#english101things

Growing up I always considered myself regular. Nothing special, just another ordinary person. I thought that I was leading a plain life, and nothing interesting has ever happened to me. I went to school, ate two meals a day, got anxious for tests, slept a lot. Just regular things every high school student does. Having hope for a exciting future is what I clung to, it supported me and gave me hope to continue on. What I couldn’t see is that my existence wasn’t actually as cheerful nor normal like the other kids my age.

The amount of sleep I got started to expand around the summer when I was only 15. I could sleep for over 15 hours, more if I pushed myself. I didn’t wanna be awake, I didn’t want to see other people. When my 2nd year of high school started I had to acting like I was fine. I could put on a smile like a champ. I didn’t want to attract attention, I was still considered normal. Standing out wasn’t my thing, I was very plain dressed and wanted to scurry through my high school years unnoticed. Inside a growing hatred for myself had grown cancerous. I hated everything about myself, top to bottom. I lost interest in friendships and things I once cared deeply for. I was so good at pretending that nobody noticed. Not even my own mother.

By the age of 16 I started to see a therapist. I started a cycle of cutting and self loathing I couldn’t break alone. Medication after medication came my way, one session a week soon grew to two then three. My anxiety levels matched my depression perfectly, both left me feeling unable to function. At a few points they spiked so badly that I started seeing things, hearing things. These caused me to have panic attacks, I would just curl up and want to die. The attacks caused me to miss two days of school every week, sometimes three. Being around others made me feel worse. It just escalated the breakdowns, even the simplest conversations. I consistently fought with my mother, she didn't understand my problems. She knew I wasn’t missing school because I was psychically sick, but she didn’t understand just how mentally I was. Her reign of abuse then began. I would have bruises from her punches, she gave them every week if I skipped more then one day. I distanced myself from her, a distance I’ve never wanted to close, even now.

My downward spiral was quickly leading me to attempting to the irreversible. I jumped down the 30 stairs attached to our porch at the beginning of my junior year. This gave me a fractured hip and a few large scrapes. After I failed my attempt I grew quiet, no more family outbursts or swearing matches. I gave up with acting out. I gave up trying all together. I went to school, got my grades up slightly, and even brought down my anxiety levels. Summer rolled around, I felt better, so much so that I stopped therapy. Then came Senior year, my list of classes was so simple, all art besides two sciences. I had it down packed, my grades were so high I got Dean's List.

Growing up I always considered myself regular. Nothing special, just another ordinary person. I thought that I was leading a plain life, and nothing interesting has ever happened to me. I went to school, ate two meals a day, got anxious for tests, slept a lot. Just regular things every high school student does. Having hope for a exciting future is what I clung to, it supported me and gave me hope to continue on. What I couldn’t see is that my existence wasn’t actually as cheerful nor normal like the other kids my age.

The amount of sleep I got started to expand around the summer when I was only 15. I could sleep for over 15 hours, more if I pushed myself. I didn’t wanna be awake, I didn’t want to see other people. When my 2nd year of high school started I had to acting like I was fine. I could put on a smile like a champ. I didn’t want to attract attention, I was still considered normal. Standing out wasn’t my thing, I was very plain dressed and wanted to scurry through my high school years unnoticed. Inside a growing hatred for myself had grown cancerous. I hated everything about myself, top to bottom. I lost interest in friendships and things I once cared deeply for. I was so good at pretending that nobody noticed. Not even my own mother.

By the age of 16 I started to see a therapist. I started a cycle of cutting and self loathing I couldn’t break alone. Medication after medication came my way, one session a week soon grew to two then three. I missed two days of school every week, sometimes three. I consistently fought with my mother, she didn’t believe I had problems. She knew I wasn’t missing school because I was psychically sick, but she didn’t understand just how mentally I was. Her reign of abuse then began. I would have bruises from her punches, she gave them every week if I skipped more then one day. Looking back I realize she had always, since I was very small, been mentally abusive with her words. I distanced myself from her, a distance I’ve never wanted to close, even now.

