Week 5 reading response: Zinsser Profile

                 I walked into Stacks today, not really thinking about much and in high spirits from the wonderful weather.  There, at one of the front tables, was none other than the charming and effervescent Emily Guzman.  Instead of continuing my blissfully mundane afternoon I decided to approach her about our class for this week and the profile we have due next week.  Essentially our conversation was me asking "What is a profile and how do I write it?"  Being the expert TA that she is, she gave me a very helpful breakdown but by the time I got home and continued thinking about it I was lost again.  It was at this time that I sat down to read the profile Marin assigned for homework.  This timing was nothing short of impecable.
                  This timing was so perfect because of how well written Dan Barry's profile of William Zinsser is.  He gives us an intimate look at someone we probably wouldn't otherwise be exposed to while avoiding tired and cliche writing techniques ("a day in the life" etc.).  I also found the tone of this piece very refreshing.  He doesn't stake a claim, or try and convince us of something (Zinsser is a good man, Zinsser is a bad man etc.) yet we finish the piece with that unmistakeable warm fuzzy feeling.  This piece embrases the reader much as I imagine Zinsser and his wife's personalities would.  This reflection is a mark of truly excellent writing.  The piece is concise, but not bare.  It overviews just enough of Zinsser's life so as to allow the reader to feel we know him, while not being long winded.
                 This piece is the ideal profile and I plan to write mine in a similar vain, what I mean by that is that my profile is going to be New York Times quality.  I'm glad to know a little bit about William Zinsser and I'm glad to have read this profile.  People have a lot to tell if there is just someone willing to listen.

The First Time I Got High Draft 3: Franklin Draft

The First Time I Got High
Woody Tauke
1538 words

Intended Publication: New York Times Magazine

Growing up I had a number of best friends.   As I got older and developed through the many complicated phases of childhood and adolescence they entered and left my life with some regularity.  As I changed, they changed, AJ, Michael, Joey, Nick, and Steve.  Despite the many differences they had, I see now one similarity.  They all found sanctuary in partying far earlier than I, and I add as a digression, far earlier than they were ready for.  Now, I use the term partying as a sort of watered down jargon for drug use.  All of the best friends I had growing up started smoking weed long before I did, and that is at least partially, if not wholly, responsible for their individual downfalls.    Whether it was through police intervention, college drop out, or excessive pharmaceutical self-medication we all fell victim to the old gateway cliché.  That is everyone except me.   Watching them drift away from me and eventually into nothingness, at least in terms of my life, was a terrifying process.  Like watching wax figures slowly melt into wire skeletons, mere husks of the friends I once had.  It was never a wholehearted commitment I made to myself, or even a conscious decision, instead, avoiding weed became a principle for me to live by, and the vestiges of my oldest friends guideposts for me; so as I might not lose my way.   The fear of them and their collective fate kept me safe, and I used it as a shield.  Yet in college, once their proverbial ghosts were no longer present in my life, I found myself only looking at the moment, and forgetting my past. 

My freshman year of college a group of friends and I decided to lock ourselves in a door room and eat some weed cookies (edibles [as they are now known to me]).  The function of locking ourselves in was more aesthetic than anything else, and we did eventually leave, but it certainly added to the ambiance of the experience.  In typical 90’s teen movie fashion (insert title here), we had Christmas lights, blankets, and plenty of weird pictures to stare at.  The group of friends I was with were, and are, considerably better versed when it comes to drugs than I, and I’m not sure they necessarily expected to trip out as bad as I did but again, ambiance was important to us.  I don’t remember who went out and actually got the weed cookies, but I paid my five dollars and upon my arrival to my friend Xanders room one was handed to me.  The door was locked.  We laughed, listened to music, and with deep breaths (mine a nervous inhalation) finally ate the cookies, which turned out to be less of cookies and more just cookie dough.  I suppose that could an unspoken, and unbeknownst to me, rule of drug dealing: you do your own baking.  Point being, and hour later we were high as hell. 

