Blog # 17 Essay # 3 A Simple Piece of Paper

Lauren, I hope you will fill these pages with words that express everything you are and everything that you hope to be. Express yourself. Be yourself. Just be you. Have a great year and a great life. - Mr. D.

I didn't see Mr D. after that year but he understood what writing meant for me and he wasn't even my actual teacher. He was an older man who helped out in my S- Track English class in tenth grade. A class he knew I didn't want t be in because I actually wanted to learn. On my birthday when I walked into the class I saw a present on my desk and inside was a blue journal with flowers on it and a bag of swedish fish. Even though I loved swedish fish, I valued the journal more.

A notebook or journal holds together numerous freshly clean and uncluttered pages that are just so welcoming and inviting. I don't want to disappoint it with amateur writing. I want my work to stand out in pride. I am fully aware of the feeling of a new notebook in my hand and often bring it up to my nose and smell its enchanting scent. It reminds me of an old library with dozens of books that I know I'll never get a chance to read.

What is a piece of paper? A simple piece of paper enables us to pour the words that our mind has created and since our mind is constantly being flooded with new information- these thoughts often get misplaced upon another bookshelf in our mind corroded with dust. So a piece of paper gives us all the ability of memory and fast recollection. It also cages in our thoughts, experiences, and pondering so we can evaluate and make sense of them. One sheet of paper eventually forms 2, 3, 100 pages and before you know it, a story is produced. But is the piece of paper in itself significant or notebook or is it just out of convenience that we use them. If you think about it, you can write on almost anything- maybe it won't always be permanent such as writing on your hand (hopefully you wash your hands several times a day) but it is still possible.

A notebook, easy access in itself, not only holds many pages together but it is our own- a connecting piece to our soul. It is our friend, catching up on old tmes or revealing innermost secrets to. A child will often tell about a first kiss that they can't yet tell their parents. Or perhaps it becomes a way to deal with what we can't in real life. In this way, It becomes our safety net. A place to hold anxieties, worries and fears.

Inside my purse, there is so many receipts. Why don't I throw anything out? Thats another story. But all my purse's have old papers and receipts- those that are crinkled and torn and smell like chocolate probably from the restaurants that give out those after dinner mints. I'm sure there are many random ideas or the start of poems I simply forgot about over time. But I don't worry about it too much because I know more ideas will come. When I look at all my old notebooks and journals; the ones I bought and the ones that were given to me as a gift, I see that I start to write but then I eventually stop, a couple pages here and there and some possible half way through. I never finish a notebook. I just like to keep buying more. Way too often I gawk at my handwriting or word usage and then it hinders me from writing something else.

I recently searched around my room and found so many of them. When i was younger, I considered them to be diaries- writing about all my heart breaking moments sich as breakups, first experiences, the cruelty of friends, boys, and oh yea- one was devoted to a cat I once owned for a sort time. And then there was the time I pretended to be Harriet the spy and hide behind trees to write about people who passed by into a black, Mead notebook. On the book shelf in my living room there is an older one I bought with a lock at the dollar store in highschool with a picture of my idol Lucille Ball scotch- taped to the cover. After a while, I stopped writing on a day to day basis or even a weekly basis because it was exhausting to relive all the moments I already gone through. But when I really needed to get something out of me, I needed a brand new notebook and quick!

My other notebook is in my mind. I write in this one all the time. I don't usually bring a notebook around with me because I don't want to flood its perfect condition with a load of useless junk i call thoughts. But aren't our thoughts useful because they accumulate to something big, perhaps an important message or story that only our subconscious keeps inside? I always wanted to wait until the perfect idea would come along or award-winning thought. But really, we can't get there without the occasional cross out here and there. So what I would do is gather up all my thoughts into a collection bin and say to myself "I'll eventually write it down." But I get so upset with myself sometimes because I could of had some good creative writing going on but it is impossible when I can't retain the same initial thoughts in my head. We think all the time. Right now I'm thinking about how my pen is making a funny noise as I'm writing and oops, there goes another essential thought in my writing process.

Thoughts come when I drive or when I'm in a state of hypnosis that I create when my conscious mind is too bored to stay focused. And then there's the inspiration that can come at any moment. And I think, wow that's a good thought. Should I pull over or keep driving? Damn, why do good thoughts come at the worst times? Sometimes my mind can drive me crazy but if I had to thank it for at least one thing, it would be my writing. We think the things we think because of who we are and we should be proud of that.