Application!!!

I'm rather wretched at adhering to essay topics.  Always I think I'm adhering, but often, at least in the eyes of normal people, I am not.  Here is the question on the "Common Application," sent out to University of San Francisco, Seattle Pacific University, and Westmont College.  St. Katherine's College has a different application.


Please provide a statement (appr. 250-500 words) that addresses your reasons for transferring and the objectives you hope to achieve.


Here's my essay (!):

All I ever want to do is write.  I guess that’s not entirely true: I also love to read, scratch on my violin, talk with friends, walk aimlessly about some place I have never been or never veritably noticed.  Still, give me the option of spending an entire day with only a cappuccino and a pen, and I will be at my happiest.  

Then again, to write about the world, I must know a little something of it.  I must learn the way we were and the way we are and the way we are becoming.  I must learn what in the world is good and write of it.  I must learn what in the world is wrong and write to heal it.  I must learn to truly see, and hear, and touch the world.  I must learn to climb up--to reach out my hand, and grasp those reaching for mine so that we may climb up together.

My most obvious reason for transferring is to further my education.  I hope eventually to earn a master’s degree in English, and perhaps even a doctorate in English.  My mother taught English to junior high students and, even though I resisted it for years, I did inherit her need to share the wonder of stories made and stories to be made with anyone I meet.  When I begin an essay with a quotation, it is not because we are supposed to begin essays with quotations.  It is because my mind swirls with what I want to say and those who, having allowed me to commune with them in the great realm of ideas, have said it better than I ever could.  So, then, I do hope to follow my mother and become a teacher.

I hope to achieve immense learning at University.  But I do not mean for my learning to be solely in books, though I clearly am all too eager to immerse myself in the writings of yesterday and today and tomorrow.  I hope to learn about the people in the world from the people themselves.  I hope to learn about their needs and learn how to meet them.  I hope to learn where I fall short and learn how to be pulled up by another.  I hope to learn the problems which need solving and learn how to solve them.
All I want to do is write.  I want to write what I know.  I want to write my questions.  I want to write of friends.  I want to write of strangers.  I want to write that which springs from my own soul and that which I do not understand.  I want to write of the old, and of the new, and of that existing only in turning minds and low whispers.  I want step into the world with clear eyes and moving feet and open hands and bleeding pen.  This is why I want to attend University.

Real Things

    Today I'm writing about real things.  Or unreal things.  Or why it is that unreal things are, so often, the closet we can get to real things.

    Do you ever read fiction that is more real than anything you've ever seen or heard or touched?  You don't know why it's real, and yet the world brightens because you finally know something that you've known all along.  The feeling of separateness leaves for a moment, because someone understands what it's all about.  Someone understands that everything is either meaningless or essential.  There is no in between.

     And then you want to share it.  Try to tell people.  Try to write a blog post about it.  But there is no answer.  Most try to get it.  They'll nod, furrow their eyebrows.  "Yeah, I see what you mean."  Try and  try again to explain, but then it leaves you.  You think you still have it, but it's gone.  Or someone goes off on it quite academically, and you're so excited until finding the spark in your eye missing in your companion's.  "Yes, yes a bit like that, but not exactly.  More this way."  But the spark never comes.  Maybe it wasn't that great after all.  So simple; everyone knows that.  You pick up the book, sad and enlightened, but as the words climb up through your fingers your heart begins once more to race, and that invisible hand comes around your shoulder.  You weren't wrong.  It's right here.

     I meant this to be a rather lengthy post, but my subject limits me.  I can't explain what I say.  I keep trying, but find myself exhausted.  Falling asleep on the keys; it's not even noon.

    I find real things and I must write about them.  I must give Afton his voice and let him speak for me.  I must remember Meadow and the tight embrace she gave me--I must remember so that I can write her a story about real things.  About why she is real.  That real things are never understood.

     Then I can't write about unreal things.  Suddenly essays are incredibly hard.  My sentences are choppy.  I've no flow between ideas.  I sound half-asleep.  Wandering.  As if I can't write directly.  All must be inference.  I try to be conversational, but none care for my conversation.  The assignment is to be self-revealing, but I'm not vulnerable in the right way.  My self isn't worth revealing.  I used to be a "good writer," and so without really trying I could do well on assignments.  Now, if I don't try, I'm hardly coherent.  There are little pockets of care: groups of two or three sentences which sound like me.  But so quickly they drop away.  Not fade, not step: drop.  A bubble of over-zealous passion, forcing it's way up through my tired and whitewashed blabbering.

