In this blog I will be reflecting on my experience in English Composition l. I really enjoyed that had to build a website that acted as our textbook for this course. The website contained all the information I needed plus more.
The best thing I that learned from this class is how to become a better writer. Professor Sabatino taught us in a non-traditional way. For example, for the narrative project we had to present our blog in front of the class. As I read aloud, I noticed all of my mistakes and every time I write I make sure I read it aloud to myself. I also found gratitude and learned about the importance of well-being. It was very odd at first, but it all started to make sense. I never ever thought I would learn how to increase my well-being from an English class. Now that I have been introduced to that, I have been into studying well-being and fitting it into my lifestyle. From just a month of doing this I have been happier, less stressed, my anxiety has decreased. I also recorded my first vlog ever for this class. I never liked recording myself speaking because it would just freak me out to hear myself. I overcame that fear. I became a blogger! I never ever thought that I would have my own website and have a place to write about anything. I will continue to use and build my website in the future.
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In this blog I will be providing a seven journal entries about what went well during my week and explaining why it went well. To complete this blog I used the text Greater Good in Action: Science-Based Practices for a Meaningful Life from UC Berkeley and Three Good Things (Greater Good in Action). We also talked about the importance of positive psychology in class along with the text What is Positive Pyschology & Why Is it Important? (Positive Psychology Program).
OCT 30
I will continue to do the "Three Good Things" everyday. I feel more motivated and positive. This blog is going to be about where I am in life right now. Feel free to leave advice in the comments.
Currently, my life has been hectic. I have been trying to balance school and my personal life while trying not to fall back into depression. I have fell off with my school work which is not good at all because this is important to me and it makes it look like I do not care. My health has always been in the way of everything since I was around the age of 11. Having Crohn's disease and Autoimmune hepatitis (Liver Disease) is hard to cope with. The biggest misconception that everyone has about me is that because I look fine out the outside that means I am fine in general. That is not true. I am a mess on the inside and it will never go away. I have a disability that people cannot see. It has no cure. I just wish people could understand that about me and other people who suffer from similar problems like me. I am trying to play catch up with a lot of my work, but having these problems makes my life 10x harder than it should be. I always come out strong in the end though. In this blog post I will be writing about a time that shows the reader a moment when a you or someone close to you made a decision that had a negative impact on your life. In class, we listened to a podcast called “What You Don’t Know” by Lulu Wang. Listening that the podcast will help with my writing process for this blog post.
It is a cold October night and I am excited to be intending the homecoming game at my school. This is the first time I get hang out with my friends from school. I did not usually go to school events because I hated my school, but today I was stepping out on my shell. My Mom was not the strict type of parent, so she did not care if I went out. As long as I got home on time. My friend Savannah from a different school and I was sitting by the door waiting for my friends to arrive. I decided to bring along my other friend because I talked about her a lot in school so they wanted to meet her also. We talked about how much fun we are going to have and how much we want the lions to win the football game. After 10 minutes of sitting by the door my rose gold IPhone 6 ring and I got a test saying that they are outside. I yelled to my mom “We are leaving. I’ll call if I need anything”. She yelled back “Ok. Have fun” in response. I had the window of the car rolled down so I could feel the crisp fall air hit my skin. My friends talked amongst themselves, but I did not pay much attention. A couple minutes later we pulled up to a packed parking lot looking for a parking spot. I pointed out more people from school that I knew and I had