Stress Overload

Today I feel really and truly crazy.  Like I know I'm normally a little crazy.  But I mean, today I am seriously crazy.

OK, so I am totally stressed out about school right now.  Tomorrow, I have a presentation I have to give for my Shakespeare class.  This group presentation/class discussion is worth a whole whopping 20% of my grade.  Plus, on top of that, I have a midterm due for the same class, also worth 20% of my grade.  And this isn't a simple, walk-in-the-park, multiple choice type midterm either.  We're talking 4 complete essays.  And not like essays that you do in the testing center where they're not really polished and you just spout relevant information in some kind of cohesive format.  No, we're talking full-on, well-polished, thought-provoking essays that go above and beyond what we've already gone over in class.  And my teacher is extremely harsh in her grading.  And we're talking FOUR of them!  And let's not even go into the fact that each essay is also going to double-count toward the assignments I've missed this semester (also worth 20% of my grade).  So for this one class, I have 60% of my entire grade riding on how I get through the rest of today and tomorrow morning.

On top of which, I have to worry about writing and revising three chapters' worth of a novel for my creative writing class by next Saturday, I have to re-write my research paper for my religion class by Monday, I have a grammar assignment due this Saturday, a grammar research paper due ASAP, and another 10-page research paper for my Shakespeare class due by the last day of the semester, for which my professor is requiring that I actually do painstaking library research for instead of just finding scholarly sources online.

And that's just school.  Tonight alone, in addition to my crazy 4-essay midterm, I've got to go to the creamery and buy soda and sherbet for our custodial meeting tomorrow, drop that off at work, straighten the house so my in-laws can come over, take a shower, and get to the movie theater to stand in line early for Harry Potter so we can actually get decent seats.  Then on Saturday I've got a good friend's wedding reception to go to, and then we have Thanksgiving.  Looks like I'll be working all day Monday, and probably all day Tuesday.  Fortunately, I get Wednesday off, but most of that will be spent trying to get stuff ready for Thanksgiving.  Thursday will be packed with cooking and cleaning, and then on Black Friday Andrew and I are getting up early to check out deals at Best Buy and hopefully buy a computer.  That afternoon, I have to work at my new job, for which I still feel pretty unprepared, which doesn't help when it comes to working Black Friday.

...Whew.  I needed to vent all of that.  Anyway, I finally got so stressed that I got up super early this morning and a pill from my ADD prescription.  Unfortunately, when I went back to bed, that meant that my brain tried to analyze every random dream to come up intelligent insights into my Shakespeare midterm essay questions.  Then, when I woke up, I was bombarded with nausea and the shakes, both side effects of the ADD pill.  Fortunately, it also makes me not hungry, so I've saved money today by not buying food on campus.  And on the plus side, I've already breezed through my grammar assignment and I wrote this blog entry pretty quickly.

Still...If you don't hear from me in the next few weeks, I've probably gone insane and eaten myself.  Just didn't want you guys to worry...

Picture Book--Draft 1

OK, first draft of my picture book.  I used the idea I talked about in my last post and changed the name of the main character to Jackie.  It's still a really rough draft, so naturally it's lousy.  Keep in mind as you read that the numbers at the end of each phrase show how many pages that phrase is taking up.

It was Jackie’s birthday. (1)

Her mom had made her a big, whipped-cream-covered birthday cake with a big number four on it.  (2)

Jackie was so excited she ran around the kitchen. “Jackie, don’t run!” said Jackie’s mom. (2)

 “It’s time to go!” said Jackie’s dad.  He pulled the car out of the garage for everyone to get in.  Jackie was so excited, she ran around the car.  “Jackie don’t run!” Mom said. (2)

When they got to the park, Jackie’s mom and dad opened the car trunk.  They pulled out the cake, balloons, and…PRESENTS! (2)

Mom and Dad had to walk slowly with all the birthday things.  But Jackie was so excited, she ran down the hill to the park.  “Jackie don’t run!” shouted her mom. (2)

Jackie kept running.  But then, Jackie fell.  (1)

She slipped and she slid until finally she stopped. (1)

Jackie’s head hurt and there was a lot of blood.  Mom and Dad were too far away.  “I’m going to die,” Jackie thought, and she cried. (2)

Then a big man came and picked Jackie up.  He carried her back up the hill to her mom and dad. (2)

When the big man put Jackie down, Mom helped Jackie clean up her cut and put a band-aid on it.  “Are you ok now?” the big man asked.  Jackie nodded and said, “Thank you for saving my life.”  He laughed and said, “Any time.” (2)

When Jackie’s friends got to her birthday party, they couldn’t wait to play.  Jackie was so excited, she began to run with her friends to the playground…“Jackie, don’t run!” shouted her mom. (1)

Jackie stopped and walked to the playground. (1)

When the birthday party was over, Jackie’s mom said, “Thank you for not running, Jackie.  I love you and I don’t want you to get hurt.”  (2)

“I love you too, Mom,” said Jackie. (1)


So yeah...I left a lot of description and things out because I want the illustrations to say as much as possible about the surroundings and even about the characters.  Like I say, it's a first draft so it's bound to be lousy.  I'd appreciate as many comments as possible telling me how to make it less lousy.  Also, I want to get as much characterization in there as possible, so if you knew me as a 4-year-old, or if you have/know a kid who fits this character, please post and tell me what I/they were like.  Thanks!