I still have video of us on my phone.  I don’t remember taking the clip, but it’s a lot of giggling and us trying to walk in slow motion.  I make a brief cameo at one point, just long enough to laugh myself to tears before turning the camera away from my face again.  I’m not sure if I mentioned this or not, but this was my first experience getting recreationally high (I broke my arm once my sophomore year of high school and they gave me a twilight sedation) and I didn’t have much insight into the experience prior to eating the edible.  Most vividly I remember an incredible force, greater even than the gravity that night (which was suspiciously heavy), which pulled at my mind and body equally.  I know this endless power now only as one word.  I mentioned above not having much knowledge of what being high was like and while I knew that you got the munchies from weed it would have been nice for someone to warn me of their intensity.

  I don’t remember too much of that night, I was abysmally high and a little drunk, but at some point I remember hitting a mental wall and from then one I only had one thought:  I must eat.  It didn’t matter what or how much it cost; I just had to eat.  As I’m sure you guessed, I ordered a shit ton of pizza.  How much pizza can an incredibly high freshman in college order for fifty dollars on a Friday night, you might ask?  Three 36-inch thin crust pizzas which took entirely too long to get to me (albeit time was passing much slower that night).  They were “for the group” ( ;] ) and they cost me $50.  Their arrival wasn’t nearly as glorious as pop culture had led me to believe it would be, and all I can remember doing is chomping.  Now, I use the word chomping with much consideration, because I wasn’t exactly eating the pizza.  I was hardly chewing it and I certainly wasn’t tasting it.  It was just entering my body with some mild consideration for me not choking to death.  I wasn’t even really hungry in the sense that I had thought I was moments before, my mouth hurt from the friction, and I was relatively unaware of the pizza.   I was merely a vortex that could only be satisfied with Gumby’s (formerly Gumby’s, now decidedly less fun Gumba’s).   The pizza vortex never really closed that night, it merely consumed all that it could and got temporarily distracted.  That temporary distraction was an out of body experience for me, and I seemed a guest in my own life.  I watched myself, with complete disregard for my surrounds, unlock and leave that room, walk back down the hill and enter my own dorm, and eventually dorm room. 

Leaving that night was probably all motivated by my unending quest for food, but at the time, I was not thinking nearly that rationally or linearly.  What I found in my freshman year dorm room (my mini fridge) was an unopened, but semi frozen, 36-oz. jar of applesauce.  The night before I had started the 1998 Terrence Malick classic, The Thin Red Line, and so, with my applesauce in hand, I slumped onto my futon and picked up where I left off.  It was distinctly more difficult to follow the second day in, and I, to this day, can’t remember much of that movie.  What I do remember is a scene when the screen goes completely black.  A full blackout, only lit by the backlight on my MacBook.  That night in my dorm room, I caught my self reflected in the Gorilla Glass of my laptop’s screen.  I had the, now all but empty, jar of applesauce resting against my chin, mindlessly shoveling its contents into my mouth, my eyes swollen, red, and half closed, trying to focus on the Vietnam War.  

I have never been able to shake what I saw that night my freshman year of college from my mind; that image of my face, backlit by my computer, and seemingly haunted by all the faces of my childhood friends.  In that moment, the weight of their sacrifice, the reminder of their lost presence in my life, and why I had conducted myself the way I had for so long, came crashing down around me.  The survivor’s guilt of the past was crippling, for the first time it fell on me and I almost wept.  Instead, as soberly as I could, I closed my computer, and went to sleep.  

Since then, I’ve had a lot of time to reflect on myself, my old friends, and the bonds we seem to share despite our differences.  I haven’t changed hugely in that time, I still get high every once in a while, and the guilt from my freshman year still comes, sometimes as I’m falling asleep, sometimes the morning after.  It’s not quite as strong as it once was, and while it dwindles, I suspect I will always carry it with me (old habits die hard).  What I’ve come to terms with now though, is that while the people that were once closest to me are gone, it was never my fault.  Nor am I the same as them, regardless our past together.  The fear of their fate, and the terror of the future that kept me safe for so long, is no longer necessary.  They made their mistakes, and despite an indefinable bond between us being undeniable, I am a different person and I will make my own.  I still don’t favor getting high, it’s somewhat of a novelty to me now, and I still blame marijuana for a lot of the loss I have faced in my young life, but at least I’m a freer stronger person now, no longer tethered by fear and connections to the past.  I will keep reflecting on this chapter of my life, one brought on by a small skunk smelling herb, for a long time, and maybe someday I’ll give one of the gang a call, maybe not.

