egotistical. How the hell could we put ourselves all the way out there on the page without an ego? We'd be utterly naked, and probably better writers.
So i've been rambling on about pretty much nothing. Trying to stretch this into 500 words. But i've got to go to my spanish exam. Cue sticking my finger towards my opened mouth and gagging grossly. I really appreciated this class Dave. I want to thank you for such "never too harsh just harsh enough" writerly wisdom. Checked out your blog. Dig it.
Friday, November 20, 2009
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Thin Blue Line
The entire time i was watching this movie i was convinced i would figure it out. I paid articulate attention to the 27 reenacted scenes of the murder, each time calculated the slight differences it possessed from the others. I was, and still am, fascinated by the perceptions of others.
My initial reaction to the story line was--cool a nonfiction piece un-convicted someone. That's baddass! Then the idea of why someone simply showing the multifacets of the truth could change the way people believed something happened began to sink in. The entire movie was based on truth. Not truth necessarily in the outright sense--he did this she did that--but truth in the eyes of perception. It really sought to analyze memory and the way in which people view things. During the film, contradictions littered the dialogue quicker than beer cans litter frat parties.
Holy shit, so is there really such a thing as true?
A friend of mine always says, in his characteristically cynical way, "there is no such thing as an original thought." I like to push him into explaining himself. He believes that every thought a person conceives is based on a prior knowledge of something similar being said, thought, or did. He discounts imagination as original because humans start from a normal blueprint then discount that blueprint to make something up. So in imagining something you really are just telling of how things are not. Which is not original because you have to be aware of how things are to claim that they are not. And the only way you learn how things are is by being told about them or experiencing them. He believes that every stream that passes through our head is built off of something we already knew or were told about.
I don't care for this philosophical cop-out. I don't think my friend really believes it either. I mean if he did where does he get off acting all hoity toity about his theory. He didn't make it up. It's not original.
I was thinking about this when i watched the movie though. I know, how does it apply? I was thinking about it in the sense that we don't actually know what happened. No one actually knew what happened. Even the killer and the cop saw the scene as different. We all filter things through our own perception. So maybe there is no exact truth to any situation.
I loved the way this notion was brought out by the direction of the movie. The contradictions were key to me because they truly showed me that no one ever really knew what the fuck happened or what was happening. He didn't kill the guy though. I do know that. I wonder why the 16 year old did though? I wonder how he justified the act as being true to his nature?
My initial reaction to the story line was--cool a nonfiction piece un-convicted someone. That's baddass! Then the idea of why someone simply showing the multifacets of the truth could change the way people believed something happened began to sink in. The entire movie was based on truth. Not truth necessarily in the outright sense--he did this she did that--but truth in the eyes of perception. It really sought to analyze memory and the way in which people view things. During the film, contradictions littered the dialogue quicker than beer cans litter frat parties.
Holy shit, so is there really such a thing as true?
A friend of mine always says, in his characteristically cynical way, "there is no such thing as an original thought." I like to push him into explaining himself. He believes that every thought a person conceives is based on a prior knowledge of something similar being said, thought, or did. He discounts imagination as original because humans start from a normal blueprint then discount that blueprint to make something up. So in imagining something you really are just telling of how things are not. Which is not original because you have to be aware of how things are to claim that they are not. And the only way you learn how things are is by being told about them or experiencing them. He believes that every stream that passes through our head is built off of something we already knew or were told about.
I don't care for this philosophical cop-out. I don't think my friend really believes it either. I mean if he did where does he get off acting all hoity toity about his theory. He didn't make it up. It's not original.
I was thinking about this when i watched the movie though. I know, how does it apply? I was thinking about it in the sense that we don't actually know what happened. No one actually knew what happened. Even the killer and the cop saw the scene as different. We all filter things through our own perception. So maybe there is no exact truth to any situation.
I loved the way this notion was brought out by the direction of the movie. The contradictions were key to me because they truly showed me that no one ever really knew what the fuck happened or what was happening. He didn't kill the guy though. I do know that. I wonder why the 16 year old did though? I wonder how he justified the act as being true to his nature?