     I guess I must find something to care about.  Something real when it all seems unreal.  Curdie or Psyche or Sam in the false brilliance.  It's still there.  Not hurt, just a bit harder to find.

     This reminds me of a truly wonderful experience I recently experienced.  That was me making fun of myself: I can't stand it when I repeat words, yet do it all the time.  Anyway, I recently visited an art house.  The owners of the house, both artists, turned their entire home into a gallery.  Many of their works had religious influences, from quite a number of religions.  In one corner of the house was what I think is most clearly described as an altar.  It held candles, incense, and small statues of Jesus, Buddha, and a few others.

     Just typing that freaked me out a little.  It feels weird to capitalize "Jesus" and then capitalize "Buddha."  It feels weird putting "Jesus" in quotation marks.  Not that I hold disrespect for religions other than my own, but    I cannot separate myself from what I believe.  The Buddha shouldn't be anywhere near Jesus.  But that's just me; a personal struggle.  As you guessed, I'm sure, an altar dedicated to both Jesus and numerous other gods would completely unnerve me.  But I heard something.  That doesn't usually happen to me; I'm not one who often receives revelations.  But this was the most wonderful experience.  I heard, very clearly, I'm still here.  It didn't matter that the statue of God was displayed as equal with all these others.  He was still there.  I didn't need to protect Him.  He will always be right there.

     My goodness.  Thank you, this has been stream-of-consciousness blogging.  Wow.  But a post about real things has to end with God, doesn't it?  That's what this is really all about.  It's what this is all about even when we don't know or don't acknowledge it as so.        

   

     

   
   

   

Caleb Mithun: March 12th

Usually my head holds pictures of my characters which are perfectly clear until I try to focus in on them, upon which time they deform into entirely different people.  I have to neglect them a while before they’ll turn back into my characters.  But, walking through the Cuesta library, I saw an exact picture of Caleb on a book cover.  I stared at the book a good while, then proceeded to check it out in order to stare at it some more.  Sadly I didn’t have time to read it as it deserves to be read; it’s about the situation faced by foster children as they age out of the foster system.  As an aside, the situation is disgusting and should never be allowed to happen.  You’re entirely alone in the world?  We can no longer collect funds on you?  Poor Dear!  Allow me to point you toward the nearest bridge; looks likely to rain.  Disgusting.  Anyway, Caleb entered the foster care system at age eight, which makes his picture appearing on the cover of a book about foster children especially trippy.  



So, that really is exactly what he looks like. The facial expression is even more exact than the rest of the picture.

Caleb is six foot three, all legs, and terribly thin, with hair somewhere between blonde and brown, and a practically translucent complexion.  His eyes are a bright, startling green: easily his most distinctive feature if the scar on his neck; a jagged, raised, red line; is disregarded.  He received the scar in an extremely traumatic way, which left him phobic of crowds and closed-in places.

“Caleb?  Are you all right?”

He hunched his stiff shoulders forward, creasing further and further into himself.  It took him a long time to speak; I saw the clatter of voices and heat of forms crushing him to powder.  “I can’t sit here anymore,” he whispered.
“Then let’s leave.”
“I don’t know if I can.”  His eyes finally yielded the the pressure bearing on them, shutting out the world with little hope of reopening.  “I don’t think I can.”
I stood and threw on both our packs.  “We’re leaving.”
“I can’t move.”  His fingers were white around the table.  “They’re trampling me already.  I can’t move at all.”
“Yes you can,” I whispered back, taking and squeezing his arms from behind.  “You just need to stand up.”
“This won’t stop.  Not until they’re gone.”  He clenched his teeth, desperate to hide his suffering.  “That’s why I never come in here.  They’re never gone.”     

Further circumstances of his young childhood make eating difficult and sleeping nearly impossible.  Evan’s friendship tremendously lessens his anxieties, but still he is haunted by wickedly, truly tangible memories, mostly that of his scar's origin.