Franklin Outline:

Complication:  Fear constrains Woody.
Development:  Woody loses friends.

                        Woody feels survivor guilt.

                         Woody battles self.

Resolution:       Woody releases fear. 

Week 4 response: Franklin Outlines.

            I roll my eyes at textbooks, or rather textbook authors, who try to fight against the monotony of instruction through "voice."  I find it really contrived.  Or at least, I did.  I discredited the first pages of Franklin’s book for this reason.  I regret doing that and even though they are only a few short pages, I will go back and reread them.  What I am trying to say is that this text was the first “stylized textbook” that I connected with and actually truly enjoyed. 
            You asked us to focus Franklin’s chapter on outline, so that is where I will focus my reflection.  Although, this is the section that I found most informative or “inspiring”, so I probably would have focused on it regardless.  I have never outlined before, not even in school when it was “required” did I outline.  I didn’t realize until now exactly why this was, and incidentally how useful outlining can be.  I think the true genius in Franklin's method is in the fact that his outlines are not detailed maps, showing you the exact route, but rather strategic reminders that allow you to rediscover your writing several times over the course of the writing process.  His simplified form isn’t necessarily “easier” it’s just streamlined.  Streamlined in a way that allows it to cut through the often incredibly unstreamlined nature of the creative mind.  I think it also offers real value in that it is applicable to almost any piece of writing.  Some forms obviously require more tweaking than others, and this tweaking could result in either a more narrative or a more journalistic piece, but regardless this outlining will strengthen the piece.  While I realize I could have you used Franklin’s outlining style for this blog post, and it probably would have been better, I did not.  I plan on starting to outline my work before, or shortly after, I start writing.  This will cut back on the shitty nature of first drafts and serve to keep my later drafts self-discovering. 

TL:DR?  Franklin is awesome, and outlining sucks unless you do it his way.  I will begin outlining everything immediately.  

Week 3 reading post

I sat down today, lugging the many enormous volumes of Literary Journalism behind me, dreading the mind numbing, finger slicing pages I would have to read about "How to Write Narrative Journalism."  I was soon there after pleasantly surprised to know my worry was for naut, and that I would be reading some stories instead.  I'm not sure why I did this but I took note of how Marin chose to assign these two pieces (reverse page order), and flipped it.  Reading The American Man at Age Ten first and Trina and Trina second.  I note this because after finishing TAMAT I was left with a distinct feeling of disappointment.  Not overwhelming disappointment, but disappointment in the sense that I wanted some dramatic turn.  I wanted something to happen, which I'm not sure it did.  The twist or drama I wanted came shortly thereafter however with TAT.  However, again, their wasn't a turn in this story for me as well.  In fact, I think the fact that neither had a turn was the only united factor I could find.  If we are talking binaries though, I thought these two made an excellent coupling. TAMAT is a story of hope, a chronicle or reminder of sorts of the childish innocence that lives within each of us, while TAT was a crippling story of loss of innocence and in the end, hopelessness (abandonment).  Regardless of the nothings I've just shouted into cyber space, I enjoyed reading both of these pieces.  I found them simple and compelling.  Both authors pulled us through the piece with clean imagery and "factual" speech (for lack of a better phrase).  Neither employed much drama, yet there pieces had power and left the reader still thinking long after they are done.  I know this is not a very poignent post but I'm not sure what more to say or what more I am required/ need to say.  I think this will do ok.  Blog over.

