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artbyclairevictoria · 10 years ago

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Starting a blog for the Hundredth time.

I've always wanted to write a blog, and I've sat at a computer and started typing into a word document dozens of times. But then I re-read it and I don't think that a particular word correctly articulates my point... Then I think that the middle is too much of a rant... Then I notice that a bottom paragraph should probably be put at the top somewhere... but it does lead into the conclusion so smoothly...

Even writing the three sentences above, I ball my hands into fists resisting the urge to pick them apart immediately. I wish I could say that I've always enjoyed reading and writing, but that isn't true. I can say that I’ve always admired readers, and always wanted to enjoy writing.

In school I was a slow reader. I could easily remember important dates from history, and I still know the quadratic formula by heart, but when we had to read an article on our desks at the start of class, the discussion would begin and I'd still be halfway through it circling words I didn't know.

I hated reading as a child.

I remember sitting at my Omum's table with my mother, more embarrassed than flattered, that I, a child of six, had to be given so much individual attention. Besides my general inaptitude, I also found the act of reading physically exhausting. I remember getting my eyes checked in middle school, and hearing an incredulous doctor point out that I needed glasses badly, and should have had them much earlier. The astigmatism I'm sure I could have handle, like most people do, however the muscular problems that weren't corrected early enough, meant just the act of focusing on something was a manual task.

If I ever needed to fall asleep as a kid, my parents should have just handed me a book. 5 minutes of reading would have my eyelids dropping, from pure fatigue.

I can't say that my writing was better than my reading, (I still have a clear memory of randomly placing commas and periods throughout a paragraph after being told to use punctuation), but my creativity managed to show through my horrible spelling and grammar. Several of my teachers in elementary school thought that I wanted to pursue poetry, and despite definitely mastering extremely basic similes and metaphors that other kids couldn't seem to grasp, my magnetism towards poems was more directed towards their brevity and accepted abstraction, that is to say, they were short and the grammar could be incorrect (also, rhyming is so much fun).

I wrote short stories throughout middle school, and in high school I was hit with a curriculum asserting that essay writing was the way to prepare teenagers for college. I wrote essays every single week: Narrative essays, descriptive essay, argumentative essays, expository essays, you name it. Of course, essays are usually formed using evidence, from readings, that were long, dense, and numerous. My advisor was in charge of the program for kids with learning disabilities, so although I was never tested for one, she'd let me into an empty classroom whenever I had a free period. I would get to school early, and stay late, and somehow I still managed to fail history twice.

Despite struggling throughout high school to improve my grades, one day I woke up and finally understood senioritis. I had spent all of junior year arduously reading and writing, full of stress and anxiety in the rush of figuring out the rest of my life... at least what college I was going to go to anyway. Then all of a sudden I had a cathartic and life changing revelation:

"It doesn't matter."

I can't remember the moment at all, but I remember the additional thought clearly:

"I'm smart."

I grew up in a home full of encouragement. My mother raised me to believe that I could do anything I set my mind to, and I've always 100% believed that. I'm not going to be crime scene investigator, or a psychologist, or a lawyer, as my younger self considered as possible future paths, but I do know that if one day I woke up and felt that I absolutely needed to spend the rest of my life as a neuro scientist, I could get myself there. I wasn't a dumb kid. In the 6th grade I was in a program that prepped students for the specialized high school exam, and in 7th and 8th grade I volunteered there tutoring the younger students 9th & 10th grade subject matter.

When I took the test I scored high enough to get into Stuyvesant (for non-NYers, let's just say this is a hard school to get into).

I loved mock trials and debates. I could always recall the perfect facts and figures to rebut the other side's claim. I remember writing a note to one group I was arguing against giving them a good counter argument because they were stuck and I didn't want to have to wait to continue the discussion. I wasn't afraid to ask questions in class, when I didn't know a vocabulary word, when I didn't understand a reference I wasn't afraid to say "excuse me, I have no idea what you are talking about". And yet, my grades were very hit and miss. I got a A on an in-class essay of a summer reading I only got half way through. Then the same teacher scolded me for half an hour because of one small spelling error in a 3 page comic book about the French revolution that I poured weeks into (trust me, I triple checked, I don't know how that spelling error made it past inking).

I'm getting carried away, but I promised myself I wouldn't self edit, so I'll just get right back to my point.

