I Am Bismark

here is some more stuff that i write. it was meant to be better than the other stuff i posted, but that doesn’t neccesarily mean that is true. my professor liked it though. she gave me an A and had me enter it into a writing contest (results still pending!).

My First Writing Assignment

I’ve had some bad nightmares. The worst, I think, was when I was four. I was sitting in my parents' room and I looked down the hallway, and out of a black abyss all of these monsters started floating towards me. It looked like they wanted to eat me, and, of course, I couldn’t move. Seventeen years later, I’m standing here thinking my second worst nightmare is about to begin.

I am in a place called the HGB. I’m not sure what the real name of the building is, because I was told that no one else knew, so it was pointless for me to find out. It sounds like an acronym for some evil government agency, or perhaps some sort of illegal drug. In front of me is a huge, wooden door, probably a relic from some ancient civilization, circa 1954.

“Sigh…” I crack open the door and slowly walk in. The sight of the room does very little to improve my mood. A clock is the only thing hanging on the wall. My physics classroom at least has a periodic table to spice things up. This is my English class. Ah, my old nemesis… It has been a few years. I slip into the desk that I hope will offer the greatest protection from class participation.

The other desks fill up with students, and then a young woman walks in. Instead of flopping into one of the open desks, she sets her bag on the table in the front, turns to us, and starts talking about something. I assume she must be our professor. She seems normal enough as she begins, not like those other English instructors with their “I-did-too-much-LSD-but-now-I-teach” long, curly hair (ponytail optional). This gives me hope. For two and half years of my high school career, Mr. Patton was my English teacher. Of all the things I got out of those classes, I wish I had learned some better synonyms for “extreme dislike,” because I have trouble articulating my true feelings about him. But, maybe this time around, words like ‘compassion’ or ‘mercy’ will be within the vocabulary of my instructor.

“Can any of you tell me the difference between a personal narrative and a personal essay?” No one knows, so she tells us. Our first assignment is going to be a narrative portraying an internal change in our life.

I have no good stories. Even if I did, I wouldn’t be able to write about it. What little confidence I had wanes as I think back through the catalog of my memories and am confronted with banality. The other students are all sitting up straight, listening attentively, while I start sliding lower and lower into the desk.

“What are some characteristics of a bad personal narrative?” Professor Spencer continues. I’m only partially listening as I think.

Well, I guess I could just do it on something easy, like about how I became a better runner, or maybe even my first kiss. I sit up straight in my desk again. Yeah, those stories we read in middle school always had something about first love in them. Why can’t I pull something like that off?

Next she sets up the projector and holds back a laugh as she places her example of a “bad personal narrative” on the screen. The story is about some guy who gets his first kiss. I start slouching again.

“Bad personal narrative, bad personal narrative, bad personal narrative…” drums through my head as class ends and I walk outside. Snow is falling. The sidewalks are slushy and my feet are quickly soaked through as I trudge back towards the dorms to find some place to hide. If I were a good writer, I bet I could make a great comparison with this weather and how I feel.

I have horrible visions of a class next semester, listening to Professor Spencer.  “Now for an example of a bad personal narrative. Yes, here is one of the most cliched, uncreative pieces I’ve seen in my entire teaching career. And guess what? It was written just last semester! I usually wouldn’t tell you the name of the person who wrote this, but this is just so bad, I have to. His name was…”

I have to swerve to avoid a couple holding hands. They don’t bother to make room for anyone else, not that there is any less snow on the grass than on the sidewalk. I walk with my head down to keep the snow out of my eyes and also with the hope that someone will have pity on me.

English has always been the one subject that I struggle with. It’s the kind of thing that at its least, ruins a weekend due to a four-page essay. At its worst, it keeps one from an elite university due to a poor ACT/SAT score. Math makes sense to me. A few numbers and letters on a page that actually have a logical flow. English is seriously worse than a root canal, and I am justified in using that analogy, because I’ve had a root canal. I get a cool story about nitrous oxide from the root canal; all I get from English is possible hair loss.

“I hate English!” I catch myself before my thoughts become public to the people passing by.

A thousand curses upon my professor and any other person who has ever thought English is a thing to be studied. Once I reach my dorm room, I open my laptop and turn on music, something dark and depressing. I get on my bed and stare at the ceiling. I feel completely empathetic with Thom Yorke as he moans, “What the hell am I doing here?” through my speakers. What in the “heck” am I doing in an honors-level writing course?

Professor Spencer sends the class syllabus to us by e-mail a few days later for those of us who didn’t take the time to look it up online. I take my laptop along and glance at it during the few minutes I have before physics class starts.  “Aww, crap.” My audible groan causes some nearby students to turn and look. I glance at their quizzical stares and can tell by the healthy shine in their eyes that they haven’t been staying up until insane hours of the night writing. Obviously, they are completely ignorant to the things on my computer screen.

After class, I weave my way back into the deep recesses of the library. I open my laptop and the file is still up on the screen. I scroll down the seven-page syllabus that describes what my life is going to be like for the next four months. Sucking in a deep breath, I look around. The other students sitting nearby are doing various things. One guy is playing solitaire. A table over, a girl is planning out her weekend with her friend. As my eyes return to my screen, it’s apparent that I won’t be doing anything of the sort if I stay in this course. I will definitely have to rethink that plan of having a hot date every night of the week. Maybe this isn’t what I had bargained for when I first registered for classes.

I log onto the web site where I can change my class schedule. There it is: Honors 200, Section 007. I stare at it for a little while, and run my finger over my track pad. My mouse cursor hovers over the ‘D’ (for “Drop Course”) button. That heavy feeling in my gut that I always get before I do something drastic kicks in. I put my finger down to the mouse button. It would be so easy to do… Just one click, and it would all be over.

For some reason, I think back and remember how “You can do hard things,” always ended my mother’s letters to me during my missionary service. I had to tell myself that a thousand times some days just to get by. Amazingly, I did, and it ended up being some of the best experience that I have ever had. So if I can survive two years of waking up at 6:30 AM, riding through pouring rain on a bike in a suit, and trying to explain why the article “a” is a required part of English grammar to a Japanese person in my English conversation class, maybe I can do hard things.

Someone walking by pulls me out of my thoughts, and I look back down at the screen. With another deep breath, I close the website and go back to the syllabus to remind myself what I need to start writing about, I carry my laptop into the dorm’s day room and flop down on one of the couches.

It’s 6 o’clock AM and I’m still just wearing a pair of surfer shorts and an old t-shirt. I’ve found over the years that early mornings seem to be when I can write the best. Perhaps it comes from an equal dislike for both, or maybe it’s just because I’ve procrastinated writing a paper until the morning of its due date so many times that it is just habit now. The night before was spent playing video games with the guys on the floor until 2 AM. I have been able to find a semblance of a social life, though I’m still working on those hot dates. The first rough draft of my personal narrative is due at ten and I have Book of Mormon class at nine. I haven’t done my hour’s worth of reading for it yet either. Though my brain is fuzzy and my eyes are puffy, I force myself to type. Sounds of people stumbling out of bed and turning on showers fill the background, and slowly the page fills up clumsily with words.

“What are you doing up so early?” asks one of the guys before he gets on the elevator to go to his janitorial job.

“Oh, just working on a paper for my writing class which is due in 4 hours.”

“Oh, that stinks.”

I smirk and half-chuckle. “Eh, it’s not too bad.”