The First Time I Got High Draft 2

The First Time I Got High
Woody Tauke
1475 words

Intended Publication: New York Times Magazine

Growing up I had a number of best friends.   As I got older and developed through the many complicated phases of childhood, and adolescence, they entered and left my life with some regularity.  As I changed, they changed, AJ, Michael, Joey, Nick, and Steve.  Despite the many differences they had, I see now one similarity.  They all found sanctuary in partying far earlier than I, and I add as a digression, far earlier than they were ready for.  Now, I use the term partying as a sort of watered down jargon for drug use.  All of the best friends I had growing up started smoking weed long before I did, and that is at least partially, if not wholly, responsible for their individual downfalls.    Whether it was through police intervention, college drop out, or excessive pharmaceutical self-medication we all fell victim to the old gateway cliché.  That is everyone except me.   Watching them drift away from me and eventually into nothingness, at least in terms of my life, was a terrifying process.  Like watching wax figures slowly melt into wire skeletons, mere husks of the friends I once had.  It was never a wholehearted commitment I made to myself, or even a conscious decision, instead, avoiding weed became a principle for me to live by, and the vestiges of my oldest friends guideposts for me; so as I might not lose my way.  Yet in college, once their proverbial ghosts were no longer present in my life, I found myself only looking at the moment, and forgetting my past. 

My freshman year of college a group of friends and I decided to lock ourselves in a door room and eat some weed cookies (edibles [as they are now known to me]).  The function of locking ourselves in was more aesthetic than anything else, and we did eventually leave, but it certainly added to the ambiance of the experience.  In typical 90’s teen movie fashion (insert title here), we had Christmas lights, blankets, and plenty of weird pictures to stare at.  The group of friends I was with were, and are, considerably better versed when it comes to drugs than I, and I’m not sure they necessarily expected to trip out as bad as I did but again, ambiance was important to us.  I don’t remember who went out and actually got the weed cookies, but I paid my five dollars and upon my arrival to my friend Xanders room one was handed to me.  The door was locked.  We laughed, listened to music, and with deep breaths (mine a nervous inhalation) finally ate the cookies, which turned out to be less of cookies and more just cookie dough.  I suppose that could an unspoken, and unbeknownst to me, rule of drug dealing: you do your own baking.  Point being, and hour later we were high as hell. 

I still have video of us on my phone.  I don’t remember taking the clip, but it’s a lot of giggling and us trying to walk in slow motion.  I make a brief cameo at one point, just long enough to laugh myself to tears before turning the camera away from my face again.  I’m not sure if I mentioned this or not, but this was my first experience getting recreationally high (I broke my arm once my sophomore year of high school and they gave me a twilight sedation) and I didn’t have much insight into the experience prior to eating the edible.  Most vividly I remember an incredible force, greater even than the gravity that night (which was suspiciously heavy), that pulled at my mind and body equally.  I know this endless power now only as one word.  I mentioned above not having much knowledge of what being high was like and while I knew that you got the munchies from weed it would have been nice for someone to warn me of their intensity.

  I don’t remember too much of that night, I was abysmally high and a little drunk, but at some point I remember hitting a mental wall and from then one I only had one thought:  I must eat.  It didn’t matter what or how much it cost; I just had to eat.  As I’m sure you guessed, I ordered a shit ton of pizza.  How much pizza can an incredibly high freshman in college order for fifty dollars on a Friday night, you might ask?  Three 36-inch thin crust pizzas which took entirely too long to get to me (albeit time was passing much slower that night).  They were “for the group” ( ;] ) and they cost me $50.  Their arrival wasn’t nearly as glorious as pop culture had led me to believe it would be, and all I can remember doing is chomping.  Now, I use the word chomping with much consideration, because I wasn’t exactly eating the pizza.  I was hardly chewing it and I certainly wasn’t tasting it.  It was just entering my body with some mild consideration for me not choking to death.  I wasn’t even really hungry in the sense that I had thought I was moments before, my mouth hurt from the friction, and I was relatively unaware of the pizza.   I was merely a vortex that could only be satisfied with Gumby’s (formerly Gumby’s, now decidedly less fun Gumba’s).   The pizza vortex never really closed that night, it merely consumed all that it could and got temporarily distracted.  That temporary distraction was an out of body experience for me, and I seemed a guest in my own life.  I watched myself, with complete disregard for my surrounds, unlock and leave that room, walk back down the hill and enter my own dorm, and eventually dorm room. 

