tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-82173988878410111142024-03-12T20:52:25.267-07:00Matt's NarrativesAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.comBlogger19125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-26570492399619900942013-06-10T14:24:00.002-07:002013-06-10T14:48:10.774-07:00Fostering Empathy: A Social Justice Journey [Audio Piece]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="http://i.ytimg.com/vi/_q8ejQiPPPc/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/_q8ejQiPPPc?version=3&f=user_uploads&c=google-webdrive-0&app=youtube_gdata" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/_q8ejQiPPPc?version=3&f=user_uploads&c=google-webdrive-0&app=youtube_gdata" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div>
<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-354356414948613932013-06-10T14:23:00.000-07:002013-06-10T14:48:55.547-07:00La Mexicana Rises from the Ashes [Final Draft]<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
On November 7, 2012
flames illuminated the pre-dawn darkness in the Edison neighborhood
as Francisco and Carmen Vargas' life work burned to the ground.
Apparently sparked by weathered electrical wires in the basement, La
Mexicana Market was scorched inside and out, resulting in a total
loss.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Judy Sarkozy, the
owner of Sarkozy's Bakery, which suffered its own fire in February of
last year, was one of the first to arrive on the scene.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“It just broke my
heart to see all the stuff that was ruined,” said Sarkozy who
recounted watching a river of yellow <i>masa</i> wind its way across
the blackness of the market floor.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span lang="en-US"> “It
affected all of us. That's our livelihood, that's our baby. We built
it from the ground up, with no bank loans—nothing,” said Javier
Vargas, Francisco and Carmen's son. We had to throw everything away:
cans, produce, meat. </span>It's a very dark feeling because your
career, your life work—in four hours, it's gone.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Nearly seven months
later, on a warm, late-May afternoon, Javier and Judy stand in the
doorway of Bell's brewery and shake the hands of community members
who have arrived for a benefit in support of the rebuilding of the
market.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Carmen Vargas moves
about busily in a traditional white, embroidered Mexican dress,
making her rounds through the crowd of people who fill the Bell's
patio. She and her husband Francisco, hair neatly combed in a crisp
red polo shirt, thank the community members for their donations in
limited English, sell home-made ice cream, and direct the volunteers
who have shown up to help out with the benefit.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“I could never
have imagined the support that we received from the Kalamazoo
community.” said Carmen, whose eyes welled up as she looked at the
event around her.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
The Vargas family
came north to the United States in 1993 from Nayarit, Mexico looking
for work and a chance at a brighter future. As Carmen Vargas, the
family matriarch puts it: “We came for the same reason as many
people all over the world. The opportunity for a better life.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
After first
settling in Chicago, the family came to stay with relatives in
Kalamazoo after Carmen suffered a broken arm and leg in a car
accident while riding in a work van on her way to job. Driven to
Michigan by unfortunate circumstances, the family never looked back
and Kalamazoo has become their home for the last 18years.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“We got
accustomed as quickly as possible. Since that moment, we began to
become penguins” said Carmen who chuckled and smiled, referring to
the shock of the Michigan climate.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Right away,
Francisco saw that there was a market for goods that served the small
and steadily-growing Hispanic population in Kalamazoo and he, his
wife, and his sons began to sell Mexican products from Chicago out of
the back of a truck.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“It was literally
a mobile grocery store,” said their son Javier, who remembered that
they began to sell exclusively to the Latinos in the Edison
neighborhood. “We would go door-to-door every Sunday. <span lang="en-US">We
could count 15 houses and that was it. Maybe less than that.”</span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
According
to Javier, due to an influx of Hispanic immigration to the city and
the expansion of their clientele to include other members of the
community, the family achieved their dream of owning their own store
when La Mexicana opened on the corner of Portage Road and Lane Blvd
in 1998.
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Since
then, the Vargas family has opened a Restaurant, Mi Pueblo on Gull
Road, an ice cream warehouse where they produce their own Mexican
popsicles, and has two lunch trucks which visit work sites around the
city.
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“My
dad's always been an entrepreneur,” said Javier. “He always said
he'd rather work for himself than anyone else.”</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Despite
their success and expansion in recent years, Carmen said that the
market was the heart of their business.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“The blow was
huge, but not big enough to ruin our years of work, she said. “I
tell my husband: 'We're like gladiators, we take a lot of hits, but
we keep on going.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
For Carmen and
Francisco, letting the market go was never an option and they have
plans to rebuild what they started with the support of their
neighbors. The family is currently dealing with the insurance
company, but even with the money they will receive, they will still
be short $75,000-$100,000 short of their goal, according to Javier.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
The whole family
expressed their determination to fight for the business that they
love; the business where Javier grew up working the “cash register,
butcher shop, taco stand, inventory, payroll—everything.”
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“If you achieve
something, it's because you worked hard and you believed in what you
were doing,” said Carmen.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
This hard work has
paid off with the many community members who rushed to their side
after hearing about the fire, including Noel Corwin, the owner of
Gorilla Gourmet, and Laura Bell, the vice president of Bell's
Brewery. Bell's donated their banquet and patio spaces free of charge
and Corwin donated his time and pineapple chicken tacos for all those
in attendance.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“I think they
supported us <span lang="en-US">because
we're a local, family-run business. We have good principles. We're
not there to rip people off or make a bunch of money. We help local
schools and local police organizations. They see that from us and
they appreciate it,” said Javier.</span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Noel Corwin, who frequented the market, praised the Vargas' business
and was one of the first to commit to helping them do what he could
to rebuild.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“Judy [Sarkozy]
and myself were talking about it in December. When the conversation
started, I said: 'Let's throw a big ass party.” said Corwin. “I
think their business is essential to a town that's transitioning.
It's one of the few places you see a mixture of culture.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
The mixture of
culture that Corwin referred to was visible in the diversity of
people who filled the benches at Bell's and waited eagerly to shake
Carmen and Francisco's hands and give them well wishes.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“We are very
blessed by God,” said Carmen. “We feel like we're not alone in
this. It gave us a lot of motivation to keep on going.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
The $4,000 raised
at the event last Saturday only scratches the surface for the Vargas
family and will be put towards buying new merchandise for their
makeshift store at the front of their restaurant.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“<span lang="en-US">We
would have been just as happy with $100,” said Javier. “It wasn't
really for the money. Its just awesome how the community still
supported us.”</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Still, Carmen made
it clear that they were going to keep on fighting to begin serving
the community they love once again.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“Half of our
heart is in our homeland and the other half is here in Kalamazoo,”
she said.<br />
<br />
<b>Word Count: 1,139</b><br />
<b>Intended Publication: The Kalamazoo Gazette </b> </div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-91719650980756386772013-06-03T17:05:00.000-07:002013-06-03T17:05:12.553-07:00La Mexicana Process Writing<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
I think it is fitting that this is the
last piece that I write for this narrative journalism class. I do not
say this because I think it is the best first draft that I have ever
written; I say it because I feel I was able to put all of the skills
that we learned in this class into action when I was working on
reporting for this project.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Unlike my first profile, I knew right
off the bat that I wanted to do a wide array of reporting and that I
was going to have to start early if I wanted to get it all done. A
couple of weeks ago, my friend lent me her car to run a few errands
and I decided to seize the moment and stop by the Edison Neighborhood
Association to see what was going on in the community. I already knew
about the fire at La Mexicana, but it was them who tipped me off
about the benefit and many other things that were going to be
happening soon. Unsure of what direction to proceed in, I attended
the Bell's benefit on a Saturday morning and I got to talk to a lot
of amazing people. Originally, I did not think that I was going to
write about the Vargas family, but something told me to go to the
event anyways. I am so happy I did, because in talking to Carmen and
her son Javier, I knew that there was a story to be told about their
journey to the United States and all of the things that they have
been able to accomplish.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
After that day, I set up in-depth
interviews with both Javier and Carmen. In addition, I collected
information from Judy Sarkozy, Noel Corwin, and Laura Bell at the
event itself. I am looking forward to putting together a more
cohesive and organized final draft and I am interested to know
everyone's thoughts during workshop. I am happy with the reporting I
did, but I want to turn that reporting into a good piece of writing. </div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-27079777777181790182013-06-03T15:05:00.002-07:002013-06-03T15:05:47.107-07:00La Mexicana Rises from the Ashes [First Draft]<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="line-height: 200%;">On November 7, 2012
flames illuminated the pre-dawn darkness in the Edison neighborhood
as Francisco and Carmen Vargas' life work burned to the ground.
