into the air

I’m just gonna put it out there - I loved having a blog. Wait, that might not convey exactly what I feel. I loved getting to write on my blog. It felt so personal and really cool to just have a collection of my own writings there before me. After we got our first couple of posts out, and Dr. A reassured us that we can use our blogs for pretty much whatever, I felt occasionally inspired to write freewrites. And by inspired, I mean I think I was procrastinating writing some kind of paper for one of my writing classes this semester (I unintentionally took 4 WI’s. how that ever happened, I have no idea…). Some other ideas hit me while I was struggling to focus the thoughts for my papers, and so I logged into the Metamail and just wrote. Ahh… freedom of expression. It’s a beautiful thing.

Cool Blog thing #1 - Tracking my own progress. Honestly, I don’t know if I’m completely satisfied with my progress this semester. I don’t know where I stand as a writer. Maybe I’m so confused from the different types of voice, creative writing, and business and research method writing I’ve done this semester that I have no friggin idea about what actually defines my writing. While I wish I could have or see confidence in my writing, I’m glad that it is readily available to me through a blog. I think it’s one of those things where I’ll look at this a couple months from now, and really get a perspective on my writing. There’s something about the time disconnect that gives me a more self-reflective ability. Kind of like reading your old journals from the 5th grade. Man, those are awkward…

Cool Blog thing #2 - getting to read others’ blogs. Seriously… one of the sweetest assignments we’ve had this semester. I didn’t even see that coming until we started reading them, and suddenly I was addicted. I know we get to read others’ works in writing workshops, but it’s different. First of all, I got to see the final products of my workshop companions - which was cool, because I felt like a had a more one-on-one connection (literally) with their writing. Second of all - I got to see everyone’s personality coming out in their writings. Really sweet. Third of all - I realized I’m not alone. I mean, that’s a given… but really though. We all struggled, and we all changed in different ways.

Though I really liked the involvement we had with each others’ blogs at the end of the semester, I’m not sure it would have been the same had we read everyone’s blogs periodically throughout the semester. For me, it was better to read them at the end because then I really gained perspective on where everyone has been this entire semester. Sure, it was time consuming - but it was really cool. Overall, I enjoyed having a blog. I hope I can still use it…? It’s great to have our works readily available, or to have a space where we can write just for writing’s sake. That’s what’s great about having this thing is that we can be uninhibited. This is my space. I can write whatever the heck I want. You know, I know Dr. A never gave us limitations when writing these, but I wish I had taken an assertion in my own voice more in the beginning of the semester. I noticed that a lot of people’s reading responses were about their own thoughts on the reading, but they didn’t let the author themselves take ownership of their thoughts. The thoughts were the students’ thoughts. I don’t think I accomplished this in all of my own writings. I think it’s something I recognized now at this point, and I hope to continue to acknowledge that it is okay to write in my own voice. Like I’m talking. It’s kind of fun, actually.

Anyway, my point is that we are able to write what we want to write on these bad boys, and for me, that has really helped with my overall progress as a writer. I’ve become more comfortable on this page with putting my thoughts out there and literally knowing that others will read them. But for some reason, I don’t care as much anymore. Maybe that’s my sense of newfound confidence. I don’t know… I’ll see how it plays out.