Leaving that night was probably all motivated by my unending quest for food, but at the time, I was not thinking nearly that rationally or linearly.  What I found in my freshman year dorm room (my mini fridge) was an unopened, but semi frozen, 36-oz. jar of applesauce.  The night before I had started the 1998 Terrence Malick classic, The Thin Red Line, and so, with my applesauce in hand, I slumped onto my futon and picked up where I left off.  It was distinctly more difficult to follow the second day in, and I, to this day, can’t remember much of that movie.  What I do remember is a scene when the screen goes completely black.  A full blackout, only lit by the backlight on my MacBook.  That night in my dorm room, I caught my self reflected in the Gorilla Glass of my laptop’s screen.  I had the, now all but empty, jar of applesauce resting against my chin, mindlessly shoveling its contents into my mouth, my eyes swollen, red, and half closed, trying to focus on the Vietnam War.  

I have never been able to shake what I saw that night my freshman year of college from my mind; that image of my face, backlit by my computer, and seemingly haunted by all the faces of my childhood friends.  In that moment, the weight of their sacrifice, the reminder of their lost presence in my life, and why I had conducted myself the way I had for so long, came crashing down around me.  The guilt was crippling, for the first time it fell on me and I almost wept.  Instead, as soberly as I could, I closed my computer, and went to sleep.  

Since then I’ve had a lot of time to reflect on myself, my friends, and the bonds we seem to share despite our differences.  I haven’t changed hugely in that time, I still get high every once in a while, and the guilt from my freshman year still comes, sometimes as I’m falling asleep, sometimes the morning after.  It’s not quite as strong as it once was, and while it dwindles I suspect I will always carry it with me (old habits die hard).  What I’ve come to terms with now though, is that while the people that were once closest to me are gone now, it was never my fault.  They made their mistakes, and despite an indefinable bond between us being undeniable, I am a different person and I will make my own.  I still don’t favor getting high, it’s somewhat of a novelty to me now, and I still blame marijuana for a lot of the loss I have faced in my young life, but at least I’m a freer stronger person now, no longer tethered by connections of the past.  I will keep reflecting on the chapter of my life, one brought on by a small skunk smelling herb, for a long time, and maybe someday I’ll give one of the gang a call, maybe not.

The First Time I Got High

The First Time I Got High
Woody Tauke
1445 words

Growing up I had a number of best friends.   As I got older and developed through the many complicated phases of childhood and adolescence they entered and left my life with some regularity.  As I changed they changed, AJ, Michael, Joey, Nick, and Steve, but despite the many differences they had, I see now one similarity.  They all found sanctuary in partying far earlier than I, and I add as a digression, far earlier than they were ready for.  Now, I use the term partying as a sort of watered down jargon for drug use.  All of the best friends I had growing up started smoking marijuana long before I did, and that is at least partially, in not wholly, responsible for their individual downfalls.    Whether it was through police intervention, college drop out, or excessive pharmaceutical self-medication we all fell victim to the old gateway cliché.  That is everyone except me.  

My freshman year of college a group of friends and I decided to lock ourselves in a door room and eat some weed cookies (edibles [as they are now known to me]).  The function of locking ourselves in was more aesthetic than anything else, and we did eventually leave, but it certainly added to the ambiance of the experience.  In typical 90’s teen movie fashion (insert title here), we had Christmas lights, blankets, and plenty of weird pictures to stare at.  The group of friends I was with were, and are, considerably better versed when it comes to drugs than I, and I’m not sure they necessarily expected to trip out as bad as I did but again, ambiance was important to us.   After dinner the group and I left the cafeteria and headed our separate ways with the understanding that we would all meet later that evening and have that experience.  I don’t remember who went out and actually got the weed cookies but I paid my five dollars and upon my arrival to my friend Xanders room one was handed to me and the door was locked.  We laughed, listened to music, and with deep breaths finally ate the cookies, which turned out to have m&ms in them (also they were less of cookies and more of just cookie dough).  I suppose that could an unspoken rule of drug dealing: you do your own baking.  Point being, and hour later we were high as hell. 