Apparently sparked by weathered electrical wires in the basement, La
Mexicana Market was scorched inside and out, resulting in a total
loss.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Judy Sarkozy, the
owner of Sarkozy's Bakery, which suffered its own fire in February of
last year, was one of the first to arrive on the scene.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“It just broke my
heart to see all the stuff that was ruined,” said Sarkozy who
recounted watching a river of yellow <i>masa</i> wind its way across
the blackness of the market floor.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span lang="en-US"> “It
affected all of us. That's our livelihood, that's our baby. We built
it from the ground up, with no bank loans—nothing,” said Javier
Vargas, Francisco and Carmen's son. We had to throw everything away:
cans, produce, meat. </span>It's a very dark feeling because your
career, your life work—in four hours, it's gone.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Nearly seven months
later, on a warm, late-May afternoon, Javier and Judy stand in the
doorway of Bell's brewery and shake the hands of community members
who have arrived for a benefit in support of the rebuilding of the
market.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Francisco and
Carmen move about busily in the patio outside the building, thanking
people for their donations, selling home-made ice cream, and
directing the volunteers who have shown up to help out with the
benefit.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“I could never
have imagined the support that we received from the Kalamazoo
community.” said Carmen, whose eyes welled up as she looked at the
event around her.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
The Vargas family
came north to the United States in 1993 from Nayarit, Mexico looking
for work and a chance at a brighter future. As Carmen Vargas, the
family matriarch puts it: “We came for the same reason as many
people all over the world. The opportunity for a better life.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
After first
settling in Chicago, the family came to stay with relatives in
Kalamazoo after Carmen suffered a broken arm and leg in a car
accident while riding in a work van on her way to job. Driven to
Michigan by unfortunate circumstances, the family never looked back
and Kalamazoo has become their home for the last 18years.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“We got
accustomed as quickly as possible. Since that moment, we began to
become penguins” said Carmen who chuckled and smiled, referring to
the shock of the Michigan climate.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Right away,
Francisco saw that there was a market for goods that served the small
and steadily-growing Hispanic population in Kalamazoo and he, his
wife, and his sons began to sell Mexican products from Chicago out of
the back of a truck.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“It was literally
a mobile grocery store,” said their son Javier, who remembered that
they began to sell exclusively to the Latinos in the Edison
neighborhood. “We would go door-to-door every Sunday. <span lang="en-US">We
could count 15 houses and that was it. Maybe less than that.”</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span lang="en-US"> According
to Javier, due to an influx of Hispanic immigration to the city and
the expansion of their clientele to include other members of the
community, the family achieved their dream of owning their own store
when La Mexicana opened on the corner of Portage Road and Lane Blvd
in 1998. </span>
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span lang="en-US"> Since
then, the Vargas family has opened a Restaurant, Mi Pueblo on Gull
Road, an ice cream warehouse where they produce their own Mexican
popsicles, and has two lunch trucks which visit work sites around the
city. </span>
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span lang="en-US"> “My
dad's always been an entrepreneur,” said Javier. “He always said
he'd rather work for himself than anyone else.”</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span lang="en-US"> Despite
their success and expansion in recent years, Carmen said that the
market was the heart of their business.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“The blow was
huge, but not big enough to ruin our years of work, she said. “I
tell my husband: 'We're like gladiators, we take a lot of hits, but
we keep on going.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
For Carmen and
Francisco, letting the market go was never an option and they have
plans to rebuild what they started with the support of their
neighbors.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“If you achieve
something, it's because you worked hard and you believed in what you
were doing,” said Carmen.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
The Vargas' hard
work has paid off with many community members who rushed to their
side after hearing about the fire, including Noel Corwin, the owner
of Gorilla Gourmet, and Laura Bell, the vice president of Bell's
Brewery. Bell's donated their banquet and patio spaces free of charge
and Corwin donated his time and pineapple chicken tacos for all those
in attendance.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“Judy [Sarkozy]
and myself were talking about it in December. When the conversation
started, I said: 'Let's throw a big ass party.” said Corwin. “I
think their business is essential to a town that's transitioning.
It's one of the few places you see a mixture of culture.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
The mixture of
culture that Corwin referred to was visible in the diversity of
people who filled the benches at Bell's and waited eagerly to shake
Carmen and Francisco's hands and give them well wishes.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“We are very
blessed by God,” said Carmen. “We feel like we're not alone in
this. It gave us a lot of motivation to keep on going.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
The money raised at
the event last Saturday only scratches the surface for the Vargas
family and will be put towards buying new merchandise for their
makeshift store at the front of their restaurant. Still, Carmen made
it clear that they were going to keep on fighting to begin serving
the community they love once again.</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“Half of our
heart is in our homeland and the other half is here in Kalamazoo,”
she said.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<b>Word Count: 961</b></div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<b>Target Publication: The Kalamazoo Gazette </b></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-1282260638429170302013-05-27T22:49:00.000-07:002013-05-27T22:49:05.761-07:00Create Your Own Assignment: "How Gay Marriage Won"<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhG461ZF_0eK6iZXGwNywd_xUEgSX8MnGyZabHeQsAcsYiTfcWMWJQcR4G79yddsT_cQXe03LzgHnT9Z01iK_IYbCiAtby5F1gEd1hmt87J0xmItnJYz6yDstHrDJztuKdsD57zgpuaka6m/s1600/time.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhG461ZF_0eK6iZXGwNywd_xUEgSX8MnGyZabHeQsAcsYiTfcWMWJQcR4G79yddsT_cQXe03LzgHnT9Z01iK_IYbCiAtby5F1gEd1hmt87J0xmItnJYz6yDstHrDJztuKdsD57zgpuaka6m/s320/time.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://swampland.time.com/2013/03/28/how-gay-marriage-won/">http://swampland.time.com/2013/03/28/how-gay-marriage-won/</a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
Working in the mail center has its pluses and minuses, but one of the benefits is constant contact with the various newspapers and magazines that students order to be delivered to them on a weekly basis. Sometimes, if the student for whom these publications are destined has since graduated, we the employees get to take them home with us to read. It is impossible to forward magazines and they would otherwise be thrown in a recycle bin--so hey, why not?<br />
<br />
A couple of weeks ago, the cover of one of these magazines happened to catch my eye and prompted me to crack it open and read further. That week's Time Magazine was printed in two different versions, each with a picture of a same-sex couple kissing and words overlaid in yellow, block print reading: "Gay Marriage Already Won." The article came out the week that the Supreme Court began to hear oral arguments for the Prop 8 and DOMA cases, and there was a clear reference to these events. I was intrigued to read further, eager to see what rationale they would use to defend such a big statement about an issue that still remains highly contested in the United States.<br />
<br />
Although David Von Drehle's article is more of a long-form feature than a narrative piece, he employs gay peoples' experiences to further his point and put a human face to this broad issue which he tackles head-on. I think it is a great example of how the different genres of journalism can intersect to create something truly great. The piece includes history, politics, narrative, and on-site reporting, which Von Drehle then sews together to create a cohesive article. Most importantly, he uses all of this information to defend his bold claim on the front of the issue.<br />
<br />
This article caught my eye right from the beginning and I thought it was a really good read. I hope you enjoy it as well and I look forward to discussing it in class!Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-29382561195719930752013-05-22T14:37:00.000-07:002013-06-10T14:25:25.558-07:00Fostering Empathy: A Social Justice Journey [Final Draft]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">Lillie
Wolff teeters with full arms and makes her way into St. Basil's
Catholic Church in South Haven, Mich—a balancing act of posters,
papers, buttons, and baked goods. The pastries are from a local
bakery in Kalamazoo and the lemonade is made from certified organic
lemons. She enters a large, empty room filled six rows deep with
chairs and a turquoise-blue crucifix that hangs high in the back of
the room and sets everything down. She looks around, takes a breath,
and begins to set up.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> Tonight
she is representing Welcoming Michigan, a foundation that focuses on
migrant worker outreach in the rural Southwest Michigan community;
but she is not here to educate immigrants, she is here to educate
Americans on their role in ending xenophobia and discrimination. Her
only prior advertisement comes from word of mouth, from church groups
like the ones at St. Basil's, and from the local South Haven
newspaper. The room slowly fills with an elderly, Anglo crowd and
Lillie welcomes them, smiles and keeps breathing. People are
watching, but Lillie is not sure they are listening, so she clears
the air.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> “</span></span><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">Just
to let you all know before I begin, I'm okay,” she says as she
smiles nervously, scanning the crowd.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> Lille
was only 14 when her hair began to fall out. She remembers it falling
out in clumps until she “didn't have enough left to have a full
head of hair.” It was the summer before high school when she had to
shave it all off and she covered her head with wigs until she was a
senior. She remembers facing it bravely, “stoically” as she puts
it, but below the surface she </span></span><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US">struggled
with the potential of getting judged for being different.</span></span></span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> Alopecia
is an autoimmune disease that attacks Lillie's hair follicles and
causes her hair to fall out at random, leaving her patchy. Although
purely cosmetic, it may have left more marks on her internally then
externally.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> “</span></span><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US">I
think my Alopecia has led me to understand what it's like to be
different, outside the parameters of what mainstream wants to say is
acceptable or in the in-group,” she said. </span></span></span></span>
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> Lillie
is an artist, an advocate, and an instructor. She moves about busily
in a flowing black dress, dangling earnings that she hand-crafted,
her piercing blue eyes fixed on the crowd that shuffles out of the
room at St. Basil's.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> “</span></span><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">Well...I
think that went pretty well,” she says with a big smile.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> Events
like these are the cornerstone of Lillie's work. During 45 minutes,
she shows a short documentary about the migrant farm work situation
in Van Buren County and fields discussion questions. Some make
statements rather than ask questions, some are kind and others are
not, but Lillie keeps cool under the pressure. The event ends and
Lillie pours herself a glass of organic lemonade.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> Lillie
believes in the power of nature. It was during a college orientation
expedition in the wilderness in 1999 when her hair began to come
back. It started growing and for years it didn't stop. If you flip
back though a college yearbook, you will find her smiling with the
same smile, staring out with the same blue eyes, but with long hair
caressing her shoulders.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“</span><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">I
like to think that it was nature,” said Lillie who for years tried
a slew of herbal supplements and healing massages, believing with all
her might that she had the power to bring her hair back. She now
likes to believe that all she needed to do is to let go.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> Although
her hair began to fall out once again when she was 25 and has not
since returned, Lillie has found peace with her condition. Her
experience with prejudice has been formative and she channels her
can-do attitude into her work, advocating for those at the margins of
society.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US"> “She
has a strong sense of justice and empathy for folks,” said Chris
Moore, Lillie's partner of three years. </span></span></span></span><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US">He
remembers early on in their relationship when a man on a bicycle
approached her after a concert at the Arcadia Creek Festival Place
and harassed her about her Allopecia, taking note of her difference.
