The blog assignment due Friday, September 11, 2015 is to describe a fear.  Make the reader feel your fear in your description.

My Sample:

Amusement parks are not my idea of a good time.  When I do find myself in one, I know there are particular rides that I will not be on.  Anything that puts me on a skinny rail, in a car from which I can easily plummet, takes me 2 miles in the air and the gleefully hurtles me to the ground, otherwise known as roller coasters, will not be on my to-do list that day.

I am always adamant that I WILL NOT ride a roller coaster, and just as often I find myself talked into going, just one time.  My interior monologue goes like this:  "This is a perfectly safe ride.  It is inspected.  It has never lost anyone.  I will be fine.  I should be adventuresome, brave and do this."

Then, when I'm on the roller coaster, secured in my seat, and it gives a lurch forward to begin, my interior monologue goes like this:  "Are you crazy?  Why did I think I should be adventuresome?  It's way over-rated!  There is no merit in being dead.  I will be dead by the end of this ride either because this monster will have its first collapse in history or I will die of a heart attack!"

And so it creeps out of the station and begins the painfully slow ascent to the top.  Is my stomach lurching?  I don't think I have a stomach at this point.  Is my heart racing?  Not sure I have one of those either.  Basically, I'm brain dead.  And we haven't even reached the top of the hill!

Of course when I see the first cars begin to drop over the edge, I'm not coherent, I can no longer breathe, I cannot even scream.  Even now as I write this in the safe environment of my home with no roller coaster in sight, my stomach is cringing, my heart is pounding as I imagine that terrifying moment when I free fall to the bottom.  Just as quickly, I'm being yanked back to the top of another hill and dropped again.  Of course there are the requisite loops and twists and spirals in which I become completely disoriented.  These are intermittently scattered throughout so that I have no sense if I'm falling or spinning.  The wind is rushing by my head, my eyes are squeezed shut and I can only moan.

We roll to a final stop.  Around me there are excited voices about how absolutely awesome the ride was.  I can only babble, "Don't make me do that again!"

August 28, 2015

Your first blogging assignment will be to something that you have multiples of, i.e. what do you or your family “collect”, not a hobby.  What thing do you accumulate?  Discuss why you might be saving that item.  What does it say about you?  

Here's is my sample:

Rubber Bands

Useful little items.  They come stretched tightly around my newspaper so that the Kmart ad and the sports sections don’t end up flying around in my driveway.  Since they seem so useful and I might need them sometime, I drop them in the drawer with the pencils, pens, paperclips, post it pads and other miscellaneous items. Finally, my husband got tired of them getting jumbled up with the other non-essentials.  He meticulously wrapped each rubber band around a piece of cardboard. So now we have an oblong object made up of rubber bands.    Do I really need 500 rubber bands wrapped together?  But, it seems hard to throw out something that can really be useful.
            I don’t think of myself as a pack rat.  However, when it comes to something like rubber bands (and plastic grocery bags!), I find that I save them.  I justify it by thinking that I’m recycling them, making them useful a second time.  And I do re-use them.  But, again, how many do I need to keep on hand?
            But, I would hate to run out of rubber bands!

August 27, 2015

Welcome to creative writing for the 2015-2016 school year.  This class is designed so that you have opportunities to express yourself in writing, improve those skills, and learn new ways to do that.  One tool that we use is blogging.

Blogging allows you to see the writings of others in the class.  Each of you will be expected to to post 2 blogs each week.  One of those will be an assigned topic.  The other post will be a topic of your choice.

You will receive up to 3 points for each post.  3 points = well done, you should be proud to post it.  2 = good, but maybe you could have thought it out a bit more. 1 = do you really want other people to read this?

I will comment on each of your posts.  Your points will be posted on Renweb for you to view privately.

As you read each others' blogs, you are encouraged to post an encouraging comment.  You may share your blog with people outside of class if you are comfortable with that.

Writing can be private, but it's also good to share.  "Creativity takes courage." (Henry Matise)

I am looking forward to this class and working together!

Mrs. Petersheim