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Brevity
I read Brevity in its entirety. Then i read some past issues in their entirety. I really dig this magazine. My favorite short to date is "Studies for a drawing in red." I love the color of the piece (scuz the pun). I can see the little boy sitting on the back porch waiting for the hummingbirds. I laughed out loud at "It's Valentines day, you ass wipe." However, i don't know what it means.
I love when i read something and i get to the end and feel fulfilled. For many this is because there is closure or because it had a nice outcome. For me, i love things for the unanswered. I find this to be difficult. I want to write and simply just let people take it for what it is. I go back to the Sam Shepard quote: "Do you go to a rolling stones concert and ask 'what does it mean?'"
I don't care what A. Papatya Bucak (such a writerly name) means in his/her story. I love that i feel red when i read it. I love that in a few short lines i can go 'aww', laugh, and stare at my wrists as i imagine them 'run(ning).'
So many times people ask me what my poems mean. Especially my mother. Is this about me? Hell no it's not about you. Where in the world would you get that? But then i look at it, really dissect each line, and yeah it is kind of about her. Everything i write is usually about my life. In one screwed up way or another. So yeah, mom is in my life; yeah, she's in the poem.
I get that feel when i read other peoples work. There is something just under the surface that i do not understand. I'm okay with that. I like looking at things through others goggles.
Back to red. I have the jumbled emotional attachment to the line "Shall I paint my nails, dye my hair, rouge my cheeks, shroud myself in my living room curtains—red red red?" I want to say this is the point of the piece. I also want to say that i don't get it in the way it is meant. I have asked these questions. Well not exactly, i'm not that clever, but i have had these meanderings when evaluating my own physical failings.
Isn't it wonderful? This whole learning about life by listening to life.
I love when i read something and i get to the end and feel fulfilled. For many this is because there is closure or because it had a nice outcome. For me, i love things for the unanswered. I find this to be difficult. I want to write and simply just let people take it for what it is. I go back to the Sam Shepard quote: "Do you go to a rolling stones concert and ask 'what does it mean?'"
I don't care what A. Papatya Bucak (such a writerly name) means in his/her story. I love that i feel red when i read it. I love that in a few short lines i can go 'aww', laugh, and stare at my wrists as i imagine them 'run(ning).'
So many times people ask me what my poems mean. Especially my mother. Is this about me? Hell no it's not about you. Where in the world would you get that? But then i look at it, really dissect each line, and yeah it is kind of about her. Everything i write is usually about my life. In one screwed up way or another. So yeah, mom is in my life; yeah, she's in the poem.
I get that feel when i read other peoples work. There is something just under the surface that i do not understand. I'm okay with that. I like looking at things through others goggles.
Back to red. I have the jumbled emotional attachment to the line "Shall I paint my nails, dye my hair, rouge my cheeks, shroud myself in my living room curtains—red red red?" I want to say this is the point of the piece. I also want to say that i don't get it in the way it is meant. I have asked these questions. Well not exactly, i'm not that clever, but i have had these meanderings when evaluating my own physical failings.
Isn't it wonderful? This whole learning about life by listening to life.
Monday, October 12, 2009
Essay as a genre.
While reading this work i stumbled across the line ""The mixture of elements in the essay--the unsorted 'wholeness' of experience it represents-- can only be held together by the concept of self. The selection and order of the ideas and objects can have no other basis. The order is 'as it occurred to me,' not 'as it usually occurs.'" I have been toying with order a lot in my recent essays. I wish my memory were chronological. It would make telling stories a whole heck of a lot easier; however, my memory is like one jumbled pit of twenty years in which nothing has a certain order. I can look back to when i was 7 and get memories of opening flowery wrapped presents that my mother assures me i "got when i was 4." The past is warped but even more disconcerting is that last weekend is warped.
I find myself writing a piece how i usually do. Sitting at my laptop with the intention of keying in some moments and suddenly it's 2:40 AM and i am looking at 5 pages of word vomit. Then i take the paragraphs and jumble them up. Tell about meeting someone before i had actually met them or place waking up before i actually went to sleep. It's confusing to me because i have lived it. It is probably not even something anyone else notices. I like to warp order, though. I mean, nonfiction is a very relative term. (Whoa! dangerous waters, i know.) I think i like to play with chronological details simply because it happened to me and i want it to appear more interesting than it actually was. I feel the need to entice a reader more than by straight-forward experience alone. But, by doing it on purpose am i discombobulating the notion of truth in the above quote? Or is it more true because it allows me to introduce a reader to someone and tell how i feel about them before i show my actual reaction to them? Which, raises an even bigger question for me--are good non-fiction writers good simply because really cool things have happened to them, or because they can show even the banal things in life in a relatable way?