It was the first time he had ever had to witness the questioning that
Lillie undergoes frequently. </span></span></span></span>
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> Since
then, he has experienced numerous uncomfortable encounters with
curious strangers who are unafraid to approach her and ask about her
condition. While both Lillie and Chris acknowledged that most people
are kind and come from a place of concern, there were power dynamics
related to who approached her and what they asked. </span></span>
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> “I
have this theory that it actually has a lot to do with race,” said
Lillie who noted that her most abrasive encounters had been with
white people seeking to 'quell their curiosity'. “People of color
either don't say anything or they say something really nice. They
trust that I'm fine and they affirm me. I think that has to do with
the way people of color are treated in our society.”</span></span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> Chris
believes that Lillie's daily experiences have been key to her
involvement with social justice work. Her work with migrant farm
workers is just one of the ways she is reaching out to make a
difference in the lives of “people who everyday have to expend
energy to assure people that they're human.” </span></span>
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> During
a typical workweek, Lillie works over 40 hours doing desk-work for
Welcoming Michigan in addition to the time she spends out in the
field putting on events like the one in South Haven. And this is only
her day gig. She has recently become involved in the ERAC/CE
(</span></span><span lang="zxx"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">Eliminating
Racism and Claiming/Celebrating Equality)<span style="color: navy;"> </span></span></span><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">movement
which is seeking to eliminate racism in Kalamazoo and she
participates in numerous events throughout the city.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> But
it is at Lillie's night job that she finds solace and tranquility.
Every Wednesday and Thursday she instructs classes at the Sangha Yoga
Studio in downtown Kalamazoo. She found yoga ten years ago, after
returning from studying abroad in Ecuador in 2003. Lillie's
self-driven attitude has worn her out on more than one occasion, but
she recalls feeling </span></span><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US">particularly
defeated upon her arrival home after 9 months.</span></span></span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> “</span></span><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">I
came back and basically I was a hot mess,” said Lillie, whose
father recommended she take up yoga. During the last 10 years, a lot
has changed for her but yoga has remained her constant.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> Born
in New York and raised in Traverse City, Lillie returned back to the
Big Apple after graduation from college and began to make connections
with nonprofits in the city. Later, she moved back up to Traverse
City and founded an ESL Program for migrant farm workers before
moving down to Kalamazoo and furthering her work within the migrant
worker community.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> She
has been to India to study yoga, back to Ecuador twice, from coast to
coast of the United States, but she cannot imagine being anywhere but
in Kalamazoo.</span></span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> “She
came to Kalamazoo to reinvent herself,” said Chris who reminisced
about the Lillie he met three years ago, just getting her start again
in the city she had left after her graduation from Kalamazoo College
in 2004. She found stability in her job teaching yoga, but she found
her passion engaging in race work in the community. </span></span>
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> “</span></span><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US">I
think that the anti-racism work that's happening in Southwest
Michigan is unlike anything happening in any other part of the
world,” she says. “There's so much potential here. There's so
much we can do here.”</span></span></span></span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> She
puts emphasis on the word “we,” recalling times when she felt
like she could set out to singlehandedly save the world and nearly
got crushed by the pressure.</span></span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> “</span></span><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US">I
can't not do this,” she says passionately. “But, you can't be
alone in this work. It's not sustainable or healthy.”</span></span></span></span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> She
shifts her eyes upward and to the left and runs her hand across her
scalp and remembers long sleepless nights organizing in Traverse City
where she worked alone on issues surrounding the migrant community.
She remembers the hustle and bustle of New York City and the
neighborhoods of Ecuador where she once walked and lived.</span></span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> But
ultimately Lillie keeps on looking forward; she keeps on moving and
organizing, advocating for leaders to work together for change in the
community.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> “</span></span><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">My
liberation is tied up in your liberation” Lillie says and she
smirks. “Everyone has historically thought that their fight is the
good fight, but people shouldn't have to choose what hat they wear.
It's all connected; it doesn't have to be an either-or, it's a
both-and.”</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Target Publication: <i>The Kalamazoo Gazette </i></b></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Word Count: 1,445</b></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-9228798423272928502013-05-22T12:11:00.000-07:002013-05-22T12:11:40.136-07:00"The Events of October" Reading Response <br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
The minute that I picked up <i>The
Events of October</i>, I could not
put it down. I borrowed a copy of the novel from a friend this past
Saturday afternoon and cracked it open with the intention of just
reading the first chapter. Three hours later, I found myself still
sitting in the same spot with my face in the middle of the book. I
know that my instant interest has a lot to do with me being a part of
this college community and the sense of shock I felt at the prospect
of a tragedy of this magnitude. Having said that, I think that Gail's
powerful ability to tell a story drew me in and sustained me. For me,
the sign of a good writer is the one who can get you to desire to
read more and to want to get to the end of the book. In this reading
response, I want to identify and break down the stylistic and
structural strengths of <i>The Events of October </i>that
make it one of the best pieces of creative nonfiction that I have
ever read.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<ol>
<li><div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Ample
Context</div>
</li>
</ol>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
One
of the first things that I observed when reading this book is the
amount of time that Gail spends setting up the context for the
tragedy that later ensues. Not only does she describe the college
well for someone who has never visited a small, liberal arts college,
but she also does a good job at getting the reader to picture
Maggie's and Neenef's upbringing. In the case of Maggie, the reader
gets a good look at all of the potential she had and which was robbed
from her. In the case of Neenef, the reader gets a glimpse into his
psychological formation and red flags are raised for the reader early
on.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<ol start="2">
<li><div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Widespread
Research and Interviewing</div>
</li>
</ol>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Another
thing that stuck me about this book is the sheer amount of
researching and interviewing that Gail did in order to put this book
together. I cannot even imagine all of the notebooks and files she
had filled and what a tedious task it would have been to sort through
it all. I think the her book is a testament to the power of ample
researching and the abundance of information appeases all of the
reader's doubts.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<ol start="3">
<li><div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Highly
Thought-out Sequencing</div>
</li>
</ol>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Due
to the fact that Gail seems to have had so much material to put into
this book, I admire how she handled the arduous task of putting
everything together. Since being in this class and beginning to write
my own narrative pieces, I have discovered that this is the hardest
part of the process for me. Especially in the sections entitled “The
Endless Night” and “Hold Fast,” she manages to piece together a
narrative using all of her interviews that takes into account nearly
every aspect of those tragic weeks. Whether she divided them through
the use of her own voice or through the simple drawing of lines, the
chapters never read as jumpy to me. I think that she is more fabulous
that ever in this realm and I am going to ask her a lot about it in
class.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
I
thoroughly enjoyed reading this book, even though the subject matter
is truly traumatic. I think that Gail puts together a fantastic
example of narrative journalism and I am really looking forward to
our class today so I can ask her for tips, both stylistic and
structural.
