writing history I
05/03/2003 06:50 a.m.
prompted by a thread in the general forum.

first writing, non-poetry, 3rd grade, short story, got some sort paper award that's still floating around here somewhere.

fifth grade, placed sixth and fourth at young author's contest with an abc book of professions co-authored with a friend and a fractured fairytale - blue hair.

sixth grade, wrote first poems i remember. mostly remember them because i still have them. they suck. make me wince to read. altho the limerick about newts and boots is a little humorous...all things considered. didn't get them done in time to enter young author's contest.

seventh grade, placed first with an amusing story about a raccoon. wrote quite a few haiku that mostly sucked. instead of english class, the teacher ran a writer's workshop. definately my favorite class, lol. still have everything i wrote then, most of which make me shudder but were slightly improved over what came before.

ninth grade, wrote a humorous poem summarizing the odyssey for english. homer would've not been amused, heh.

summarized the little prince in haiku in tenth grade.

eleventh, parents saw page in local paper showcasing student writings. out of amusement dad made each of us write something to see how it would compare. mine was a slightly dr. seuss-ish piece on annoying parents. had they less of a sense of humor, that could've turned out bad.

senior year, wrote an anonymous piece for the school newspaper grumping about half-days starting at ten am. would've much rather preferred going in at 7am and getting out at ten rather than going through the rigamarole that went on at our house which usually ended in us missing the bus. the story was funny and it got printed, LOL. unfortunately, it was the last issue before graduation so i never got a chance to see if they'd take anything else.

that year i took grammar and had to do a writing for each chapter. the teacher was lenient, if you did the writing and passed the test, you didn't have to do the work for that chapter. i did quite well, although i've since debauched the grammarian living within my skull.

did not write anything real until a good five years after graduating. lived at home, paid rent. had five younger siblings. up to then i had the wisdom to know that anything put on paper would've gotten me in trouble. then they got a puter. 'rents were comp illiterate enough that i didn't have to worry about them finding my stuff. wrote alot. fell in with people who wrote poetry. would share our work and offer suggestions. wrote alot more. found out how useful it was for releasing pent up emotions. needed that.