papers.

I'm writing my ten page paper like I write my book. It's completely my voice this time. At least, I'm trying to make it so. It's an experiment. To see if my voice can actually get me a good grade. I always shift into my college-I-want-a-good-grade-voice when writing papers. But not this time. I'm going for it. I'm editing it and pretending it's my book. And we shall see. As for the fragments that I love so dearly. .. .I have introduced the semicolon into my paper many many times. Hope he likes it.

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

One thousand wink faces.

If it were up to me...

If it were up to me, I would spend all day on amazon.com searching for books that I want to read; reading the first few pages and then buying the book for only a cent. If it were up to me, I wouldn't have four 10-page papers due the day I get back from Thanksgiving break. I would only have letters to clack out on my typewriter. If it were up to me, my teachers would let me write my papers however I want. And I would use run-on sentences. The kind that leave you out of breath and excited when you finally reach the period gasping for breath, trying to remember how that sentence started and wondering why you are now talking about the sound of a wet Popsicle falling on the hot concrete slithering beneath your bare feet. And fragments. I would use lots of sentence fragments. If it were up to me, it would be snowing right now instead of going from extreme cold to oh-this-is-okay-weather so I would know what kinds of clothes I should wear everyday. Once it starts snowing it's easy: snow suit. If it were up to me, I would have worn my knee-high rainbow socks today because these pants just aren't keeping my legs warm enough. If it were up to me, I would still be asleep in my bed. Curled up under the blanket that feels like a bear, dipping in and out of my bucket of dreams. If it were up to me, we'd both be ready but we're not and that's okay because time is growth.

But my teachers are still going to say "Find your voice!" and when they read, "I just. Didn't. Care." they're going to circle it and write fragment in red pen and put question marks on the page and give me a B-. And that's okay. I guess I can write fragments on my own time. And I can curl up with my bear blanket in the middle of the day and pretend it's still too early in the morning to be awake and I can try to find those dreams I was having a few hours ago. And I guess I can write four big papers in a week. I'll just take breaks where I breathe for a minute and then search amazon.com for books with long titles. And if it takes a while to snow, I can still wear my snow suit and pretend I'm a spaceman or someone's teddy bear. And I can wait any amount of time to be ready. I'll just spend my time typing on my typewriter fragments and run-ons and words of endearment like "pood".

I get dressed with the lights on

I really do want to go back through my life and count how many times I have heard the exact phrase, "Did you get dressed in the dark this morning?" directed at me. I bet it would be a lot. I heard it today when I walked into work. I heard it all the time in high school. I hear it at work a lot too. People must just think I have some bad fuses in my house. But really. I rarely get dressed in the dark. I just have a philosophy called I wear whatever I want to wear and sometimes that means I wear my red sweatshirt with hot pink boots over my dark blue pants and green and black scarf. But I just wanted to wear the boots so my feet wouldn't get wet and I like my red sweatshirt and I just finished making the scarf today so I wanted to try it out. It's very warm.
So.
Really.
When you look at me. You just have to look at each thing individually for it to make sense. Oh nice boots. And scarf. Oh nice sweatshirt. See? It all fits together. They match because they are all nice things. They have a common thread between them: I wanted to wear them.

But really.
If I get a time machine, I will go back to each time that it was said to me and I'll count. Or maybe I'll get a life computer. One that has a script of your whole life written out and I can CTRL F and find each time.

I don't know how I feel about prop 8. And I don't know how I feel about people celebrating about it. . . .

My Dramatic Monologue

I remembered last night near midnight that I was supposed to write a 20 lined dramatic monologue for my British Literary History class. My first draft was a story about a safari tour guide who eats his tourists but since the last poem I wrote for that class was about a jungle and graphic gore, I decided to change the subject matter. Liz, laying lifelessly on my couch with her knitting resting on her stomach suggested writing about Cat in the Hat. And with Liz and Alex yelling lines and ideas and me laughing so loudly I'm sure I woke the neighbors, this was created:

A Famous Poet’s Conversation with His Mother

Mother, do you remember the first book I tried to publish? The not-so-famous one?
No, not the Cat in the Hat; the one before the operation.
I see you trembling, mother. Were you afraid that I would remember?
You think I don’t remember my true father, but you are wrong. I remember his
strong paws, how I used to hop on pop. Oh, the places we would go!
But look at us now; a disgrace. We’ve betrayed our own kind
from the moment we walked into that plastic surgeon vet’s office. I remember it all.
And just because clogs weren’t a popular trend yet and the hat, that damned hat, was always in.
Oh, yes I’ll have more eggs please. Make mine green.
But back to the real issue; you forced me to get pointy ears and a sunken in face
and to poop in this sand box! Oh, if I were to go back – things would be different.
The Dog in the Clog would rise in popularity and we could still have this lavish life – but it would be honest. Now, I suppose you’re right. The clog did go in and out of style quite quickly,
and the hat has never failed us yet.
I just don’t like the fact that you traded in our own culture for a quick buck.
And what I’m trying to say, mother is it’s time I go back.
Leave this life of fame and lies and fleas and chew on a nice juicy bone the way I was born to.
Don’t give me that Seuss abuse, mother! I’ve made up my mind! I am going back!
It’s beginning! Arf! Arf!
The Dog in the Clog will hit stores immediately, May 2009!
Be prepared, mother. All your secrets will be revealed.