I really hope it's the second. I am not a cool kid. :)
I find myself writing a piece how i usually do. Sitting at my laptop with the intention of keying in some moments and suddenly it's 2:40 AM and i am looking at 5 pages of word vomit. Then i take the paragraphs and jumble them up. Tell about meeting someone before i had actually met them or place waking up before i actually went to sleep. It's confusing to me because i have lived it. It is probably not even something anyone else notices. I like to warp order, though. I mean, nonfiction is a very relative term. (Whoa! dangerous waters, i know.) I think i like to play with chronological details simply because it happened to me and i want it to appear more interesting than it actually was. I feel the need to entice a reader more than by straight-forward experience alone. But, by doing it on purpose am i discombobulating the notion of truth in the above quote? Or is it more true because it allows me to introduce a reader to someone and tell how i feel about them before i show my actual reaction to them? Which, raises an even bigger question for me--are good non-fiction writers good simply because really cool things have happened to them, or because they can show even the banal things in life in a relatable way?
I really hope it's the second. I am not a cool kid. :)
Monday, October 5, 2009
Man on Wire
Throughout watching this movie i focused on the passion of Phillipe and the internal calling he had to walk across the wire. His drive to complete these dangerous walks, especially the one across the twin towers, is admirable and utterly untouchable for me. When he spoke of it, his dream, he flailed his arms around enthusiastically and the look in his eyes was almost inane. I have never felt that driven or called to do anything. It was a beautiful thing to see his face change during his last walk. He started with an essence of fear and concentration and then he smiled and started to laugh.
My big question at the end of the movie was in his motive. I understand the honor and prestige a wire walker received when walking in Notre Dam however, i do not understand why Phillipe felt the need to be so achieving. Why was one not enough?
The act of setting the wire up and sneaking into the building was so extremely taxing. This was apparent when one of the men in his team began crying during an interview. What an emotional roller coaster it must have been. I do not understand how Phillipe did not feel such a stress and unattainable relief when the deeds were accomplished.
Phillipe could go either way for me. He is either one of the craziest people i have ever heard of or he is so admiringly brave and interesting. I fall towards the latter most of the time. I loved getting to see him speak in the personal interviews. He got high off of walking the wire. I believe it was an addiction for him.
The notion of addiction trips me up as well. Why do we do such dangerous things to ourselves? I was watching some television program with my little brother last night that featured thrill-seeking motorcross riders and the feats they accomplished. One man had shattered his pelvis and as he held up bars in each of his hands (the bars that were the size of those holding his legs together) he nodded and laughed as he said he still rides everyday and still jumps across buildings. Then my little brother looked at me with this mixture of awe and admiration on his face as he said, "i would kill to be that good." Good? This guy has fallen from high enough heights that he literally has pieces of re-bar holding his legs in place? How is that appealing?
Human beings do thrill seeking things everyday though. When i look inward, i know i do it too. I've jumped off a bridge and swan dive style plunged into a murky river that i couldn't see the bottom of. Why? I did it because it was fun. The adrenaline pumping through my arms and legs after i swam to the bank still makes my head spin in memory. I climb 60-90 feet up a rock face just to get to the top? What the hell for?
I guess i do these things because i can. Phillipe walked on the wire for more than that. I'm just not sure what it was.
My big question at the end of the movie was in his motive. I understand the honor and prestige a wire walker received when walking in Notre Dam however, i do not understand why Phillipe felt the need to be so achieving. Why was one not enough?
The act of setting the wire up and sneaking into the building was so extremely taxing. This was apparent when one of the men in his team began crying during an interview. What an emotional roller coaster it must have been. I do not understand how Phillipe did not feel such a stress and unattainable relief when the deeds were accomplished.
Phillipe could go either way for me. He is either one of the craziest people i have ever heard of or he is so admiringly brave and interesting. I fall towards the latter most of the time. I loved getting to see him speak in the personal interviews. He got high off of walking the wire. I believe it was an addiction for him.