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-61150545108482709682013-05-17T17:59:00.000-07:002013-05-17T17:59:24.502-07:00Final Story PitchHey everyone,<br />
<br />
I just wanted to check in with some potential story ideas for the final project. At this point, I am still undecided about which topic to go with, but I am going to solidify my choice over the weekend.<br />
<br />
Idea 1- For my first idea, I thought about doing an extension of my last article, which was loosely related to farm work. This time around, I would ask Lille for contacts who do work in the South West Michigan farm industry and interview migrant workers who work in the fields. I would hopefully be able to go out for them during a day of work, as well as doing sit-down interviews.<br />
<br />
Idea 2- My second idea would be to do a story on the Kalamazoo College arboretum. There is a senior history major who just did extensive research on the history of the arb and I think it would be cool to explore that (how it came into the college's possession, prior historical use, plans for the future). I am going to do more looking into this and see what I find.<br />
<br />
Idea 3- My third idea was potentially doing a story about the Henderson Castle. I noticed that Suzanne also had pitched this idea, so I would only do it if she did not take it. After speaking with my boss at the mail center (she's been at the college 30 years and she knows all the business), she said there is a secretary in the theater department who used to own it. She and her husband were K students and they would always go on walks past it and say "we are going to own that someday" and they did! Unfortunately, they lost the property due to economic troubles a few years ago, but I still think the story would be worth exploring as a whole.<br />
<br />
I look forward to hearing everyone's ideas in class! See you all on Wednesday!Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-81566355755059269332013-05-17T17:44:00.000-07:002013-05-17T17:44:33.891-07:00Telling True Stories Reading Response<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span lang="en-US">There are a couple of pieces in the reading for this week that have changed the way that I
think about story writing forever. I feel like these two sections on
“structure” and “quality” were much more helpful to me in my
writing than was Franklin's entire book </span><span lang="en-US"><i>Writing for
Story</i></span><span lang="en-US">.
In the “structure” section, it was a short little piece called
“Narrative Distance” by Jack Hart that really conveyed the
importance of putting the reader in the shoes of the story's
protagonist. Many of the pieces echoed the notion that it is
important to make readers feel sympathy for the main character early
in the story and Hart gives us the tools to do this. In his little
blurb, he essentially rewrites the same sentence three times, but
each time he zooms in the camera a little bit more to make the
perspective more personal. I found that when I read the version of
the sentence that was the most focused, it spoke to me much more than
a disinterested narration from across the room. It was in this moment
that I realized I needed to apply these same techniques to my own
story. I had previously included dialog by Lillie and given
descriptions of her, but I don't think I had truly let them get
inside of her head. I decided to use my interview with her boyfriend,
Chris, to try and figure out more about this person who he himself
called “mysterious.” He told me about a few instances when he has
been with her and people make comments about her hair and the
emotional reactions that she has. This is something that she has
never mentioned to me directly and it was great to get a new
perspective. I incorporated some of Chris' dialog into my revised
version of the story and I hope that it is working to improve the
piece as a whole. </span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span lang="en-US"> The
piece that stuck out to me the most in the “Building Quality”
section was “Sequencing: Text as Line” by Tom French. Throughout
his entry, he uses writing examples from David Finkel to show what
makes good story writing. I was previously familiar with David
Finkel, since I read his book </span><span lang="en-US"><i>The
Good Soldiers</i></span><span lang="en-US">
(about US soldiers in the Middle East) during the summer before my
sophomore year. To this day, it remains one of my favorite
journalistic books because he makes the scenes come alive to the
reader. Example after example, French showed how Finkel chooses
seemingly small aspects of a larger conflicts and puts them at the
center of his story. He puts value on the small details and believes
that these things can speak volumes when places within a larger
context (a war, an economic downturn, etc). In my revised draft, I
have tried to hone in on descriptiveness in the hopes that the story
comes more to life. Having said that, I think I need to go further
for the final draft. I want to select a scene from her life and
describe it so that the reader can get an idea of where she comes
from and how that has shaped her worldview. I am looking forward to
the last revision and this week's reading have helped me a lot to
re-envision my piece. </span>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-45644257695867248062013-05-14T16:27:00.001-07:002013-05-14T16:27:22.925-07:00Fostering Empathy: A Social Justice Journey<br />
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Lillie
Wolff teeters with full arms and makes her way into St. Basil's
Catholic Church in South Haven, Mich—a balancing act of posters,
papers, buttons, and baked goods. The pastries are from a local
bakery in Kalamazoo and the lemonade is made from certified organic
lemons. She enters a large, empty room filled six rows deep with
chairs and a turquoise-blue crucifix that hangs high in the back of
the room and sets everything down. She looks around, takes a breath,
and begins to set up.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Tonight
she is representing Welcoming Michigan, a foundation that focuses on
migrant worker outreach in the rural Southwest Michigan community;
but she is not here to educate immigrants, she is here to educate
Americans on their role in ending xenophobia and discrimination. </span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Her
only prior advertisement comes from word of mouth, from church groups
like the ones at St. Basil's, and from the local South Haven
newspaper. The room slowly fills with an elderly, Anglo crowd and
Lillie welcomes them, smiles and keeps breathing. People are
watching, but Lillie is not sure they are listening, so she clears
the air.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Just
to let you all know before I begin, I'm okay,” she says as she
smiles nervously, scanning the crowd.</span></span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Lille
was only 14 when her hair began to fall out. She remembers it falling
out in clumps until she “didn't have enough left to have a full
head of hair.” It was the summer before high school when she had to
shave it all off and she covered her head with wigs until she was a
senior. She remembers facing it bravely, “stoically” as she puts
it, but below the surface she <span lang="en-US">struggled with the
potential of getting judged for being different.</span></span></span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Alopecia
is an autoimmune disease that attacks Lillie's hair follicles and
causes her hair to fall out at random, leaving her patchy. Although
purely cosmetic, it may have left more marks on her internally then
externally.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US">I
think my Alopecia has led me to understand what it's like to be
different, outside the parameters of what mainstream wants to say is
acceptable or in the in-group.”</span></span></span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Lillie
is an artist, an advocate, and an instructor. She moves about busily
in a flowing black dress, dangling earnings that she hand-crafted,
her piercing blue eyes fixed on the crowd that shuffles out of the
room at St. Basil's.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Well...I
think that went pretty well,” she says with a big smile.</span></span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Events
like these are the cornerstone of Lillie's work. During 45 minutes,
she shows a short documentary about the migrant farm work situation
in Van Buren County and fields discussion questions. Some make
statements rather than ask questions, some are kind and others are
not, but Lillie keeps cool under the pressure. The event ends and
Lillie pours herself a glass of organic lemonade.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Lillie
believes in the power of nature. It was during a college orientation
expedition in the wilderness in 1999 when her hair began to come
back. It started growing and for years it didn't stop. If you flip
back though a college yearbook, you will find her smiling with the
same smile, staring out with the same blue eyes, but with long hair
caressing her shoulders.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I
like to think that it was nature,” said Lillie who for years tried
a slew of herbal supplements and healing massages, believing with all
her might that she had the power to bring her hair back. She now
likes to believe that all she needed to do is to let go.</span></span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Although
her hair began to fall out once again when she was 25 and has not
since returned, Lillie is not grieving her loss—she is out in the
community advocating for those at the margins of society.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">“<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">She
has a strong sense of justice and empathy for folks,” said Chris
Moore, Lillie's partner of three years. Alongside her, he has
experienced numerous uncomfortable encounters with curious strangers
who are unafraid to approach her and ask about her condition. While
both Lillie and Chris acknowledged that most people are kind and come
from a place of concern, there were power dynamics related to who
approached her and what they asked. </span></span></span></span>
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">“<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I
have this theory that it actually has a lot to do with race,” said
Lillie who noted that her most abrasive encounters had been with
white people seeking to 'quell their curiosity'. “People of color
either don't say anything or they say something really nice. They
trust that I'm fine and they affirm me. I think that has to do with
the way people of color are treated in our society.”</span></span></span></span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Chris
believes that Lillie's daily experiences have been key to her
involvement with social justice work. Her work with migrant farm
workers is just one of the ways she is reaching out to make a
difference in the lives of “people who everyday have to expend
energy to assure people that they're human.” </span></span>
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">During
a typical workweek, Lillie works over 40 hours doing desk-work for
Welcoming Michigan in addition to the time she spends out in the
field putting on events like the one in South Haven. And this is only
her day gig. She has recently become involved in the ERAC/CE
(</span></span><a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&ved=0CDEQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.eracce.org%2F&ei=ZsaSUbXzNq_HywHX2oDoBg&usg=AFQjCNGM0K5Fr26bK0zYh_1bD1MLKz9IaA&sig2=VwbPeJhady07BYewCwhVfQ&bvm=bv.46471029,d.aWc"><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Eliminating
Racism and Claiming/Celebrating Equality) </span></span></a><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">movement
which is seeking to eliminate racism in Kalamazoo and she
participates in numerous events throughout the city.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">But
it is at Lillie's night job that she finds solace and tranquility.