I still have video of us on my phone, I don’t remember taking the video but it’s a lot of giggling and us trying to walk in slow motion.  I make a brief cameo at one point, just long enough to laugh myself to tears before turning the camera away from my face again.  I’m not sure if I mentioned this or not but this was my first experience getting recreationally high (I broke my arm my sophomore year of high school and they gave me a twilight sedation) and I didn’t have much insight into the experience prior to eating the edible.  Most vividly I remember sitting on my friend Xander’s bed, the lower half of a bunk bed, and sleepily staring out at the room.  We had the lights low enough that it could pass as dark and things were quiet in my tiny cave.  The bed above me, and its posts framed my view perfectly as I watched, what I’m sure I thought at the time was, some serious melodrama unfold.   It felt like I was in a movie theater, a private screening, seeing a film of my best friends being generally goofy.   I still hold that idea to be pretty surreal, but where things really got wild was where my legs bent at the knees over the edge of the bed, and through what I thought was the movie screen.  I was partially in the movie and partially in my private theater.  I remember being okay with this concept, somehow able to justify the notion that I could simultaneously be in and out of a movie to myself at the time.  The night took a significant turn for the worse when my friends noticed me and started to actively break the fourth wall.  Even then I was still having a good time and eventually I snapped out of my movie mindset.

 I mentioned above not having much knowledge of what being high was like and while I knew that you got the munchies from weed it would have been nice for someone to warn me of their intensity.  I don’t remember too much of that night, I was incredibly high and a little drunk, but at some point I remember hitting this wall and not being able to think about anything except eating.  It didn’t matter what or how much it cost; I just had to eat.  As I’m sure you guessed I ordered a shit ton of pizza.  Fifty dollars worth of pizza to be specific.  How much pizza can an incredibly high freshman in college order for fifty dollars on a Friday night, you might ask?  Three 36-inch thin crust pizzas which took entirely too long to get to me (albeit time was passing much slower that night).  Their arrival wasn’t nearly as glorious as pop culture had led me to believe it would be and all I can remember doing is chomping.  Now, I use the word chomping with much consideration because I wasn’t exactly eating the pizza.  I was hardly chewing it and I certainly wasn’t tasting it.  It was just entering my body with some mild consideration for me not choking to death.  I wasn’t even really hungry in the sense that I had thought moments before, my mouth hurt from the friction, and I was relatively unaware of the pizza I was merely a vortex that could only be satisfied with Gumby’s (formerly Gumby’s, now decidedly less fun Gumba’s).   The pizza vortex never really closed that night, it merely consumed all that it could and got temporarily distracted.  That temporary distraction was an out of body experience for me, and I seemed a guest in my own life.  I watched myself, with complete disregard for my surrounds, unlock and leave that room, walk back down the hill and enter my own dorm, and eventually dorm room. 

I realize now that this was probably all motivated by my unending quest for food, but at the time I was not thinking nearly that rationally or linearly.  What I found in my freshman mini fridge was an unopened, but semi frozen, 36-oz. jar of frozen applesauce.  The night before I had started the 1998 Terrence Malick classic, The Thin Red Line, and so with my applesauce I slumped onto my futon and picked up where I left off.  It was distinctly more difficult to follow the second day in, and I to this day can’t remember much of that movie.  What I do remember is a scene when the screen goes completely black.  A full blackout only lit by the backlight on my MacBook.  That night in my dorm room (Hoben room 1), I caught my self-reflected in the Gorilla Glass of my laptop’s screen.  I had this now all but empty jar of applesauce resting against my chill, mindlessly shoveling its contents into my mouth, my eyes swollen, red, and half closed, trying to focus on the Vietnam War.   And I remember thinking “This is too much, I’ve really hit bottom.” The guilt was too much and I went to bed. 

The next morning I was left muddled, to reflect on the night before. I know now, that that was a period of experimentation for me, and I have gotten high since, but I have never been able to shake that image of my face, backlit by my computer, and seemingly haunted by all the faces of my childhood friends.  I guess I have them to thank, their individual sacrifices rather, for my sanity and grounded attitude towards “partying.”  I have a rather staunch opinion against drug use, including but not limited to weed, yet every now and again I find myself, at a party, getting high.  And I always feel the same guilt I did that night freshman year.  Is there some united factor from our childhoods that lead us down this path?  Do I do it to remember them and give myself that humility, or grounding, for lack of better words?  I’m not sure.  I just know that I can’t seem to stop myself.  Not in a scary way, I guess I just need to think about it, my childhood, and myself a little more.  Maybe I’ll give one of the gang a call, maybe not.