(2) In your own tumblr post, make a list of the “characters” you will feature in your memoir essay (don’t forget to include yourself!). Myself, My mom, my brother, the teacher, school nurse, the two hospital nurses, the doctor, etc.(?)

(3) Think about the story you will be telling for your memoir essay.  When would dialogue work well to illustrate what was going on?  Add to your tumblr post a possible conversation between your characters.  Try using dialogue tags in a few different ways. Dialog would work between my mom and the schools nurse, my brother and the school nurse, between me and both hospital nurses, and between mom and the doctor.

---Mom growled at the nurse but then turned her attention to me, “Honey, can you hear me? Are you alright?”

---My brother who was now standing in the doorway with eyes as wide as an owl spoke softly, “Have you called our mom?”

Animal Crossing or Pokémon. (Their origin, what they mean to me, how they developed, how people respond to them, etc.)

Mushrooms or Cactus (How to treat/identify/grow)

The classroom in which English Composition 101-01 is held is a very dull cream colored, dirty around the edges, old room. While the teacher makes for a interesting class, the room is a overly boring plain environment. Overall, the room could be worse and does not distract from why we are here. 

(1) What is going on in this story?  Relate the actual events of the essay.

A man in France who can't speak French can only say one word "D’accord,” which translates basically to O.K. By only being able to say okay, David agrees to many things he'd likely wouldn't have. From sewing a button on a bear to having extensive mouth surgery. David unfortunately has a kidney stone, this winds him up in the hospital where he has to return the following week for a check up. As he says OK to the nurse, he winds up in a quiet waiting room just in his underwear.

(2) What is the larger theme or themes at play?  (What is the point?)

Going though life is a strange adventure if the only thing you can say is okay. You need to know when to say no otherwise you might end up in a waiting room in your underpants. The things you will experience while your going through life won't all be good, but they will be remembered. (3) How does the author use their inner thoughts within their writing?

He explains past events and relates them to the current situation. By bringing up his childhood, or the dog with a peg leg his interests the reader and brings in strange new twists. Inner dialog is helpful to have the reader put themselves in his shoes. Although comical, him thinking of ways to die while mostly nude is what most of us would do. (4) Pick one passage where the author uses vivid description.  Paste it into your post.  What stand out about that passage for you?  How is it effective?

"Perhaps on their way home they’ll see a dog with a wooden leg, which I saw myself one afternoon. It was a German shepherd, and his prosthesis looked as though it had been made from a billy club. The network of straps holding the leg in place was a real eyeopener, but stranger still was the noise it made against the floor of the subway car, a dull thud that managed to sound both plaintive and forceful at the same time. Then there was the dog’s owner, who looked at his pet and then at me, with an expression reading, “That’s O.K. I took care of it.”

With this style of writing the author paints a picture in your mind of just how ridiculous this dog really looks. It stood out to me because of the dog's owner and just how he is totally fine with the dog being the way it is. It's effective because of how he explains how it looks, sounds, and how others feel about it.

(5) What does the author do to make this piece interesting and hold the readers’ interest?

Metal is a very technical type of music that many people mistake for just loud nonsense. The amount of time and energy it takes time to preform the type of music would be surprising for a lot of people. Lets say you play guitar, you have to stay on time with the rest of your band mates while still focusing on the movements of your fingers to keep up with the lighting fast pace as well as the intricate riffs. Just the amount of skill needed to do this type of thing amazes me, not to mention having to write all of said music beforehand.

Giant viruses are those that measure longer than half a micron, or a thousandth of a millimeter, and thus can be observed under a light microscope, unlike other viruses that are far too tiny. Mollivirus sibericum – literally “soft virus from Siberia” – comes in at 0.6 microns, just making it into the giant virus group. Before attempting to revive it, the team of researchers plan on determining if the virus is deadly to animals or humans, though considering all previous examples have turned out to be harmless, the likelihood that this one proves deadly is not very high.

1. The point of the paragraph is to explain the type of virus they will be extracting.

2. the first paragraph was the introduction which was first explaining what they were doing and why they were reviving a virus

3. the paragraph puts the virus into perspective of being a large virus which alows it to be extracted from the perma frost in sibera.