The first week of August

I had to steal this from a dear co-worker's blog.  Love it.

“The first week of August hangs at the very top of summer, the top of the live-long year, like the highest seat of a Ferris wheel when it pauses in its turning. The weeks that come before are only a climb from balmy spring, and those that follow a drop to the chill of autumn, but the first week of August is motionless, and hot. It is curiously silent, too, with blank white dawns and glaring noons, and sunsets smeared with too much color.” ― Natalie Babbitt, Tuck Everlasting

Even if you're scared

Creative Writing Submissions

Ok, well I know you have all been dying to read what I have written for creative writing this year.  (Umm... yeah right, because I'm pretty sure no one reads this blog. Whatevs.)


Click to read my short story - Walker's Will


And here is the lyric poem below.  It's written in a Shakespearean sonnet form.  Sorry, I was in an extreme "girl power" mood when I wrote it.  It's a little harsh.  


Sorry to any guys reading this.  I know you aren't all like this.

Dear Bigot

If I could give you one thing back today

It would be the guilt that you made me feel.

I couldn’t say what I wanted to say

For fear of making a feminist spiel.

At the time, I didn’t hate you for this.

It was crucial for me to make that change.

I fell in a misogynist abyss

That only wanted my brain rearranged.

But then one day, I was liberated

Never to return to that awful place

Where women were forever agitated.

You thought I was no good, but here’s a taste

Of what you are missing, and it’s no lie

It is a chauvinist whom I must defy.

Writing advice from someone awesome

Lauren Oliver just made an awesome post about writing.  I loved it :) a little unconventional, but I think she's completely right!  Check it out here.


The short story and the poems from my creative writing class will be posted soon.

Advice from Dead Poets Society

“Avoid using the word ‘very’ because it’s lazy. A man is not very tired, he is exhausted. Don’t use very sad, use morose. Language was invented for one reason, boys - to woo women - and, in that endeavour, laziness will not do.”

No Light, No Light

No light, no light in your bright, blue eyes.

Mark Grist - Girl Who Reads

I thought this was very clever :) 

Expectations

No.  You're doing it again.

Quit expecting things to happen.

Remember: low expectations are key.

Low expectations = Low disappointments

I don't want you to crash again.

Not when things are finally going well.

Passion

"Passion. It lies in all of us. Sleeping, waiting, and though unwanted, unbidden, it will stir, open its jaws and howl. It speaks to us, guides us. Passion rules us all. And we obey. What other choice do we have? Passion is the source of our finest moments. The joy of love, the clarity of hatred, the ecstasy of grief. It hurts sometimes more than we can bear. If we could live without passion, maybe we’d know some kind of peace. But we would be hollow. Empty rooms, shuttered and dank. Without passion, we’d be truly dead."

- Joss Whedon

Imagination

Now Watching

This is the only movie in which I can stand Will Ferrell.  

But this entire movie is pure brilliance. :)

Think

Annabel Lee

by Edgar Allan Poe


It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea;
But we loved with a love that was more than love-
I and my Annabel Lee;
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me-
Yes!- that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we-
Of many far wiser than we-
And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee.

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling- my darling- my life and my bride,
In the sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.

Confessions of a out-of-it Writer

I'm currently taking a creative writing class at BYU, and I have come to a sad conclusion:

I have become a very lazy writer.  The first class and first assignment in creative writing were all devoted to creating the getting to know a specific character.  Do you know how much thought I put into the assignment?  A lot.  I wrote 5 notebook pages.  

In the story I've been working on for a couple of weeks, do you want to guess how much effort I put into creating those characters.  Not very much.  I mean, I have an idea of who they are, and why they are like that, but it's very vague.

I think this will be a very good class for me.  What I think happened was when I decided I wanted to be an editor, I kind of dropped the writing thing, because I knew I didn't want to be an author for a living.  But I forget sometimes that to help other writers, I need to be brushed up on the techniques a writer uses.