Every Wednesday and Thursday she instructs classes at the Sangha Yoga
Studio in downtown Kalamazoo. She found yoga ten years ago, after
returning from studying abroad in Ecuador in 2003. Lillie's
self-driven attitude has worn her out on more than one occasion, but
she recalls feeling <span lang="en-US">particularly defeated upon her
arrival home after 9 months.</span></span></span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I
came back and basically I was a hot mess,” said Lillie, whose
father recommended she take up yoga. During the last 10 years, a lot
has changed for her but yoga has remained her constant.</span></span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Born
in New York and raised in Traverse City, Lillie returned back to the
Big Apple after graduation from college and began to make connections
with nonprofits in the city. Later, she moved back up to Traverse
City and founded an ESL Program for migrant farm workers before
moving down to Kalamazoo and furthering her work within the migrant
worker community.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">She
has been to India to study yoga, back to Ecuador twice, from coast to
coast of the United States, but she cannot imagine being anywhere but
in Kalamazoo.</span></span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">“<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">She
came to Kalamazoo to reinvent herself,” said Chris who reminisced
about the Lillie he met three years ago, just getting her start again
in the city she had left after her graduation from Kalamazoo College
in 2004. She found stability in her job teaching yoga, but she found
her passion engaging in race work in the community. </span></span></span></span>
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US">I
think that the anti-racism work that's happening in Southwest
Michigan is unlike anything happening in any other part of the
world,” she says. “There's so much potential here. There's so
much we can do here.”</span></span></span></span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">She
puts emphasis on the word “we,” recalling times when she felt
like she could set out to singlehandedly save the world and nearly
got crushed by the pressure.</span></span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US">I
can't not do this,” she says passionately. “But, you can't be
alone in this work. It's not sustainable or healthy.”</span></span></span></span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">She
shifts her eyes upward and to the left and runs her hand across her
scalp and remembers long sleepless nights organizing in Traverse City
where she worked alone on issues surrounding the migrant community.
She remembers the hustle and bustle of New York City and the
neighborhoods of Ecuador where she once walked and lived.</span></span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">But
ultimately Lillie keeps on looking forward; she keeps on moving and
organizing, advocating for leaders to work together for change in the
community.</span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">My
liberation is tied up in your liberation” Lillie says and she
smirks. “Everyone has historically thought that their fight is the
good fight, but people shouldn't have to choose what hat they wear.
It's all connected; it doesn't have to be an either-or, it's a
both-and.”</span></span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
</div>
<div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b>Intended
Publication: </b><i><b>The Kalamazoo Gazette</b></i></span></span></span></div>
<br />
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-19167524381381404402013-05-06T13:38:00.001-07:002013-05-06T13:38:50.791-07:00Profile Process Writing<br />
<div lang="en-US" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Writing a profile piece in
narrative form is a new endeavor for me and writing this piece was,
in many ways, harder for me than the personal essay. I had previously
written profiles in a features context and I am not sure what the
exact differences are between the two genres. My biggest concern is
that my story comes off too much like a feature and that I did not
paint enough of a picture with my words. When I sat down to write the
story, I found that I had ample material, but I did not know exactly
what direction to go in. I think a lot of this stems from my
subject's context as a prominent figure in the local community. From
the beginning, I knew that my target publication was going to be the
Kalamazoo Gazette, because the story would have more of an impact for
local readers than it would for someone in Colorado, for example.
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Lillie was awesome from
the start in complying with me for this project. Although she has a
busy schedule, she let me in and I was able to get a view of a few
different aspects of her life. The day I first approached her, she
invited me that same night to ride with her to an event that she was
doing out in South Haven. I jumped on the opportunity and I am so
glad that I did because I got to truly observe her in her element.
Later, I was able to go to her home and conduct a sit-down interview
and I was able to get much of the background information on her as a
person. She was fascinating to talk to and, as we learned in class, I
saw that she was eager to tell a particular story, so I let go and I
listened. From the beginning, I imagined the story being about her
social justice leadership in the community, but the conversation took
a turn towards her Alopecia hair loss condition and provided for a
sense of depth that I had not previously counted on. I want to be
able to frame her involvement in the community as deeply involved
with her empathy towards those who are looked down upon for their
appearance. I hope I am accomplishing this and I especially want my
title to reflect this. I am currently still looking for a title that
suits the piece and I am hoping to get a few more suggestions in
class.
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
In the case of this
story, the interviewing definitely came more easily than the story
writing. I am excited to see the direction that this story continues
to move in and I am looking forward to the workshop in class. I want
to be able to polish my piece and write something that does accurate
justice to Lillie and her work. </div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-19045306980391341502013-05-06T13:19:00.000-07:002013-05-06T14:00:58.401-07:00Fostering Empathy: A Social Justice Journey [Working Title, First Draft]<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Lillie Wolffe teeters with full arms
and makes her way into St. Basil's Catholic Church in South Haven,
Mich—a balancing act of posters, papers, buttons, and baked goods.
The pastries are from a local bakery in Kalamazoo and the lemonade is
made from certified organic lemons. She enters a large, empty room
filled six rows deep with chairs and a turquoise-blue crucifix that
hangs high in the back of the room and sets everything down. She
looks around, takes a breath, and begins to set up.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Tonight she is representing Welcoming
Michigan, a foundation that focuses on migrant worker outreach in the
rural Southwest Michigan community; but she is not here to educate
immigrants, she is here to educate Americans on their role in ending
xenophobia and discrimination. The room slowly fills with an older,
Anglo crowd and Lillie welcomes them and smiles and keeps breathing.
People are watching, but Lillie is not sure they are listening, so
she clears the air.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
“Just to let you all know before I
begin, I'm okay,” she says as she smiles nervously, scanning the
crowd.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Lille was only 14 when her hair began
to fall out. She remembers it falling out in clumps until she “didn't
have enough left to have a full head of hair.” It was the summer
before high school when she had to shave it all off and she covered
her head with wigs until she was a senior. She remembers facing it
bravely, “stoically” as she puts it, but below the surface she
<span lang="en-US">struggled with the potential of getting judged for
being different.</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Alopecia is an autoimmune disease that
attacks Lillie's hair follicles and causes her hair to fall out at
random, leaving her patchy. Although purely cosmetic, it may have
left more marks on her internally then externally.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span lang="en-US">“I think my
Alopecia has led me to understand what its like to be different,
outside the paramaters of what mainstream wants to say is acceptable
or in the in-group.”</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Lillie is an artist, an advocate, and
an instructor. She moves about busily in a flowing black dress,
dangling earnings that she hand-crafted, her piercing blue eyes fixed
on the crowd who shuffles out of the room at St. Basil's.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
“Well...I think that went pretty
well,” she says expressively with a big smile.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Events like these are the cornerstone
of Lillie's work. During 45 minutes, she shows a short documentary
about the migrant farm work situation in Van Buren County and fields
discussion questions. Some make statements rather than ask questions,
some are kind and others are not, but Lillie keeps cool under the
pressure. The event ends and Lillie pours herself a glass of organic
lemonade.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Lillie believes in the power of
nature. It was during a college orientation expedition in the
wilderness in 1999 when her hair began to come back. It started
growing and for years it didn't stop. If you flip back though a
college yearbook, you will find her smiling with the same smile,
staring out with the same blue eyes, but with long hair caressing her
shoulders.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
“I like to think that it was
nature,” says Lillie who for years tried a slew of herbal
supplements and healing massages, believing with all her might that
she had the power to bring her hair back. She now likes to believe
that all she needed to do is to let go.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Although her hair began to fall out
once again when she was 25 and has not since returned, Lillie is not
grieving her loss—she is out in the community advocating for those
at the margins of society.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
During a typical workweek, Lillie
works over 40 hours doing desk-work in addition to the time she
spends out in the field putting on events like the one in South
Haven. And this is only her day gig. She has recently become involved
in the ERACCE movement which is seeking to eliminate racism in
Kalamazoo and she participates in numerous events throughout the
city.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
But it is at Lillie's night job that
she finds her true solace. Every Wednesday and Thursday you can find
her at the Sangha Yoga Studio in downtown Kalamazoo instructing
classes. She found yoga ten years ago, after returning from studying
abroad in Ecuador in 2003. Lillie's self-driven attitude has worn her
out on more than one occasion, but she recalls feeling <span lang="en-US">particularly
defeated upon her arrival home after 9 months.</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
“I came back and basically I was a
hot mess,” said Lillie, whose father recommended she take up yoga.
During the last 10 years, a lot has changed for her but yoga has
remained her constant.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Born in New York and raised in
Traverse City, Lillie returned back to the Big Apple after graduation
from college and began to make connections within the social justice
world. Later, she moved back up to Traverse City and founded an ESL
Program for migrant farm workers before moving down to Kalamazoo and
furthering her work within the migrant worker community.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
She has been to India to study yoga,
back to Ecuador twice, from coast to coast of the United States, but
she cannot imagine being anywhere but in Kalamazoo.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
“<span lang="en-US">I think that the
anti-racism work that's happening in Southwest Michigan is unlike
anything happening in any other part of the world,” she says.
