What?

So I am the first to admit I am lost. I don’t consider myself to be an incompetent writer. To the contrary, I find that my writing shows promise. However, I think that I am coming to slow realization that despite my desire to recapture the world with my prose, I am lacking in the academics section of my education. How to write an academic paper, for instance, is something that I haven’t done in years. Through exclusion, I have eliminated writing from my daily life. Once a promising writer in undergrad, I shed my fear of filth and snow, and embarked to “make it” in the dismal streets of New York. After college I took my $2000.00 nest egg and decided to sleep on a friends couch until I was published. That dream lasted about 3 weeks, when the pipes busted in her apartment, and we were stranded without a place to live. Soon I needed to pound the pavement to find a paying job. This reversal of fortune landed me on Wall Street where I began my career in finance. Fast forward eight long Sex and the City years later, I am back in my native state of California trying to reclaim my voice.

A few misled attempts at prophetic love letters, more than a dozen unpublished short stories, and my occasional novel of the week during my subway commute to work are all that I have to rely on as evidence of me continuing on with my literature studies while in New York. Now I am challenged. While reading Lindemann’s chapter on sentence structures and how to teach them, I revisited my own writing. I can only say that I am rusty. When Lindeman mentions the student who strays from complex sentences to avoid comma use, I can only raise my hand to say guilty. Not to say that since graduating I haven’t written a single sentence. However, my sentences mainly consisted of emails to colleagues, correspondence to investors, and the occasional power point presentation. When Lindemann’s speaks of the professional writer who…”sensitizes themselves to avoid sentences where meaning is almost obscured within the lengthily confines of the sentence itself; they study those sentences where pause, and momentary reflection have their impact” I become nostalgic. I would like to say that was me. I was that type of writer. I would also like to say that I can still be that type of writer. While I am learning how to teach students writing, I am learning what it takes to be a better writer.

I am venting of course, but I like the idea of this blog. While in class as students we focus on our understanding of the text, but we rarely get a chance to understand where/what people feel about themselves. In this blog I am granted the opportunity to share, if anyone is listening, where I feel I can improve. I am slowly getting back into the swing of writing for readers, and of course for myself.