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October 10, 2005
Colleges, Writing, and Loneliness (like I can bloody complain)
life
I feel like I'm starting to get a handle on my William & Mary application. The application itself is mostly done but for a bit of work on the activities section (it's rather vague in what should be included), my essay seems good enough, and although I've yet to start my résumé it should be easy and objective. My mom made a bunch of suggestions for my essay but I really didn't like that process; she was pretty much arguing for some ethereal "well reading" quality over the actual meaning of the essay.
Myself, I feel pretty anesthetized to the smoothness of a piece or writing; the better something is written the better it flows, but other than obvious things like incorrect or awkward usage of structure I don't notice writing "not flowing well". To me, getting the actual meaning of the essay across is far more important, and should always be the priority when choosing between two possible phrasings. My mom fought tooth and nail for good flow though, which quite unsettled me; I don't think I'll consult her much about my essay again.
It's strange how much easier I find writing for my blog than writing my college essay. Other than the essay's word limit they're both really the same; in both instances I write mainly about me. Part of what makes the essay harder is the pressure which is on it; it, more or less alone, has to woo the admissions officers. More so, though, the different editing process seems to get in the way. When I write for my blog I merely write what I want to say, reviewing it to make sure there're no mistakes and that the sentences came out how I wanted them to. It's largely an unconscious process; the writing and corrections just flow out. With the essay, however, I have a handful of other people offering corrections as well. I find these difficult to consider because I'm unable to assimilate them into my emotional writing flow.
In short, I'm not used to concentrating on form. My writing concentrates on function, with the assumption that with practice form will follow. While I will obvious correct any errors in form which I notice, my mind isn't really tuned to this wavelength. My writing's purpose is to convey a point, not to look pretty and flow like silk. Without meaning, appearance is useless.
Other than the college process things seem to be flowing well enough; there aren't any other turbulence in my portion of the sea, although things are a bit calm for my tastes. We really need more to do on the Eastern Shore; you can usually scare up one activity per weekend, whether it be yard sales, movies, eating out, a music fest, or some fusion of the above, but so far it's been quite rare to see several activities in one weekend.
This has really plagued me this last 3 day weekend; I've severed my connection to gaming, more or less, to make way for the far-superior socialization, but this has the downside of leaving me dependent on people who aren't always around as much as I might like. I wouldn't change this for the world but it still gets a bit lonely some weekends.
Posted by Trevor Savage at October 10, 2005 9:23 PM
Comments
Alo Trevor, or should I say "Mr. Savage"? Hahaha
Brings back "old" memories.
Wow, you're going to apply to W&M??
Holy crap, bercause I am to!
I told you I was in Williamsburg this summer right?
Well, during my visit, I got a chance to visit the college,
and I *loved* it. So thus, I am apply there as well.
As for writing the college essay, I can really identify with you.
If fact, it's the same way for writing somehting for the school. Often times I'll find that I can write up an "essay" about some random concept that intrigues me at the moment while I cannot write about the theme of a book we read for class. Moreover, when I do apply my own style of writing to convey my own thoughts in my own way, I find that I'm often penalized by teachers as they deem that there is a set rule of essay writing and that anything that doesn't conform to it is automatically wrong. Thus, people who do well on essays at school are people who simply conform to the style of another (or may others) while others with genuine thoughts (rather than writing what they know the teacher wants) are put down. This is especially for the new SAT which includes the writing section. It is said that the essay is reviewed and scored within 3 minutes. Obviously this means that they simply look for form. Therefore, in order to "score higher", one must write in the style that the graders look for. Thus, this will breed a generation of SAT-studiers who will concentrate on appearance without meaning.
Excuse my inconsistencies and spelling errors and other mistakes. It's 4am here, I get to do that. :p
Posted by: Nijimaru Ohno at October 19, 2005 3:22 PM