Tuesday, September 11, 2012

The Unexceptional Writer


During my journey through public education, writing surrounded me. It seems as if it was incorporated into every creases and crevice of each class. I never minded it but it was not something that I particularly excelled at. Sure I did fine and got the grade I wanted when I put in the appropriate amount of work but it never came easy. The one kind of writing that was enjoyable was history. Those experiences were very positive as I even went to the state level for the National History Day Competition, for an essay on the Revolution in Iran. English papers on the other hand were an entirely different experience. For me at least, they required a lot more work and even then they never seemed like anything exceptional.
Most of the papers I wrote were either on novels or for a history class. It seemed like the norm in every English class was to read a novel and write an essay on it. In the history classes, we would write short two page essays on a given topic. These had their own challenging aspects to them but they never opened the door into different kinds of writing. I have not had much experience writing different kinds of papers. The longest one I wrote was the one for the history competition, which was around eight pages. For that paper and other history papers, I had to do a good bit of research, so I am familiar with how that works. I have not done much research for English classes though, so I am not sure if it is different.
Whenever it was time for me to sit down and write a feeling of procrastination would creep up my spine. I would never intend to procrastinate but I would find it very difficult to start an essay. Generally I sit in front of a computer screen listening to music while I think about what I want to write about. Sometimes this can take a while. Once I figure out what I want to say, the actual writing process does not take that long. I suppose me biggest problem is trying to figure out a starting point each time I go to write. Overall though, while I do not mind writing it is not something I think I can excel at. 

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