a feeling it would be a fun night. We finally found a space and we all got out of the car. We walked towards the football field to find seats. It was very packed since we were playing against Strath Haven High School. When we got the to bleachers we sat next to a group of kids I already knew. The game had just started and I was just taking everything in even though I had no clue how the game of football worked. One girl I was with named Kayla yelled of the noise of everyone else and said “They are serving free chick-fil-a sandwiches down there. We should go get some”. Everyone agreed and we walked over to get some. As we walked over a girl in the group named Stephanie pulled me aside. She said, “You ever smoked weed before?”. I was not shocked that she asked me that because a lot of the kids here smoked. I looked at her and replied “No” in a very stern voice. “You should try it. It helps with a lot of stuff. I remember you saying that you get anxiety being around large groups of people. I will help”. I thought about it and it did not seem like a bad idea. I mean it does not do much harm to people anyway. “OK, I’ll try it”. She smiled as I agreed to the idea. I normally do not fall in the trap of peer pressure but I did not think it would be bad. She came back with the weed and said we should smoke it in an area where no one would see us. It was a lot of staff around. We went on the other side of the school where no one was. It was darker down this end. It was Kayla, Savannah, Stephanie and me. I was the only one out of the group who never smoked before. She used a Backwoods in Black N’ Sweet Aromatic flavor to roll the weed in. I had a very uneasy feeling about being over here. I was way too quiet for my liking. Kayla pulled out her lighter and sparked the blunt. I was a very potent smell that smelled kind of good to me. As Kayla passed it to Stephanie a bright flash came to our attention. A slender man with our school security guard outfit on looked at us. “I knew I smelled something. Did anyone ever tell you that you can smell marijuana miles away”. At this point I knew we were in trouble. In this blog, I will be building onto my writing skills and continuing learning how to write present scenes. This post will be a continuation of my last blog post. I read and annotated Hills Like White Elephants by Ernest Hemingway to get examples about how to use dialogue and symbolism in my writing.
Today I spent the day with my family. It is very rare that we get to spend time because we all have lives. All the kids in the family are all grown up. I miss the days like this. The laughs and the jokes. Talking about the great memories we share. The best memory my family and I share is our vacations in the Poconos. “Loved when we used to get together and go to the Poconos” I said looking over to my aunt. “We have so many home videos from there.” My aunt smiled and said, “I still have all of those videos on a disc.” “I remember the first time we went. I just wish we could go back to times like that. Having fun, eating food, playing games, going swimming. I don’t remember the last time we actually got together as a family and had fun. We are all so busy with our lives that we are losing the value of family.” My mom said in a sad tone as she continued to speak. “Some of our family members did not see or reached out in years. We are so divided now.” “Yeah I know but we are all together now. Having dinner on the last day of summer. Enjoying the company that we missed for years.” I said looking at my family members sitting around the table. “This is true. It is lots of people who do not have family at all. They have people who forgot about them. Lost people. One thing I learned in life is that blood does not always make you family. You can meet a friend and they treat you more like family than your own blood. They care about you and take you in. Their family starts to love you and now that is your family. Some people do not have it good like us. We have the luxury to sit at a table and bring up the best memories we have together” My aunt spat out with all her emotions laid out on the table as everyone listened. “She was right. Family means everything when you have a family that is genuine. Having a family built off love is the best feeling in the world. I am so grateful that we can get together no matter what problems we had in the past. This is everything” I added on t In this blog I will be composing a present scene with the help from these texts, What is Creative Nonfiction? by Lee Gutkind and My Name is Margaret by Maya Angelou.