I realized senior year of high school that it didn't matter that I was never going to please my history teacher, who, despite it being difficult to put in print, I honestly think just didn't like me. It didn't matter that I thought my philosophy teacher was a complete hypocrite for wanting our class to open ourselves up to the possibilities, despite shutting us down if we said something she didn't agree with. The fact that the usual 100 questions of homework weren't being completed in math didn't change the fact that I was doing well on tests, but it did mean I was getting a shitty grade. I shouldn't care so much that the gym teacher still didn't know my name, and that my reviews were definitely being written about someone else in class.

I realized that I should stop stressing over these subjective opinions of my intelligence (my school did PBAs, Presentation Based Assessments, an alternative to tests for visual learners).

I finally understood that I was deeply interested in what I was learning, but I hated learning it. I was so worried about doing well because in my eyes I was doing well, but apparently in "the world's eyes" I wasn't. I was working hard, and I felt like I was good at school, but bad reviews kept rolling in.

Until no shits were given.

I started to skim my history texts instead of spending 4 hours intently trying to understand every word. Instead of answering the question "What was your favorite use of evidence the author employed to make his point?" I'd answer with something akin to "I think that his author employs a lot of biases and isn't really telling us all the information. I think he's a really boring writer because he's trying to sound overly intelligent. He needs to read Orwell's essay on Politics and the English Language." I guess I hadn't put into words until just now, but I stopped thinking about school the way I thought school wanted me to think, and started to think about it the way I wanted to think about it. Somehow being honest worked. My grades went up. My history teacher and I never really worked it out, but I made up the credits I'd lost.

The point is, when I entered college I realized how over prepared I'd been. The Liberal arts homework level for one class in my college was about a third as much work as one class in my high school. All of a sudden I had time to read books so they were more fun to read. The essay that I would have had to done overnight at high school was being written over 2 months at college. Over the course of a year, what had once been an impossible and draining task became something I did with comparable ease, an observation I could only make when my context was completely shifted (My high school was in Midtown NYC, my college was just outside Downtown Minneapolis). I'd put the hours in, so now it wasn't that hard.

I started to read more, keep journals, write stories, and try to incorporate language into my art whenever possible. And yet, I was always so self-critical. As I look at what I've written so far (but not actually read it because I spend too much time re-reading before I'm even done writing) all I can see is an unstructured ranting attempt to create context for a blog that I'm forcing myself to believe will last longer than 5 posts.

Anyway, for comparison: I always enjoyed drawing, and was pretty good at it, but I didn't really consider myself a drawer until freshman year I spent over 15 hours every week doing 5 hours of homework, in physical exhaustion, trying to figure out how other kids knew how to use charcoal because it was not my medium. I had to put up work that I hated having my name on, knowing I had spent three times as long on it as they kids who had amazing drawings. I had taken one none-mandatory art class before college, and it showed. I had to sit through critiques that pointed out every flaw that I could clearly see, clearly understand, and I wanted to enter every class saying" I know it's bad, I know the composition isn't good, I know the lines aren't dark enough here and they are too dark here, I know all of this, but I can't spend 40 hours a week to make this one assignment looks perfect, so here's shit."

But, in the end Drawing I and Drawing I, I had clocked some serious hours drawing. Not only had I improved immensely, but also I learned a lot about the value of pushing through work I didn't want to do, watching a drawing change, watching myself progress. I realized that I had to be terrible for a long time to be able to draw the way I do now, and to this day I contribute any observational drawing skills I have to David Andre, my teacher for those two classes.

I've always wanted to write a blog, but I know that I edit too much, I re-read paragraphs over and over, I look at synonyms for hours, I worry about small mistakes. But my drawings aren't perfect, in fact, they are all about how I see the world differently. They are wonky drawings, the perspectives off, the relationships are weird, and yet all the pieces fit together. After those hours and hours of drawing freshman year, I know I have the ability to draw a photorealistic scene, but I don't want to, and the only reason I don't want to is because I spent so long thinking that was the way I was supposed to draw.

...and now I just draw the way I draw.

I've spent my entire academic career writing the way I was taught to write. This blog will be the reality of putting hours and hours into the in the hope that my writing will improve.

...and I'll learn to improve upon, and more importantly appreciate, the way I already write.

Well this is the way I write. I suppose this should have been about what I have to say.

Guess that will be the next post.

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