I realize that not updating for a month in no way ingratiates me to my readers or to the paltry few who stumble across this site with a crazed-twilit shine to their eyes. I think my previous style of posting on things — that is, writing commentary on interesting things or about my daily life, which I generally boil down to the interesting particulars — isn’t quite working. I almost feel as though I want to turn this into more of a journal — this would mean more regular updates, but on the other hand more vagueness, snippets of my writing, some general observations. I’m getting a little tired of scanning the Internet for something I can cast a second-hand gaze on. And moreover, I want my voice back. I don’t think I’ve had it for some time now, but I do miss it.

Academic writing and stylistic integrity

My English teachers from elementary school on tried to train us as students to find our own literary voice. In elementary school, that meant paragraphs, carrying a thought across an entire story or paper; in short, focus. In middle school, we lost conventions like the “five-paragraph essay” (and good riddance to that!), came face-to-face with literary analysis of plot, style, function. In high school, we were warned that college professors wanted only a certain thing from our writing. These were my most inventive years. Now, here at college, I feel that this muse has begun to peter off. One of my weakness is that I often choose style rather than content. This is easily remedied, I told myself. I just have to balance the aesthetic with the analytical.

This worked for a time. But this semester especially, that balance is shifting all the more from expression to convention. And this is a terrible change for me. Just the other day, I was told to write the words, “In this paper, I will argue that…” into my final English paper. I have not heard those words for so many years that I hardly think it is possible for those words to appear in the context of an honors English class. My essays for another class keep returning to me with adjectives changed, adverbs altered. These are tools of perception, not truth. If I choose to call a man “brave,” it means that I think he is brave. To cross that out and write, for example, “audacious,” instead is a gross interpretation of what I meant. If I meant audacious, I would have written it — I am very capable of using the English language to suit my needs. But I am not used to being told to take a perspective on something that is not my own.

I have always approached my writing with some degree of rebellion — I thought I was capable of literary criticism (as were so many others) in my senior English class, so I wrote my own analysis of “Ash Wednesday” by T.S. Eliot. I dislike being told what I should write and how I should write it — I think I am old enough, experienced enough to at least phrase an idea in my own words. If my professors don’t find me capable now, what hope do I hold for academic writing I will do in my future?

Because I must mention this

I admit it. I partake of Internet fandom-ry. I recently scooped up an opportunity to see Heather Armstrong (Dooce) talk in Austin — because I would never forgive myself if I couldn’t bother myself to take a bus (for free) and plop myself down in a bookstore ten minutes away. The whole trip actually cost me around $26, because in a fit of book-inspired mania, I had to buy a copy of It Sucked and Then I Cried, which so far reads a bit more like her blog than I would like, but it entertaining nonetheless. I mean, the blog is what convinced me to keep reading in the first place, isn’t it? I was fascinated that she sits through and reads every single comment on her site — just so you have an idea, every time you refresh the comment thread on any one of her articles, the numbers skip from 15 to 68 to 107 to 163, and so on. For reference purposes, I read the five I get annually, and I don’t think I can even comprehend the amount of energy Heather needs to make it through to the end of any of the threads. Mindboggling.

A note in conclusion

Treat this post as a disclaimer. I might be experimenting in the next few days with more literary types of content. I still adore commentary, but I would rather it not be the focus of the sight. I was misguided; now I see. Here’s to frequency and quality, and may they never again be forced to compete against one another. Or, better yet, here’s to cheese, because you really can’t go wrong with cheese.