Short short stories

For someone who is considering being a writer, I am incredibly bad at writing stories, short or otherwise. I love reading stories and novels; losing myself in the plot, details, and identifying with a character or two. Writing them, however, is a completely different story (pun intended).

I live my life as a sort of slave to my emotions. I do everything based on how it feels, or the vibes I get from things. I feel everything so deeply, which can be a gift as well as a burden. I write poetry very well because it is meant to evoke emotions and empathy. I like writing about a specific moment or detail. Stories are hard to write because they focus more on a central plot and characters.

I loved reading the short story about the gay couple who we assumed both had AIDS. While it was kind of sad because the story talked about how he did not want to survive his partner, I enjoyed the symbolism and the narration of the story. It was about one moment and the thought process that can go into that one moment. They were arguing about who was going to die first, and the narrator was explaining his thinking on why he wanted to die first.

His partner's family would come to visit his flat after the funeral, and he talked about how they disapproved of their son's lifestyle. Why would they even attend the funeral if they disapproved and clearly hated their son so much? And why would they come to visit their son's partner if they had such contempt for him?

I felt the narrator talking about setting the parrot free was very symbolic. The parrot would be free of it's cage, just like when the partner died he would finally be free of the disapproval of others.

On Goldberg

The section that caught my eye was the chapter titled "Baking a Cake", mostly because I love cake and I was pretty hungry when I was in class. I related to the chapter a lot because when I write, I start out with one or two thoughts or ideas. From there I let the words flow and fall from my mind and in the end, the writing turns into something completely different than what I started with.

For example, the other night I started writing something, thinking it was going to be about love. It started out being about someone, but about half way through it changed into more of an explanation of myself. I had not planned it that way, but that's what came out of my head. I don't always love everything I write in the beginning, but as I read it over again and make changes, I grow to love it.

I loved the part when she talked about the cake/ writing being the hippie child that the parents won't accept. Your writings are like your children; some of them are great, some of them are okay, and some of them turn out kind of bad. However, you have to love and accept each one, no matter how they turn out.

On Tocqueville

I have recently discovered that poetry is my favorite form of writing. Not to say that I don't enjoy reading novels, but I love the way that poetry flows. Last Christmas, my dad got me a book of poems. I can't remember the name of the author off the top of my head, but I love most of the poems in the book. Tocqueville has become a book of poetry that I am proud to have on my bookshelf.

At first, flipping through the pages, I didn't think I would enjoy this book very much. The power point-style poems were confusing and strange to me. However, upon actually reading the book, I found that I thoroughly enjoyed the actual poems. My favorite to read as well as imitate was Ecclesiastes. I interpreted it as a kind of therapist's guide to helping patients. In fact, I even sent my therapist the name of the poem so she could look it up. Maybe it was just the ending part: "The rule is everyone is a gypsy now. Everyone is searching for their tribe." That kind of reminded me of my therapist because she's a hippie and that sounds like something she would say.

I loved imitating Ecclesiastes. I took a poem that was up for interpretation and made it blatantly obvious that it was about an eating disorder. I have struggled with anorexia for about a year now. She whispers nasty things about my body in a raspy voice that I find it hard to ignore and fight at times. As soon as I read this poem when searching for one to imitate, I knew exactly what I could do with it. I let her tell me everything she wants from me and put it into Mattawa's format. She's still there, but she's quieter now.

Writing Response to Toqueville

The poem that jumped out at me the most was On My Mind. I found it very interesting that the author thought that this woman, who we would consider "white trash", was so incredibly lovely. He speaks of her gold tooth and extensive cigarette smoking as if they were charming qualities. He even says that he loved her, but he knew that he shouldn't because she was the type of woman who would think nothing of him. I love the metaphor he uses to say this: "for she could brush me away like a curl of smoke."

I loved the structure and punctuation of the poem. My favorite author, Ellen Hopkins, structures her poems very similarly. I am currently reading her book Perfect and the flow of the poems from that book was fresh in my mind when I read Toqueville, so On My Mind stood out to me. Her poems are also only a page or two long, so i opted for the shorter poem.

The poem takes place in a factory in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Keeping that in mind when i re-read the poem, I realized that he must be in an area where many rednecks live. He talks about how she wants to keep a man around and keep her son in school and keep her daughter from becoming a teen mom, which means that they probably live in a lower income area. Pregnancy rates are higher among impoverished teens, as are drop out rates. It's difficult for a single mother to raise two teenage children on her own on a factory worker's salary, so that must be why she wants to keep a man around.

Writing Response two

When I first started reading the Goldberg book, I was nervous. Were my writing habits good? Was I doing something wrong? Am I a good writer? Apparently, I am doing something right. One of the chapters talked about setting aside a certain amount of time to write. I have a writing blog on tumblr and, since creating it, I force myself to write at least once a day; sometimes for an hour, sometimes for ten minutes. It all depends on how i feel that day.

She also talks about associating writing with chocolate chip cookies (i think we talked about this in class?) Recently, someone I knew passed away. I wasn't close to him, but I have still been very sad. I find it hard to put the words together to process my grief in my writing. Lately, I have been watching the show Skins and, in the season I have been watching, one of the characters dies. It shows how the other characters deal with the death, and that has helped me pour out my feelings. Skins actually helps me feel my sadness very intensely, which helps me write and process through it.

My favorite part of the book was when she talked about how we are not the feelings that we write about. It really hit home for me because for so long I have felt that I am my sadness. I am my depression. I don't know how to live without it, which is why I was afraid to go on antidepressants.

Writing Response

I throughly enjoyed the poem "Lens" because it brought up so much imagery for me. I love the idea of glass being a metaphor for how fragile people are. To me, the phrase "blue into white" reminds me of how i have heard someone describe bipolar disorder. "Air full of unfallen rain" is an amazing way to describe waiting.

Introducing Me

My name is Hayley. I'm 20 years old and I am currently in my second semester at Eastern Michigan University. I came to Eastern for their teaching program originally, but upon further investigation, I realized I do not want to teach anymore. Instead, I want to look into the Creative Writing Program. 
I have loved reading and writing since elementary school. As I got older, reading and writing became therapeutic. I was lonely and sad and no one wanted to hear what I had to say, so writing allowed me to talk to the page.
When i was 16, I was diagnosed with depression and anxiety. I did not have a support system; I had no one to help me besides my therapist. 
Recently, I created a writing blog on tumblr. It forces me to write at least once a day and it is extremely therapeutic. 
I took Intro to Creative Writing as a test; if I can do well in this class, maybe my writing is good enough to make it a career.