“There's so much potential here. There's so much we can do here.”</span></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
She puts emphasis on the
word “we,” recalling times when she felt like she could set out
to singlehandedly save the world and nearly got crushed by the
pressure.
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
“I can't not do this,”
she says passionately. “But, you can't be alone in this work. It's
not sustainable or healthy.”</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span lang="en-US"> She shifts her eyes
upward and to the left and runs her hand across her scalp and
remembers long sleepless nights organizing in Traverse City where she
worked alone on issues surrounding the migrant community. She
remembers the hustle and bustle of New York City and the
neighborhoods of Ecuador where she once walked and lived. </span>
</div>
<div lang="en-US" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div lang="en-US" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
But ultimately Lillie
keeps on looking forward; she keeps on moving and organizing,
advocating for leaders to work together for change in the community.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
“My liberation is tied up in your
liberation” Lillie says and she smirks. “Everyone has
historically thought that their fight is the good fight, but people
shouldn't have to choose what hat they wear. It's all connected; it
doesn't have to be an either-or, it's a both-and.”</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<b>Intended Publication: <i>The Kalamazoo Gazette </i></b></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-41734764450764324782013-05-01T11:03:00.000-07:002013-05-01T11:03:18.296-07:00Reading Response Week 5<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
The readings for this week all
interweave to provide a basic basis for how to report, write, and
polish a narrative journalism profile. While I found some of the
readings more helpful than others, I took a little bit from each of
them in planning my own profile writing process. “Being
There” by Anne Hull really fascinated me because she went in-depth
in her suggestions for how to truly do deep and meaningful reporting.
I had always figured that shadowing the interviewee in their daily
life was key in addition to traditional reporting, but I never took
into consideration the more abstract areas of reportage that she
touches on. For example, she recommends that a reporter should read
the local paper, go to the local church, and to use the language of
the people that you are trying to capture. I think that in all of
these areas she makes very good points, especially in small town
America. If I were doing a story in New York City, perhaps these
details would be irrelevant due to the great amount of diversity—the
New York Times would not necessarily address the concerns of the
people as a whole and no one church would have the majority of people
as parishioners. However, here in Kalamazoo, these points are very
pertinent to reporting and I may have passed them by before reading
Hull's piece. Much of the energy happening in this town proceeds from
the pulpit and the social movements are often linked to a religious
organization. If something is going on that concerns the people of
Kalamazoo, it is likely to be reflected here in the Gazette and in
the church newsletters throughout town. As far as language goes, I
think that Hull's point rings especially true in the profile that I
am trying to piece together right now for this class. I am profiling
Lillie Wolffe with Welcoming Michigan, a migrant outreach group here
in Kalamazoo. The people who are most important to her and who she
deals with on a daily basis use Spanish as their first language; if I
want to interview them or become a part of her world for reporting
purposes, using my Spanish-speaking abilities is key to my story. I
really think that knowing Spanish provides me a level of access that
would otherwise go untapped in a story like this. As I read “Being
There,” I made a lot of connections that I plan to employ in my
writing.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
As
Larissa MacFarquhar of <i>The New Yorker </i>says
in her speech: “<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Every
journalist who is not too stupid or too full of themselves to notice
what is going on knows that what he does is morally indefensible.
He's a kind of confidence man, preying on people's vanity, ignorance,
or loneliness.” I definitely have felt this way throughout the
process—trying to balance not wanting to intrude and wanting to get
the necessary material. I think that these writing guides are helping
me to cope with this balance and I am excited to see what comes of
this project. I am interested to know what others from class thought
about this dilemma and I look forward to our discussion. </span></span>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-81014186984279912592013-04-28T21:39:00.003-07:002013-04-28T21:42:11.367-07:00An Anxious Legacy (Updated with Franklin Draft)<b>Franklin Outline: “An Anxious
Legacy”</b><br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Complication: Anxiety controls Matt</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Development:</div>
<ol>
<li><div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Matt stresses maniacally</div>
</li>
<li><div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Grandpa stresses maniacally</div>
</li>
<li><div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Matt experiences attack</div>
</li>
</ol>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Resolution: Matt accepts anxiety</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
It is hard to
describe an anxiety attack to someone who has never had one before,
but I know when I pulled out of the driveway that morning I never saw
it coming. It is difficult to put into words the feeling of utter
hopelessness that comes over you or the physical torment that the
mind is able to produce and which I myself have yet to comprehend
completely.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
I guess I remember
putting the keys into the ignition and backing out of the driveway on
that summer morning, but it was in the gas station parking lot on the
corner of Grand and Schaffer that I regained consciousness. I was
shaking and sobbing hysterically on the curb next to my car and the
hum of my still-running engine made me dizzy. The word “Dad”
illuminated the screen of my phone which I was holding in my right
hand and his voice called out to me from the speaker. I struggled to
regain my breath and managed to spatter out a weak: “I’m okay.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
There's a certain
irony in diagnosing yourself a hypochondriac, which is just one of
the decisions I made the night before as I shook in terror over two
swollen lymph nodes in my groin. I was having pain urinating and had
scheduled a doctor's appointment for the next morning to do some
tests. Ever since the moment I came out to my parents two years ago,
I have harbored anxiety that being gay has predestined me for
something awful. Against all the reason in the world, I nearly cried
three months earlier as the nurse pricked my finger to draw blood for
an HIV test at a routine physical. I had now convinced myself that
the test was a false negative and tomorrow I was going to the
doctor's to receive my true fate. I pulled the blankets over my face
to keep everything out and I examined the crisscross pattern until I
dizzied myself to sleep.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Doctors offices
have always made me nauseous and I remember cringing as a child as I
accompanied my grandfather to my great-aunt Caro's numerous
appointments. He would sit and sweat and shift his eyes upwards,
examining the sterile lights nervously, as my aunt verbally abused
the office staff.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“Can you believe
she said ‘fuck you’ to the nurse?” he exclaimed one evening to
my grandmother who cooked and rolled her eyes, almost laughing from
his exasperation.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“That doctor is a
<i>cabr</i><span lang="es-ES"><i>ón</i></span><span lang="es-ES">!
And a racist! They treat me bad there because </span>I’m a
Mexican,” said my fair-skinned and light-eyed aunt who lifted her
hands to further her point.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
I picture my
grandfather in his seat at the corner of the sturdy, wooden table in
my grandparents’ kitchen piling <i>salsa picante </i>onto whatever
he was eating and worrying about the past, the present, and the
unforeseeable. If you couldn’t tell he was a ball of nerves from
the way he would rub his eyebrows, he would be happy to let you know
what was ailing him today, whether it be the Dodgers or the weather
or the remote possibility of something going terribly wrong.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
My grandmother
always told me that my grandfather’s life changed the day that I
was born and that she fell in love with him again after almost 35
years of marriage. It is true that his grandchildren were the apples
of his eye and he would show his love for us by worrying about us
incessantly at every moment of every day.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Whether it was big
dogs, the beach, playground equipment, or sub-70 degree temperatures,
everything was out to get us.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“Here comes old
‘<i>No-jacket Matthew’ </i>they call him” he would always say
as I would enter their house regardless of the month. Unless it was
the dead of summer, I was always exposing myself to the perils of the
arctic Southern California climate.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“<i>Mijo, </i>if
you love me, just put on a jacket before you walk in our house,” my
grandmother would tell me. “I don’t care if you weren’t wearing
it all day, just put it on or I will hear about it all week,” and
we would chuckle as she did impressions of him in Spanglish.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
I remember when my
grandpa got sick and I would go over during the summer to help take
care of him and my grandma would look at me over the breakfast table
with tired eyes and say: “You are going to look just like your
grandfather one day, baby.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Sometimes, in the
middle of the night, I find myself pacing around my house checking
locks on windows and doors and unplugging lamps so the house doesn't
burn down while I sleep. I think of my grandpa as I climb the creaky
stairs to my room and images flash through my mind of his shadowy
figure moving down my grandparents' hall with a flashlight at 3 a.m.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
The night before my
appointment, I retraced the usual night-time path through my house
and my heart pounded deep in my chest, waiting for something to
happen. I am always waiting for the worst to happen and that night I
almost wished someone would have broken in to my house and given me a
reason to obsess over something other than my swollen nodes.<br />
<span style="line-height: 200%;"> Anxiety doesn't
sound like a legitimate illness and certainly not something that can
be inherited. Yet the next morning as I sulked out the door for the
appointment, I glanced back and watched as my mom popped a Zoloft
into her mouth and washed it down with freshly-brewed coffee. I took
a step and closed the door slowly, pausing and staring at my car.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Caught inside my
own head as I drove towards the appointment, I remember beginning to
shake violently until I gasped for air and my foot rattled on the
brakes. I can hear the honking of car horns behind me as I tell
myself to accelerate but my foot stays still. By the time I turned
into the parking lot, I had stopped controlling my own body and I had
let my fears take the wheel. Apparently, fear is not a good driver
because, after gaining control of my breath, I was spilled out on the
sidewalk and my car was parked across three parking spaces at the
back of the station mini-mart.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“Hon?! Are you
there, hon?!” said my dad at the other end of the phone. I stood
up, trembling, and got back into the car, still sobbing. Slowly, I
switched the car into drive, turned the air conditioner on high, and
made a right onto the busy street.</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
My life-threatening
illness turned out to be a common urinary tract infection, but it
occurred to me that I had something much more serious wrong with me.