Feeling Too Lazy...

So I'm already sucking it up with the whole "daily" thing.  In my defense, it was a three-day weekend after all.  And my labor day was actually extremely productive considering it's supposed to be a day you don't work.  But anyway, maybe my laziness from the weekend is carrying over because while I am supposed to be using my writing journal to come up with ideas for a picture book, I think I'm going to just free-write instead.

OK now the idea of free-write is to just write down whatever pops into your head, and in my case, hope to heaven that it's interesting.  Unfortunately, nothing is magically making itself manifest in my head at the present.  Except that yesterday we finally broke out our grill.  Happy faces all around!  It was great, we took it out of the box and found a million little pieces to put it all together with.  Andrew was like, "Oh look it's just 8 easy steps!"  And I was like... "I still have to put the ice cream away..."  (we'd just got home from a grocery trip to Target).  Anyway, it wasn't as bad as it sounds to put it all together and soon enough we were barbecuing up some burgers, brats, and corn on the cob.  Combine that with the most delicious watermelon I have ever had and it was heaven.  What I'm wondering now is why we didn't break it out before...  I'm sorry I can't remember who gave us the grill as a wedding present, but whoever you are, you are my new best friend...

Anyway, I'm trying to think of something else...and all I've got is how freaking excited I am for the new Harry Potter movie.  I mean seriously, seriously excited.  I keep reading early reviews from the first screening of the movie in Chicago and they all say it is the most perfect Potter movie yet.  And that's coming from some really hard-core Harry Potter enthusiasts.  And that's without all the special effects finished and without a score!  Does anyone know when tickets go on sale, because I am SO there!!!  In the words of some people much more clever than I, "It's going to be totally awesome!"

OK so it looks like I am going to work on my picture book a little bit because an idea just popped right into my head.  Hooray!  So in class the other day, our guest lecturer read us an example of a picture book that did everything wrong.  It was about a boy named Freddie and how he got hit by a car and broke his arm because he ran into the road after a ball.  He comes home and he has magically learned his lesson, not only about running into the road, but about all safety lessons.  It listed all of these safety rules that kids should follow and it was the most ridiculous, patronizing thing I've ever heard.  It actually got published because guess who it's by?  Danielle Steel...figures.

Sorry all you Danielle Steel fans but them's the breaks.  So anyway I was thinking maybe I'd try to do a safety-based story from my own life but without all the problems that we discussed with Ms. Steel's book.  So here's the story:

When I was 4, we were going to have my birthday party at a little park in Murrieta.  It was in the middle of a ravine, just off a busy road.  To get to it, you had to go down a steep asphalt road that was poorly paved and therefore often covered with gravel.  I was so excited to get to my birthday party--I ran down the hill as fast as my little four-year-old legs could carry me.  But there were some loose stones and dirt and about half-way down the hill I tripped and went tumbling down.  When I'd stopped sliding down the hill, my head hurt and I was stunned.  I didn't even lift my head.  My parents had been walking sensibly and were still at the top of the hill.  It felt to me like they were a mile away and there was no way they could get to me in time.  I remember thinking, "This is it.  I'm going to die."  What's funny is that to a little four-year-old's mind, that isn't as sad as it would be to you or me:  I was pretty resigned to my fate.  But then this big, strong stranger lifted me off the sharp asphalt and carried me up the hill to my parents.  I remember he was blonde and I think he had a bit of facial hair.  Anyway, he took me to my parents, they said thank you, etc.  As he was leaving, I said, "Thank you for saving my life."  He laughed and said, "Anytime," and walked away.

I ended up with a pretty good gash on my head.  I'd never seen so much blood at once before and it scared me silly.  Every time I went to that park after that, I was sure to walk very, very slowly...But of course I still ran down every other hill I came across...That last part won't be in the story though...

PS. I believe it was this particular incident that finally made my mom decide I was too clumsy for my own good, and made her decide to put me in ballet in a desperate attempt to make me more graceful.  FYI--it didn't work.

Unapologetic

Sitting in the backseat of Kathy's two-door whatever-it-was, I watched the bright yellow lights and dark blue shadows slide over my window as we drove through the darkness.  The radio blared a modern pop tune that Kathy and Lauren knew every word to.

I nodded my head in time with the music until the radio DJ announced, "OK, time to change it up a little, here on...The Mix."  The song changed to a slightly slower 80's ballad and Kathy groaned and started flipping through stations.

"Ugh, I hate 80's music.  It's all exactly the same and it's not musical at all."