The notion of addiction trips me up as well. Why do we do such dangerous things to ourselves? I was watching some television program with my little brother last night that featured thrill-seeking motorcross riders and the feats they accomplished. One man had shattered his pelvis and as he held up bars in each of his hands (the bars that were the size of those holding his legs together) he nodded and laughed as he said he still rides everyday and still jumps across buildings. Then my little brother looked at me with this mixture of awe and admiration on his face as he said, "i would kill to be that good." Good? This guy has fallen from high enough heights that he literally has pieces of re-bar holding his legs in place? How is that appealing?
Human beings do thrill seeking things everyday though. When i look inward, i know i do it too. I've jumped off a bridge and swan dive style plunged into a murky river that i couldn't see the bottom of. Why? I did it because it was fun. The adrenaline pumping through my arms and legs after i swam to the bank still makes my head spin in memory. I climb 60-90 feet up a rock face just to get to the top? What the hell for?
I guess i do these things because i can. Phillipe walked on the wire for more than that. I'm just not sure what it was.
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Winter Wheat
Satya is still kicking my ass. It's showing up everywhere. Isin't that how it is though. Once i bought my Chevy Cavalier i found that like 7 billion people in the world have gold chevy cavaliers exactly like mine. Awesome, and i thought i was so original.
When i read Winter Wheat i couldn't help but focus on the notion of truth. I've been having a really hard time dicerning truth from fiction lately. The way that the Grandfather and Father's stories overlap and pick up on each others gaps feels like my struggle with the truth. I start telling a story and then i realize, well shit, that's really not how it happened. So how did it happen? Did it even happen at all? Ahhh anxiety kills the women in my family quicker than our terrible tendency towards menthol cigarettes. ... wow must write now, will return to homework later.
When i read Winter Wheat i couldn't help but focus on the notion of truth. I've been having a really hard time dicerning truth from fiction lately. The way that the Grandfather and Father's stories overlap and pick up on each others gaps feels like my struggle with the truth. I start telling a story and then i realize, well shit, that's really not how it happened. So how did it happen? Did it even happen at all? Ahhh anxiety kills the women in my family quicker than our terrible tendency towards menthol cigarettes. ... wow must write now, will return to homework later.
Water
This first time i read through the 'water essay' in Short Takes I have to admit i was a little confused. Okay, she has these really vivid memory from when she was a kid. Cool. So, what does it mean?
When Landon, Megan and I unpacked the extremely short essay during class we noticed some things i would have probably not picked up on on my own. For instance, we got stuck on the line "artist unglued on a scrap of glued wood." Not only is this beautifully poetic and fun to say, but, it's almost a paradox in itself. The boy riding the raging current is called an artist because why? I think it's because he was the only one brave enough to attempt to surf the water. The author even says, a few lines later, how they all wanted to be him. Everyone in some way or another wishes to be an artist. I don't mean this in a literal sense. I just think everyone wants to be original. I mean, no one looks at themselves in the mirror and says 'good i will not be noticed for a single thing today.' Wow, talk about digressing. Anyway, this artist is unglued on glued wood. He is crazy for trying to surf the wave, and yet, it's not that crazy of an idea really. It seems doable. I think this line can be analogous to a writers dream of being published. It's crazy and we all at one point in our lives think we are complete idiots for doing it, but we still try.
If i were to take the entire meaning of the essay in the way that i like to look at that line however, it would be very depressing. I think the intending meaning of the work as a whole is to symbolize youth to the flow of a river. Water, like time, is constantly moving and rushing past. Time doesn't care who it leaves in its wake or who doesn't make it.
The style of the piece helps to define the meaning of it. The beginning is composed of very short choppy sentences that are pretty constant in form. Then, the body of the piece contains long run-on-esk sentences that fuel the story forward. The end reverts back to the short chop language used in the beginning. It's like childhood. There is the beginning, which none of us really remember and is pretty simple. Then there is the growing up part. Which, for the most part, sucks and is really confusing and difficult. Then it ends--super quick, almost like it never started.