My mind. I left the office with a prescription for a three-day course
of antibiotics and a referral for anxiety counseling.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
I used to blame my
fears on things that happened to me in the past—my parents' long
and bitter divorce or maybe that time I got chased by that man with a
gun in that movie theater. Maybe none of that is out of the realm of
possibility. But when I look in the mirror, I am beginning to see
more of my grandfather in me every day—in the ways that I worry
about the past that I cannot change and the future that has not yet
happened. I am coming to the realization that this maniac worrying
may be due less to the things that have happened to me and more to
who I am deep down at the core. It has become apparent that I have
inherited more than his olive skin and his lazy eyes.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
<b>Word Count: 1,330</b><br />
<b>Intended Publication: "Lives" section of the New York Times Magazine </b></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-80429757163981252482013-04-24T14:32:00.001-07:002013-04-24T14:32:40.194-07:00Writing for Story (Week 4 Response)<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Writing for Story</i> has given me a lot to
think about with regards to the way that I write. I found that I can
incorporate many of Franklin’s structural pointers to not just narrative journalism
writing, but also to feature writing in a more traditional journalism form.
Above all, what stuck out to me the most was his emphasis on being organized.
Each chapter flowed into the next as he literally taught us how to build a
story from the ground up. Every time I read a story, I am now going to find
myself considering certain key questions, such as: “Why did he/she do that?”
and “What is his/her motive?”. When it comes to structure, the most helpful
part of the book for me personally was his lesson on outlining. When I usually
think of outlines, I imagine long and fleshed out lists of roman numerals and
sub-letters filled with ideas that sprout in every direction. It was astounding
to me that he is able to create an effective outline solely by choosing the
story’s key tensions and expressing them with action verbs; it really got at
the heart of what makes a story important.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>If Franklin
had not included “Mrs. Kelly’s Monster” and “The Ballad of Old Man Peters” in
this book, everything else he says may have fallen on me as cold theory. During
my time as an English major, I have been instructed to read several different
texts about style, but none of them have truly benefited me like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Writing for Story. </i>Had I not been able
to feel the tension in the operating room with Mrs. Kelly or explore the
intricacies of Wilk’s life, I would have been in the dark searching for
examples that put into use Franklin’s stylistic suggestions. I thoroughly enjoyed
this book and it is most definitely one that I am not selling back to the book
store. I consider it a valuable resource not only in this class, but in my
future writing endeavors. </div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-28671531634710838572013-04-16T22:55:00.003-07:002013-04-16T22:57:58.794-07:00An Anxious Legacy (Final Draft)<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
I picture my
grandfather sitting at the sturdy, wooden table of my grandparents’
kitchen piling <i>salsa picante </i>onto whatever he was eating and
worrying about the past, the present, and the unforeseeable. If you
couldn’t tell he was a ball of nerves from the way he would rub his
eyebrows, he would be happy to let you know what was ailing him
today, whether it be the Dodgers or the weather or the most recent
trip to the doctor’s office with my great aunt Caro.
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“Can you believe
she said ‘fuck you’ to the nurse?” he exclaimed to my
grandmother who cooked and rolled her eyes, almost laughing from his
exasperation.
</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“That doctor is a
<i>cabr</i><span lang="es-ES"><i>ón</i></span><span lang="es-ES">!
And a racist! They treat me bad there because </span>I’m a
Mexican,” said my fair-skinned and light-eyed aunt who lifted her
hands to further her point.
</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
My grandmother
always told me that my grandfather’s life changed the day that I
was born and that she fell in love with him again after almost 35
years of marriage. It is true that his grandchildren were the apples
of his eye and he would show his love for us by worrying about us
incessantly at every moment of every day.
</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Whether it was big
dogs, the beach, playground equipment, or sub-70 degree temperatures,
everything was out to get us.</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“Here comes old
‘<i>No-jacket Matthew’ </i>they call him” he would always say
as I would enter their house regardless of the month. Unless it was
the dead of summer, I was always exposing myself to the perils of the
arctic Southern California climate.</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“<i>Mijo, </i>if
you love me, just put on a jacket before you walk in our house,” my
grandmother would tell me. “I don’t care if you weren’t wearing
it all day, just put it on or I will hear about it all week,” and
we would chuckle as she did impressions of him in Spanglish.
</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
I remember when my
grandpa got sick and I would go over during the summer to help take
care of him and my grandma would look at me over the breakfast table
with tired eyes and say: “You are going to look just like your
grandfather one day, baby.”</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Years after he
passed away, I would stare up at a picture of him that I tacked to
the bulletin board in my room and images of him would flash through
my head as my heart beat rapidly, unable to sleep.
</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Sometimes I wake up
in the middle of the night because I've dreamed that I am in a room
filled with snakes and there is no way out. Even though it is a
recurring dream, I always leap out of bed onto the floor and rip the
sheets off the mattress, examining for anything that moves. Before I
can convince myself to give getting back into bed a try, I usually
pace the house checking locks on windows and doors and unplugging
lamps so the house doesn't burn down; this was always a legitimate
fear of my grandfather's ever since he saw that 60 minutes special.
</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Sometimes I think
that I am just crazy. It doesn't take much to put me over the edge,
usually; especially an illness. There's a certain irony in diagnosing
yourself a hypochondriac, which is just one of the decisions I made
one night as I shook in terror over two swollen lymph nodes in my
groin. I was having pain urinating and doctor's appointment for the
next day to do some tests. </div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
</div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Ever since the moment I came out to my
parents, I was always worried that being gay had predestined me for
something awful. Against all the reason in the world, I nearly cried
three months earlier as the nurse pricked my finger to draw blood for
an HIV test at a routine physical. I had now convinced myself that
the test was a false negative and tomorrow I was going to the
doctor's to receive my true fate. At this point, I had the theme
ingrained in my mind and I tossed my phone across my bed in the
latest heated exchange with my boyfriend of nearly a year about
coming out to his parents before I traveled across the globe to meet
them for the first time. But with my impending diagnosis on the mind,
would any of it matter anymore? I pulled the blankets over my face to
keep everything out and I examined the crisscross pattern until I
dizzied myself to sleep.</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Anxiety doesn't
sound like a legitimate illness and certainly not something that can
be inherited. Yet the next morning as I headed out the door for the
appointment, I glanced back and watched as my mom popped a Zoloft
into her mouth and washed it down with freshly-brewed coffee. I took
a step and closed the door slowly, pausing and staring at my car.
</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
I guess I remember
putting the keys into the ignition and backing out of the driveway,
but it was in the gas station parking lot on the corner of Grand and
Schaffer that I regained consciousness. I was shaking and sobbing
hysterically on the curb next to my car and the hum of my
still-running engine made me dizzy. The word “Dad” illuminated
the screen of my phone which I was holding in my right hand and his
voice called out to me from the speaker. I struggled to regain my
breath and managed to spatter out a weak: “I’m okay.”</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
It is hard to
describe an anxiety attack to someone who has never had one before,
but I know when I pulled out of the driveway that morning I never saw
it coming. The thing about anxiety attacks is that I never do see
them coming, but that morning it all became too much for me. Caught
inside my own head as I drove towards the appointment, I remember
beginning to shake violently until I gasped for air and my foot
rattled on the brakes. I can hear the honking of car horns behind me
as I tell myself to accelerate but my foot stays still. By the time
I turned into the parking lot, I had stopped controlling my own body
and I had let my fears take the wheel. Apparently, fear is not a good
driver because after gaining control of my breath I was spilled out
on the sidewalk and my car was parked across three parking spaces at
the back of the station mini-mart.
</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
“Hon?! Are you
there, hon?!” said my dad and I stood up, answered, and got back
into the car, still sobbing. Slowly, I switched the car into drive,
turned the air conditioner on high, and made a right onto the busy
street.</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
My life-threatening
illness turned out to be a common urinary tract infection, but it
occurred to me that I had something much more serious wrong with me.