Now I don't pretend to be a big-time 80's music lover, but I couldn't believe anyone could think such a thing.  80's music not musical?  Hello!  Anyone heard of Journey?  Van Halen?  How about Madonna?  Michael Jackson?  To say the 80's didn't produce anything "musical" is like saying the pope isn't Catholic.  Like I say, I don't care too much about the 80's.  And you're perfectly welcome to hate 80's music if that's the way your musical tastes lean.  But for Kathy to say that 80's music "isn't musical at all" bugged me to no end.  So, I said something...

"I dunno, I think you get some really great, musical stuff from the 80's.  I mean Michael Jackson's music might not be everyone's cup of tea, but it's certainly musical."

Kathy exhaled in one big huff.  "I don't think so.  I think it all sounds the same.  80's music doesn't have any redeeming value."

"No redeeming value?  Journey is an 80's group and you were saying just last night how much you love them.  Are you saying they have no redeeming value?"

"You know," Kathy said through gritted teeth as she took the next street corner a little too fast, "I really, really hate those people who have to argue about every little thing.  And always have to be right.  I have my opinion.  I like the music that I like and I hate people who think that by arguing with you they're going to change that."

I couldn't believe it.  Granted, I did know that I was right.  But I didn't feel that I'd tried to change Kathy's musical tastes, just pointed out that there was redeeming value for others in music that she did not enjoy.  If anything, I felt that she'd tried to negate my opinion by making such broad generalizations and trying to portray them as absolute truth.  Kathy and I both harumphed to ourselves for the rest of the drive while Lauren tried unsuccessfully to make polite conversation between us.

That was two years ago.  Since then, I've learned that sometimes I do have a tendency to enter a conversation as if it were a debate.  And in a debate, you state your opinion as truth and then defend it while attacking the opposite opinion.  I've learned through talking with some very good friends that this might not be the best way to make a friend feel like you actually care about them or what they think.

If you are one of these people whom I have offended in this way, I would like to extend my formal apology to you now.  Please try to understand that I was brought up in a home where debate was our bread and butter.  We all had a tendency to assert our opinions as if it were an absolute truth, regardless of how irrational they may be.  As a result, we would often spar about various topics.  It was our version of an intellectual discussion and it was how I learned.  Sometimes it gets very difficult for me to remember that such behavior amongst others can be extremely rude.

Since coming to this realization, I have taken steps to try to fix the problem.  In such a case as the one I mentioned above, I have slid into a pattern of simply saying, "I dunno, I kinda like it."  A safe statement of my own tastes typically shuts down any bashing on the things I like or the people who like them.  Or sometimes, such as with those whom I don't know so well, I'll play it even safer ("Oh really?") and then just let them talk until they're done.

Like I say, this is the safe option.  But today I came to a new realization...

I was sitting in on a writing class that I would really like to add but is too full for me.  The students fortunate enough to actually be in the class were discussing an essay by Montaigne.  One of the students remarked how unapologetic Montaigne was in asserting his opinions.  He kinda phrases it in a "Hey, this is just me" kind of way, but he still is unafraid to make his opinions known.

It made me realize that Kathy, and others like her, have made me afraid to say what I think--to be myself when I know that the people around me won't like the "me" that I reveal.  My polite phrases have been my way of hiding.  If I never take chances, then...qu'est ce que le point?

I'm not saying I'm going to go back to being rude and making you feel stupid.  I've learned a little more in the past couple of years about how to make my point known without being so insensitive.  But I'm not going to be afraid anymore to say what I think.

Getting Started

So I'm not entirely sure what I'm supposed to be writing about, to be honest.  All's I know is that I'm taking a writing class in which the professor insists we do a daily writing journal.  I don't expect that I will do too well at the whole "daily" part of that assignment.  But I do love to write.  I'd like to use this blog to write about all the little things I want to say but can never remember when the time actually comes.  Like that huge mass of people just standing about on the way out of class this morning.  Seriously, the bell had just rung, I walked out of my classroom, and there were literally hundreds of people just standing around.  I assume they were waiting for everyone to leave the many classrooms emptying into that hallway, but seriously folks: the people that you're waiting for to leave the classroom can't actually leave the classroom when you are standing about and blocking the way.  As I made my way out, there was a single file line wading through the huge mass of standers toward the only light of day to be seen in that dreary basement hallway...which unfortunately ended up being just a window.  And it was all made worse by the Utah walkers who, like Utah drivers, park themselves in the middle of the direct line of traffic and signal everyone else to go ahead, making hundreds of others behind them sit and wait for a thousand years.

Well anyway...I don't want this to be a ranting type blog.  Heaven knows there are already too many of those out there.  I'm hoping this can be a sounding board when I do want to vent, but I also want to share past experiences, random free-writes that don't seem to have a point but have a certain sense of symmetry anyway (hopefully), and of course, writing samples from my various classes.  I doubt it will be of much interest to anyone other than myself.  But then again, I do have a notoriously short attention span...