I have a hard time with the ending. Is he dead? Or will he collect the shards of his torn red shirt and start laughing? I want to know, but at the same time i don't think it matters. The piece is all about the parts when life and time is moving. Not when it's stilled. The writers offers no internal dialogue after the boy runs into the wall and the water rushes past him. It's just over. The story, and the moment. I think it adds more than it detracts from the story because it follows the short story with a short abrupt ending. I have whiplash. I think I'm supposed to though. Someone once told me (this was in reference to music) "everything you need to hear is in the reverb of the strings." I want to apply that notion here. Everything that is important is in what is not said or known. Like life.
When Landon, Megan and I unpacked the extremely short essay during class we noticed some things i would have probably not picked up on on my own. For instance, we got stuck on the line "artist unglued on a scrap of glued wood." Not only is this beautifully poetic and fun to say, but, it's almost a paradox in itself. The boy riding the raging current is called an artist because why? I think it's because he was the only one brave enough to attempt to surf the water. The author even says, a few lines later, how they all wanted to be him. Everyone in some way or another wishes to be an artist. I don't mean this in a literal sense. I just think everyone wants to be original. I mean, no one looks at themselves in the mirror and says 'good i will not be noticed for a single thing today.' Wow, talk about digressing. Anyway, this artist is unglued on glued wood. He is crazy for trying to surf the wave, and yet, it's not that crazy of an idea really. It seems doable. I think this line can be analogous to a writers dream of being published. It's crazy and we all at one point in our lives think we are complete idiots for doing it, but we still try.
If i were to take the entire meaning of the essay in the way that i like to look at that line however, it would be very depressing. I think the intending meaning of the work as a whole is to symbolize youth to the flow of a river. Water, like time, is constantly moving and rushing past. Time doesn't care who it leaves in its wake or who doesn't make it.
The style of the piece helps to define the meaning of it. The beginning is composed of very short choppy sentences that are pretty constant in form. Then, the body of the piece contains long run-on-esk sentences that fuel the story forward. The end reverts back to the short chop language used in the beginning. It's like childhood. There is the beginning, which none of us really remember and is pretty simple. Then there is the growing up part. Which, for the most part, sucks and is really confusing and difficult. Then it ends--super quick, almost like it never started.
I have a hard time with the ending. Is he dead? Or will he collect the shards of his torn red shirt and start laughing? I want to know, but at the same time i don't think it matters. The piece is all about the parts when life and time is moving. Not when it's stilled. The writers offers no internal dialogue after the boy runs into the wall and the water rushes past him. It's just over. The story, and the moment. I think it adds more than it detracts from the story because it follows the short story with a short abrupt ending. I have whiplash. I think I'm supposed to though. Someone once told me (this was in reference to music) "everything you need to hear is in the reverb of the strings." I want to apply that notion here. Everything that is important is in what is not said or known. Like life.
Ross McElwee: Time Indefinite
I missed the beginning of the movie so as i slunk into my seat and pulled my feet up under me in a comfortable position i heard him say "and so i accompanied her to her gynecologist appointment." I think it's safe to say the movie at me at the word 'gynecologist.'
I had heard this piece before watching the movie in class. "This American Life" read the script on one of its pod casts last year and i was fortunate enough to listen to it while slinging back some red stripe.
Watching it was completely different than listening to it.
I never thought about the implications of showing someone exactly what you mean by providing visual evidence for them. I want to focus on the part in the movie where Charlene refuses to throw away the ashes. Hearing the scene was heart wrenching enough. The words used and the way she is described as being "painfully in between" (or something like that) of denial and acceptance is very raw for me. Then to not only hear her regret and refusal to toss them into the water but to also see it on her face and in the way she clutched the bag of ashes close to her chest was especially mind titillating. I had imagined it so differently in my head when i heard the story the first time.
Seeing the film made the piece more funny for me. When i listened to it i remember laughing but then feeling a little sadistic for thinking someone carrying around ashes is funny. When i saw it though, i laughed hard and with others. I thought 'see! i knew that was funny! I'm not sadistic!' The humor is what makes the movie relatable. Sometimes it's easier to laugh about the gross and twisty parts of life.
I dug the movie to say the least. I'm also really glad i went because, not that i didn't have faith in you Dr. Dave, i was afraid it was going to be boring. It was really cool though.
I had heard this piece before watching the movie in class. "This American Life" read the script on one of its pod casts last year and i was fortunate enough to listen to it while slinging back some red stripe.
Watching it was completely different than listening to it.
