(no subject)
I'm not required to go to French anymore, so I spent my lunch period bumming around online. For the first time in months, I returned to Fictionpress.com, and reread my stories and poems from two, three, four years ago.
Amazing. These stories are good. I haven't written anything good, apparently, since 2002.
They aren't perfect. I was twelve. There were grammatical errors, -ment's and -ly's where there should have been none, a couple run-ons, some syntax errors. They're good because when I wrote them, I didn't care about syntax or tone or that sometimes my language was too ostentatious. All I knew was that I had a great story in my head, a blinking cursor and a page waiting to be filled, more words than I knew what to do with.
I asked myself whether it's possible to get worse at something as time goes on, even with practice. That isn't the right question, though. I am definitely a better writer. Technically, many of my papers and essays are perfect. I know about synecdoche and anadiplosis, about emphasis and logical fallacies. I know how to vary my sentence lengths, when to repeat, when to indent.
But Ms. Meisel was right when I handed in one of these oh-so-perfect papers and I got it back, with a 7/8 grade but a scrawled note in the margin.
Where are YOU?!?
There's no more heart to my writing. I still write for fun sometimes, but it's like I'm forcing myself to. There are real writers who, if they ever got to this point, would swoon dramatically and trumpet that they would never lift a pen again. I still cling to this little bit of hope, my last match, the little flame cupped in my hand against a chill wind. I still wait in hope that whatever I lost will return to me, that my creative spirit will be resurrected.
I don't have the heart nor the courage to stop writing in my Livejournal. It's too much a part of me. This is by no means my last entry. It's just a ramble, a plea for inspiration, a nostalgic whine with me, the hostess with the mostess at my own pity party. I do know that I won't be able to think about much else for a while, and wait, begging, with the clasped hands of a supplicant, that soon my muse will return.
Maybe this summer.
Amazing. These stories are good. I haven't written anything good, apparently, since 2002.
They aren't perfect. I was twelve. There were grammatical errors, -ment's and -ly's where there should have been none, a couple run-ons, some syntax errors. They're good because when I wrote them, I didn't care about syntax or tone or that sometimes my language was too ostentatious. All I knew was that I had a great story in my head, a blinking cursor and a page waiting to be filled, more words than I knew what to do with.
I asked myself whether it's possible to get worse at something as time goes on, even with practice. That isn't the right question, though. I am definitely a better writer. Technically, many of my papers and essays are perfect. I know about synecdoche and anadiplosis, about emphasis and logical fallacies. I know how to vary my sentence lengths, when to repeat, when to indent.
But Ms. Meisel was right when I handed in one of these oh-so-perfect papers and I got it back, with a 7/8 grade but a scrawled note in the margin.
Where are YOU?!?
There's no more heart to my writing. I still write for fun sometimes, but it's like I'm forcing myself to. There are real writers who, if they ever got to this point, would swoon dramatically and trumpet that they would never lift a pen again. I still cling to this little bit of hope, my last match, the little flame cupped in my hand against a chill wind. I still wait in hope that whatever I lost will return to me, that my creative spirit will be resurrected.
I don't have the heart nor the courage to stop writing in my Livejournal. It's too much a part of me. This is by no means my last entry. It's just a ramble, a plea for inspiration, a nostalgic whine with me, the hostess with the mostess at my own pity party. I do know that I won't be able to think about much else for a while, and wait, begging, with the clasped hands of a supplicant, that soon my muse will return.
Maybe this summer.