In this blog post I'm going to be vlogging my answers to 7 questions about revising my narrative project. Some materials I looked over before making this post are What is Fan Fiction -- and why is it making people nervous? (Stephen Downes), and Rewinding and Rewriting: The Alternate Universes in Our Head (Hidden Brain Podcast). Here is also a link to my Narrative project web page
YouTube video vlog answers Here are the seven questions I'm answering In the vlog. 1) How did revising this draft impact the way you critiqued the product? Did the process lead to a closer reading? 2) When you revised the story's point-of-view, tense, and choice, did you make other revisions that weren't required? 3) How did rewriting the story in third person impact your interpretation of the real-life event? 4) How did rewriting the story in present tense impact your interpretation of the real-life event? 5) How did rewriting the decision impact your interpretation of the real-life event? 6) How did it feel to revise this story "during, after, and since." 7) For draft #3, will you return to the original story or continue with the counterfactual story? Why?
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In this blog post, I'm going to be revising my scene from blog post five. I'm hoping to add at least 200 more words and I'm going to be adding dialogue to help show more action in my scene.
Seen From My Life It was a cold early January day, my mom and I were heading to chop (Children's Hospital of Philadelphia) we arrived at the woods center, it's a big old four-story brick building connected to the main wings of chop. We drove into the basement found a parking spot and get a slip from the attendant. I'm starting to feel pretty nervous wondering what options I'm going to have. We take the elevator up to the 4th floor, sign-in and were told to take a seat in the waiting room. It's a bright room, paintings of elephants, zebras, and giraffes cover the walls. There's little kids all around some coughing and crying as their parents try to console them, another's running around without a care in the world. I heard my name be called and the young nurse escorts my mom and I to room 6. We wait for surgent Adzick to arrive. After waiting about 30 minutes surgeon Adzick arrives, he knocks twice on the door and then proceeds to enter. He's a tall man probably 6 foot 3 with short gray combed over hair. He walks up to me shakes my hand and introduce himself. “Hello Seth, my name is dr. Adzick and I'm the head surgeon here at CHOP for all pectus surgeries.” I can tell by the way he carries himself that he is a very confident man. He then proceeded to say, “So Seth, after spending some time looking over your x-rays, I've come to the conclusion that your severe pectus excavatum is causing your heart to shift to the left and it seems to be putting pressure on your lungs. The pressure it's putting on your lungs could be the cause of your asthma. Do to your severe condition I would highly recommend surgery as soon as possible.” I was expecting him to say this but even still hearing it out loud made it almost too real. He then said, “This is a big surgery, so I highly recommend you taking the time to weigh your options. If you decide to do the surgery, beware that you could be out of school and work for some time.” Adzick then said, “Another one of my patients was going to have the surgery in about three weeks so if you would like, I can get yours down then also or you can wait till school ends?” The idea of waiting months was overwhelming; I don't have the patience for that. I responded almost immediately saying, “I'll do the surgery in three weeks, that works way better for me." Little did I know that this surgery and the time that I picked would end up causing me my job and months of school work, I should have waited. I should have waited till the summer. In this blog post I'm going to be rewrites a scene from The Yellow Wall-Paper (Charlotte Perkins Stetson). Two of my goals for this scene is to provide description and action. I'm also going to be writing a short scene where I or someone close to me made a decision that negatively impacted my life. In this scene I'm also going to be trying to provide description and action.
The Yellow Wall-Paper It seems that I'm not getting better as fast as John hoped. I feel that i've been making leaps and bounds lately but John says otherwise, I'm sure he knows best. He says that going to Weir Mitchell's is probably the best for me, so that is where I must go. It's a dreary day; I can't help but think about my old friend who spent some time at Weir Mitchell's, she said Mitchell's is so strict he doesn't allow for anything, I'm sure I won't be able to journal there at all. I'm going to be so far away from John, I know it is what I need, and I know it is what John wants, but it feels like too much right now. Well the time has come for me to leave John loaded up the boogie and send Jennie and I off. It's a long waze away from home. We rode through grassland and valleys, around mountains and lakes and eventually arrived at Mitchells. It's the first time I've been to Mitchell's house in quite some time. Its an old small brick building sits on a lovely piece of land overlooking over the lake. Jennie and I had inside, and Mitchell shows me my room. It's nothing like my last room there's no yellow wallpaper. There's no windows looking over a garden. It's just a quiet room on the first floor tucked away behind Mitchell's office. There's no windows nor color just a small cast iron bed in the corner with a candle holder next to it. I hope I don't have to be here long, I miss John already. I know John is strict but he cared for me, I'll have to get better for him. Seen From My Life It was a cold early January day, my mom and I were heading to chop (Children's Hospital of Philadelphia) we arrived at the woods center, its a big old four-story brick building connected to the main wings of chop. We drove into the basement found a parking spot and get a slip from the attendant. I'm starting to feel pretty nervous wondering what options I'm going to have. We take the elevator up to the 4th floor, sign-in and were told to take a seat in the waiting room. It's a bright room, paintings of elephants, zebras, and giraffes cover the walls. There's little kids all around some coughing and crying as their parents try to console them, another's running around without a care in the world. I heard my name be called and the young nurse escorts my mom and I to room 6. We wait for surgent Adzick to arrive. After waiting about 30 minutes surgeon Adzick arrives, he knocks twice on the door and then proceeds to enter. He's a tall man probably 6 foot 3 with short gray combed over hair. He walks up to me shakes