My mind. I left the office with a prescription for a three-day course
of antibiotics and a referral for anxiety counseling.
</div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
I used to blame my
fears on things that happened to me in the past—my parents' long
and bitter divorce or maybe that time I got chased by that man with a
gun in that movie theater. Maybe none of that is out of the realm of
possibility. But when I look in the mirror, I am beginning to see
more of my grandfather in me every day—in the ways that I worry
about the past that I cannot change and the future that has not yet
happened. I have come to the realization that this maniac worrying
may be due less to the things that have happened to me and more to
who am deep down at the core. When it comes to my grandpa and me, it
is becoming apparent that I have inherited more than his olive skin
and his lazy eyes. </div>
<div style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
<i><b>*Intended Publication: "Lives"
section of the New York Times Magazine</b></i></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-29005005263425743802013-04-16T14:14:00.001-07:002013-04-16T14:14:40.964-07:00Orlean/LeBlanc Reading ResponseThese two readings provided a deeper understanding for me of what a narrative journalism piece truly is. Although they are different in many ways, a common thread that ran though both of them is the extent to which the reporters engaged themselves with their subjects. For a hard news journalism piece, I am accustomed to getting to the site of the event and doing fast reporting to be able to turn around and produce a finished product before deadline. It became more obvious to me that narrative journalism is completely different in this aspect and that a real investment is necessary for a successful finished product. In the case of Orlean, it was much more clear to me the methods that she chose to engage with her subject, the little boy. It was clear that she devoted time to observing him within the household context, at school, and in the pizza place by his school; she picked a subject and she followed him through his daily environments. In LeBlanc's piece however, he relationship with Trina was something that was very unclear to me. I was not sure if she originally set out to do a piece on Trina or if one developed simply out of her interactions with her. It seems that she blurred the line between a support system and a reporter simply trying to get a story. This created a lot of problems for me because it came off as unethical that she initiate so many interactions with someone who needed help so bad if the goal was just a story. I think of the moments when Trina would call her phone and she would not call back, only to reach out a later point in time. I think of how difficult following a person like Trina would be, but I wonder if LeBlanc gave her the hopes of a false relationship.<br />
<br />
Having voiced my criticisms of LeBlanc's potential reporting, I think that her final product is a vibrant piece that tugged at my heart strings. She manages to give Trina this voice that his both comical and alarming. I think of the moment when she references vomiting to avoid HIV contraction and I did not want to believe that anyone would live in such a state or be so misinformed about something so crucial. However, at times a more carefree and humorous side of Trina came out-- such as her references of the "junkie shuffle" and the searing image in my mind of her flailing arms. In many ways, LeBlanc accomplished this better than Orlean for me. I thought Orlean told a story that was not that exciting or truly interesting like "Trina and Trina" was. On top of that, I think it made too many assumptions about what the "typical" ten-year-old looks like. While this is the perfect cookie cutter family that I have grown accustomed to watching on TV, my experience as a ten-year-old could not have been more different. I think it was a very upper-middle class portrayal that was used to speak for an entire group of adolescent boys and that did not read well with me. The insight into the boy's life was fun at times, but at the end of the day it was "Trina and Trina" that I had pumping through my mind and truly stuck. Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-40995291148930439122013-04-08T13:44:00.002-07:002013-04-08T13:44:52.453-07:00Personal Essay Process Writing <br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="ES"> </span>When I first sat down to
write this story, I was conflicted between telling two different stories. I
knew that I wanted to speak to my anxiety in some way, but I had the choice of
talking about my own personalized anxiety or that which I feel for my sister
who has faced her own hard times. In both cases, I knew that they would not be
easy to write because my experience with anxiety has not always had many
defining moments. In fact, I often find myself grappling with a lack of justification
for the anxiousness that I am feeling.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
For this piece, I decided to pick a
concrete example from my own life and relate it to my childhood relation with
my grandfather. Whenever I think of anxiety, I automatically think of him
because he was the most nervous person I ever knew. I am hoping that the
transition between these two experiences flows naturally and it is not alienating
to the reader. Since this is one of the first times that I have ever written a
piece of this nature, I am interested to get everyone’s feedback on my strong
points and my weak points. I look forward to reading everyone’s work and to a
good first workshop. </div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8217398887841011114.post-51904654388532592252013-04-08T11:59:00.002-07:002013-04-08T13:00:49.743-07:00An Anxious Legacy<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
I
picture my grandfather sitting at the sturdy, wooden table of my grandparents’
kitchen piling <i>salsa picante </i>onto
whatever he was eating and worrying about the past, the present, and the
unforeseeable. If you couldn’t tell he was a ball of nerves from the way he
would rub his eyebrows, he would be happy to let you know what was ailing him
today, whether it be the Dodgers or the weather or the most recent trip to the
doctor’s office with my great aunt Caro. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
“Can you believe she said ‘fuck
you’ to the nurse?” he exclaimed to my grandmother who cooked and rolled her
eyes, almost laughing from his exasperation. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
“That doctor is a <i>cabr</i><i><span lang="ES">ón</span></i><span lang="ES">! And a racist! They treat me bad there because </span>I’m
a Mexican,” said my fair-skinned and light-eyed aunt who lifted her hands to
further her point. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
My
grandmother always told me that my grandfather’s life changed the day that I
was born and that she fell in love with him again after almost 35 years of
marriage. It is true that his grandchildren were the apples of his eye and he
would show his love for us by worrying about us incessantly at every moment of
every day. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
Whether
it was big dogs, the beach, playground equipment, or sub-70 degree
temperatures, everything was out to get us.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
“Here
comes old <i>‘No-jacket Matthew’ </i>they call
him” he would always say as I would enter their house regardless of the month.
Unless it was the dead of summer, I was always exposing myself to the perils of
the arctic <st1:place w:st="on">Southern California</st1:place> climate.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
“<i>Mijo, </i>if you love me, just put on a jacket before you walk in our
house,” my grandmother would tell me. “I don’t care if you weren’t wearing it
all day, just put it on or I will hear about it all week,” and we would chuckle
as she did impressions of him in Spanglish. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
I
remember when my grandpa got sick and I would go over during the summer to help
take care of him and my grandma would look at me over the breakfast table with
tired eyes and say: “You are going to look just like your grandfather one day,
baby.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
Years
after he passed away, I stared up at a picture of him that I tacked to the
bulletin board of my room and tossed back and forth, unable to sleep. I was
having pain urinating and I had made a doctor’s appointment for the morning to
diagnose what I was sure to be cancer or something equally as awful. In a
moment of decisiveness, I flicked on the lights and thrust open my laptop to
check Google for the seventh time and compare my symptoms with that of kidney
stones and Chlamydia and HIV and the rare disease Cystitis that I was probably
sure to have in addition to everything else. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
I
was already sitting at the kitchen table the next morning when my mom came down
the stairs to get ready to go to work. I had spent the night productively
thinking about all of the different scenarios for having to tell my parents
that I had contracted a rare and incurable sexually transmitted disease; or I
pondered the survival rates and treatment options for my particular kind of
bladder cancer. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
“You look like hell,” said my mom
who threw bread in the toaster and placed a sertraline on the napkin on the
counter. “Did you sleep okay last night?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
I
couldn’t speak as I shivered and texted my boyfriend, too nauseous to look at
my mom’s toast. When I tried to remove the looming doctor’s visit from my head,
I could only think of my college graduation or my wedding day or my future
children, all of which I was sure I would never see. My stomach ached as my
boyfriend and I exchanged messages about him telling his parents about us
before I would meet them; I convinced myself deep down in the pit of my stomach
that I would never live to see that day, especially with my illness. When I
mustered the strength to stand up, I headed out the door, stuck my keys in the
ignition of my car, and backed out of my driveway towards the doctor’s office. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
It
was in the gas station parking lot on the corner of Grand and Schaffer that I
regained consciousness. I was shaking and sobbing hysterically on the curb next
to my car and the hum of my still-running engine made me dizzy. The word “Dad”
illuminated the screen of my phone which I was holding in my right hand and his
voice called out to me from the speaker. I struggled to regain my breath and
managed to spatter out a weak: “I’m okay.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
I
stood up and got back into the car, still sobbing, and turned the air
conditioning on high. Slowly, I switched the car into drive, turned on my
blinker, and made a right onto the busy street.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
My
life-threatening illness turned out to be a common urinary tract infection. I
left the office with a prescription for a three-day course of antibiotics and a
referral for anxiety counseling. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
I
am beginning to see more of my grandfather in me every day—in the ways that I
worry about the past that I cannot change and the future that has not yet
happened. It has become apparent to me
that I have inherited more than his olive skin and his lazy eyes. <br />
<b><i>*Intended Publication: "Lives" section of the New York Times Magazine</i></b></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00302356731568195387noreply@blogger.com9