I was at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia in a large and MRI machine getting a scan of my abdominal area. I had to drink this thick, chalky, and white formula the doctor mixed up for me. It was some special stuff to “light up my intestines”. At this point I had been sick for 2 years, so getting a bunch of test done was normal now. After the machine completed the scan the doctor said I could go home and they would get the results in a few hours. As I sat in the passenger seat of mother’s car I had no clue this would be the worst day of my life. When I got home all I wanted to do was lay down and rest. I had no energy to do anything else but that. I walked into my bedroom and I heard my mom’s cell phone ring. She continued to walk into her bedroom and all I could heard was her voice as I laid down. “You want us to come back now?” Her voice had a more serious tone than it usually has. My mom walked into my bedroom and said, “Pack up a few outfits in your overnight night bag” “Where are we going?” I asked in a very confused and concerned voice. She looked over at me with worried eyes, “We have a spend a couple days in the hospital. You should be out in no time”. I was used to going to the hospital a lot because I am basically a medical mystery, but I have never stayed in the hospital. I had a rush of emotions. I thought “maybe this is a good thing so I can finally know what is wrong with me. On the other hand, I felt very afraid because I am only twelve and I am getting admitted into the hospital. We arrived at the hospital an hour later. As I walked into the hospital it was very cold. We were told to go to the emergency room so I could be admitted in. Of course, just like any hospital it took hours. I laid on the hospital bed and cried most of the time. My mom tried the cheer me up by getting me to listen to music or watch the Food Network on the hospital TV, but nothing could make me happy. It was scary for me, and even though my mom was there with me every step of the way I still felt alone. A very slender male doctor walked into the room. “We have taken a look into your scan and we had noticed that your condition is more serious than we thought. My other colleagues are very impressed that you were eating food as well as you are.” He said and smiled in my direction. I knew this would be the hardest journey for me. It was a rainy fall day in New York. I was walking down the street and I stumbled across a quint coffee shop. I stepped inside and got in line waiting to order. I ordered a tall mocha with pumpkin spice. I received my coffee and turned to find a table. As I scoped out the room I noticed three known writers; Don Murray, Maria Popova, and Anne Lamott. Me being a college student currently studying creative writing; this is the perfect moment to have a conversation about the most important topic in writing: The Writing Process. I walked over to their table, “Hi my name is Alexa and I am an inspiring writer. Do you mind if I ask; What is the writing process?” Murray glanced at me, put his coffee down and said, “The writing process itself can be divided into three stages: pre- writing, writing, and rewriting.” I nodded and looked in Anne’s direction. “Do my drafts have to be perfect before I move onto the next step?” I asked in hopes she would answer. Anne looked at me with a slight smile on her face and said,” Now, practically even better news than that of short assignments is the idea of shitty first drafts. All good writers write them. This is how they end up with good second drafts and terrific third drafts”. I looked over at Maria “When is it a good time to work on my writing?” Maria looked up from her iPhone X and said, “I can work anywhere. I wrote in bedrooms and living rooms when I was growing up with my parents and my brother in a small house in Los Angeles. I worked on my typewriter in the living room, with the radio and my mother and dad and brother all talking at the same time. Later on, when I wanted to write Fahrenheit 451, I went up to UCLA and found a basement typing room where, if you inserted ten cents into the typewriter, you could buy thirty minutes of typing time.” I laughed at her response because I have always wanted a typewriter. “My writing process needs to be changed from the responses I have received from you all. I normally write on draft and try to make it perfect.” I asked, “Should I get people to read my drafts?” “Whenever I’m giving a lecture at a writing conference and happen to mention the benefits of finding someone to read your drafts, at least one older established writer comes up to me and says he or she would never in a million years show his or her work to another person before it was done. It is not a good idea, and I must stop telling my students that it will help them.” Anne added “ Then I go on telling people to consider finding someone who would not mind reading their drafts and marking them up with useful suggestions”. “And what is prewriting and writing to you? Mr. Murray” “Prewriting is everything that takes place before the first draft. Prewriting usually takes about 85 percent of the writer’s time. It includes the awareness of his world from which his subject is born. In prewriting, the writer focuses on that subject, spots an audience, chooses a form which may carry his subject to his audience. Pre- writing may include research and daydreaming, note-making and outlining, title-writing and lead-writing.” He continued to answer my question, “Writing is the act of producing a first draft. It is the fastest part of the process, and the most frightening, for it is a commitment. When you complete a draft you know how much, and how little, you know. And the writing of this first draft—rough, searching, unfinished—may take as little as one percent of the writer’s time. “ I continued to ask questions, “Maria what if you aren’t a morning person, but you want to write well?” Maria took a sip of her coffee and answered “I’m always in a hurry to get going, though in general I dislike starting the day. I first have tea and then, at about ten o’clock, I get under way and work until one.” She continued to talk “If the work is going well, I spend a quarter or half an hour reading what I wrote the day before, and I make a few corrections. Then I continue from there. In order to pick up the thread I have to read what I’ve done.” It was now 6pm and we talked for about 2 hours. “Wow. This was very useful information. I will definitely take all this advice and put it into my writing. The Proust Questionnaire
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Alexa AaminahI will use this blog to present my work for English Composition. Archives
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