my hand and introduce himself, I can tell by the way he carries himself that is a very confident man. He proceeded to tell me that with my severe pectus excavatum he feels surgery is my only option. I was expecting him to say this but even still hearing it out loud made it almost too real. He told me another kid was getting the surgery in about three weeks and I could have mine done then also, or I could wait a few more months till school ended. The idea of waiting months was overwhelming; I don't have the patience for that. I told him that I'd do the surgery in 3 weeks. Little did I know that this surgery and the time that I picked would end up causing me my job and months of school work, I should have waited. I should have waited till the summer. In this blog post, I'm going to be rewriting a scene from Bullet in the Brain (Tobias Wolff). The scene I've chosen to rewrite is when Anders flashes back to his memory of a pickup baseball game he played as a young boy. I also decided to rewrite part of the ending paragraph to better Incorporated my scene. I'm also going to be writing a short scene from my current life in this scene I'm going to be trying to use present tense, dialogue, and symbolism. Rewritten scene from Bullet in the Brain. This is what he remembered. The shrieking of a newborn. The emptiness of the white room surrounding him. The beeping of the heart monitor from the other side of the room. The cold air spitting from the vents on the ceiling. His wife sobbing on the bed in front of him. Her hand holding his. The doctor's yelling “you can do this push you need to push!” Anders feels in touch, connected to the environment around him in a way he's only ever felt through books and poems before. The doctor lifts up Anders newborn baby and yells “it's a girl!” As they take her to get cleaned off. Anders wife looks at him says “she's here our daughter is finally here I can't believe she's here!” for once in Anders life he has no words his internal library of literary work developed to give him the chill on command aren't helping him. His mother, his father, their friends, and family walk through the door. Anders gets hit by the reality of seeing his mother hold his baby girl that this is the world he's been looking for throughout all of his readings. Anders elated this is a feeling he hasn't felt since a childhood baseball game years and years ago. Rewritten scene from Bullet in the Brain (ending scene). But for now, Anders can surely make time for that cold white room, time surrounded by friends and family, time seeing his mother holding his baby girl trying to find the words that can describe his feelings right now. Short scene from my current life. It's early evening and the sun setting to fade, as I'm sitting on my wheel my fingers pruned and my legs tiring with every kick. I push, and I pull, feeling the clay move like the tides. The wind is starting to sway the trees, and as it does, the leaves thrash from side to side. The quiet hum of the wheel fades behind Pretty Papers playing in the background. I push down one last time, and the clay centers on the Wheel. Isaac speaks up and says “ Why did you choose to learn pottery this summer?” I continue to pull the clay keeping my hands slick with water and said: “ I wanted to learn a skill that ends with a product that will show me my progression.” “But out of all the skills to learn wouldn't it be more valuable to pick something that you'll be able to use in your career or at the very least later in life? like learning how to program or learning a foreign language.” “Yeah I mean those are great skills but that's not what this skill is about, I wanted to learn a skill this summer cuz I wanted to learn how I learn. Which is why I felt I needed a product at the end so I can directly compare what works and what does not.” The wind starts to pick up, and the music is getting muffled by the flapping tarp working as a makeshift roof. Suddenly the sky's open up and the rain starts crashing down. Isaac and I quickly grab the tools and the clay and throw it in the rickety old shed. I leave my pot on the wheel to inevitably dissolve in the rain. We both start to sprint for the house, hopping the fence and hoping that the doors unlocked. In this blog post, I'm going to be creating a scene from a moment in my present life. The scene I've chosen to write about is when I went bouldering with a couple of friends at Haycock on September 1st. I have read What is Creative Nonfiction? (Lee Gutkind) | Making Scenes in Memoir (Lee Martin) to help give me some direction on how to composing a present scene. After being a haycock for to the past 2 hours, I walk upon Honeybun Arete. Honeybun is a V2 boulder leaning against a rock face with another boulder sitting on top. There are two little trees growing out beside the rock face. As I walk underneath honeybun, it feels as if I'm in a small cave. I can smell the trees and the damn moss all around. The ground is covered in rocks and moss that has fallen off the rock. Isaac and Ray throw the pads over the most likely places I will drop. I walk up to the problem squeeze on my tight old climbing shoes, coat my hands in white chalk them blow off the excess. I grab ahold of the starting jug. It feels gritty and extremely sharp I can't tell if it's the rock or my fingers that feel like they've been on sandpaper for the past 2 hours. I throw a heel hook and bring my right hand up. I feel confident, the rock's clean and it's only a V2 I should have no problem. I twist my body to the right grabbing the arrest of the boulder then quickly throw my right hand to the next hold. Only my ring and middle finger lock into the small chip of a hold. I realize next that the only way I'm going to hit the top of this boulder is to drop my heel hook, push off and throw for the top. I'm feeling tight every muscle is tensing up trying to hold on, so I don't fall. Isaac sees me tense up thinking I'm going to fall he pulls the mat under me. I hear him yell, Ray joins in also. If I don't move now my fingers are going to pop, and I'm going to fall. I dropped my heel, push for the top and grab the jug. My legs flying behind me as if somebody switched the pool of gravity. Suddenly I can feel my hand slipping it feels wet there must be moss on the rock. My hand pops, and I go swimming off the boulder. I plummeted down on to my stomach, right on the 7-inch black and orange foam pad. My fingertips are pink and purple, my knees scraped up, my toes are squished, and I'm ready to try again. I do not have any pictures of me on the border problem but here are a few pics of it that I've found. |
GreinerI hope as you read my blogs you will gain insight into my aspirations. Archives
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