I never thought about the implications of showing someone exactly what you mean by providing visual evidence for them. I want to focus on the part in the movie where Charlene refuses to throw away the ashes. Hearing the scene was heart wrenching enough. The words used and the way she is described as being "painfully in between" (or something like that) of denial and acceptance is very raw for me. Then to not only hear her regret and refusal to toss them into the water but to also see it on her face and in the way she clutched the bag of ashes close to her chest was especially mind titillating. I had imagined it so differently in my head when i heard the story the first time.
Seeing the film made the piece more funny for me. When i listened to it i remember laughing but then feeling a little sadistic for thinking someone carrying around ashes is funny. When i saw it though, i laughed hard and with others. I thought 'see! i knew that was funny! I'm not sadistic!' The humor is what makes the movie relatable. Sometimes it's easier to laugh about the gross and twisty parts of life.
I dug the movie to say the least. I'm also really glad i went because, not that i didn't have faith in you Dr. Dave, i was afraid it was going to be boring. It was really cool though.
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Sanders' Quote
"I choose to write about my experiences not because is it mine but because it seems to me a door through which others might pass" (Sanders, 38).
Holy wow! This quote is something that will change the way I write for forever. I have always had a problem with writing about my own experiences, not because I'm dark and twisty but because I never felt that anyone should care to know my personal experiences. I mean I think every writer has an issue with being vulnerable on the page, but this quote helps me rationalize that.
It is fun for me to think about my writing as something that is not about me. It is about me because it happened to me or they are my thoughts but it is not for me. My writing can be used as a function by the reader. They can identify with it because they have been there before, or they can understand how one would get into some situations. It is not about bearing my soul and embarrassing experiences to the world. It is simply about being honest enough that its happened somewhere else before and someone else can relate to it.
It also kind of puts a spin on the thought of how well written work is truly a gift to the people. I'm not thinking a gift in the heaven-choir-sing-songy gift but in the true "wow thank god someones been there before" gift.
I have not had any history of alcoholism in my family but when i think about Sanders' essay about his alcoholic father in relationship to his quote, i feel justified in understanding such a personal piece. I have never been there before and Sanders' is not asking me, as a reader, to have sympathy or even empathy for him. He is just asking me to listen and take from it what i will. Though, i have never been in his situation the piece did truly affect me. It made me think about my mother and how she would frantically clean the house for hours on end. How one time, when i was six, she was determined to get paint off of a door by scraping at it with her fingernails and ended up with a sharp shard of dried paint under her nail that bled for seemingly ever.
It's crazy that i conjured up those thoughts but i was only able to do that because i could relate to Sanders' emotion in the essay.
I want to write about my life so others can pass through a door of my world and hopefully theirs.
Holy wow! This quote is something that will change the way I write for forever. I have always had a problem with writing about my own experiences, not because I'm dark and twisty but because I never felt that anyone should care to know my personal experiences. I mean I think every writer has an issue with being vulnerable on the page, but this quote helps me rationalize that.
It is fun for me to think about my writing as something that is not about me. It is about me because it happened to me or they are my thoughts but it is not for me. My writing can be used as a function by the reader. They can identify with it because they have been there before, or they can understand how one would get into some situations. It is not about bearing my soul and embarrassing experiences to the world. It is simply about being honest enough that its happened somewhere else before and someone else can relate to it.
It also kind of puts a spin on the thought of how well written work is truly a gift to the people. I'm not thinking a gift in the heaven-choir-sing-songy gift but in the true "wow thank god someones been there before" gift.
I have not had any history of alcoholism in my family but when i think about Sanders' essay about his alcoholic father in relationship to his quote, i feel justified in understanding such a personal piece. I have never been there before and Sanders' is not asking me, as a reader, to have sympathy or even empathy for him. He is just asking me to listen and take from it what i will. Though, i have never been in his situation the piece did truly affect me. It made me think about my mother and how she would frantically clean the house for hours on end. How one time, when i was six, she was determined to get paint off of a door by scraping at it with her fingernails and ended up with a sharp shard of dried paint under her nail that bled for seemingly ever.
It's crazy that i conjured up those thoughts but i was only able to do that because i could relate to Sanders' emotion in the essay.
I want to write about my life so others can pass through a door of my world and hopefully theirs.
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