He edged the smooth black oval under his chin.  At that time he couldn’t even wear a collar, but a violin’s delicate, red-gold arc pressed into his neck like the quieting fingers of a friend.  Although this particular instrument knew nothing and couldn’t be as careful--but when he flinched it understood, and molded itself to soothe him.  The bow and string met with a shiver.
“Don’t make me play.”
The girl hushed him, running her hand along his bowing arm.  Then she began to hum.  By the second note he was safe at home, with closed eyes and comfortable smile.  The lullaby came so easily that I didn’t begin hearing it until halfway through; then I turned to see the little clerk on his toes with the music, and Sabella swaying lightly back and forth.  I cannot write of music.  To learn the notes and write them down would be meaningless.  Caleb’s music isn’t made of notes.  It’s made of himself and his loves and his fears and a young woman’s touch and a great foggy city and a seagull’s cry and a pair of weeping eyes hidden behind his own.

When Caleb was eleven he had a rather well-to-do foster family.  Their daughter took violin lessons, and when she practiced Caleb did anything he could to hear her.  However, the daughter did not care for her own playing, and decided to quit lessons.  Caleb was utterly heartbroken, and had visible tears in his eyes for two straight days.  The family was kind and generous, and secure enough to charitably part with the violin.  They gave it to him for his twelfth birthday.

While living in dorms at SF State he never played.  That is, of course, he never played until Evan began kidnapping him and his instrument and driving out to various hidden corners of the city. He only had a couple months of instruction before changing families, and never learned to read music. For this reason he believes that he is not a real musician.

“My playing isn’t good,” Caleb half-whispered.
“He plays brilliantly,” Sabella said.
The clerk shuffled into a closet, wrenched out a case and began to unhinge it.  My friend looked to my eyes. “Thank you,” I said to the man.  “He’s supposed to perform whenever he criticizes himself.  This is the perfect venue.”  That was probably the closest Caleb ever came to hating me.

Caleb somehow manages to be both highly coordinated and terribly awkward. He has a tendency to constrict his shoulders into an uncomfortable knot, clench his jaw, walk as if encased in plaster, and stare at the ground. When walking through crowds he'll often watch Evan's feet. When still in a crowd he may look quite hard into Evan's face, if not always into his eyes.

At SF State Caleb studies accounting, because "it's quiet and has jobs."

I was currently in my second year of grad school and just months away from earning my Master’s, while Caleb had left school after the basic four years.  Although accounting jobs were always available, finding one that only required a Bachelor’s Degree had proved quite challenging.  Once he found one he didn’t lose it, performing every task flawlessly, but the firm paid him in bottle caps and treated him like a packhorse.  I’d visited him once when my composition teacher unexpectedly cancelled class, and though glad to see me he could hardly acknowledge my presence.  He was a young man at Telson’s: locked away from the sunlight so he would age faster.  He looked pale and sick in there, just as he looked pale and sick in all cold, heartless places.  He looked alone, a look I rarely saw now.  He brought take-out home with him that night, trying to assure me that he was happy and unhurt.

However, Evan maintains that his friend should have gone to medical school. One day Caleb and Evan come across a poll just begging to be jumped over. Caleb easily clears it, but Evan does not. He barely squeaks over and manages to get a nasty metal sliver in his thumb. This annoys him into a sour mood. They wind up in a coffeehouse (Ugh!!! I forgot to mention in Evan's post that he is a coffee addict. He drinks at least three cups of the motor oil variety each day, and has done so since the tenth grade. Caffeine now has little effect on him. Going to an actual coffeehouse is a treat.). Caleb starts messing with Evan's hand and further annoys him, but manages to eventually get him talking. After a bit of time Evan glances down to see the shard on the table and his thumb neatly wrapped in a napkin.

 

“Maybe I will be a doctor; I’m not old.”

“You’re studying to be an accountant.”

“I’m not smart enough for med. school.”

I didn’t favor that comment with an answer.

He nodded to my compliment, then leant back in his chair and stretched out his legs.  “I can barely handle a classroom.”

“But you wouldn’t be in school forever.”

“It’s not the school, it’s that a doctor’s job is to be around people.”

“You’re excellent with hurt people.”

“Not really.  She just needed anyone to care for her a little.”

“You’re always doctoring me.”

“You always manage to hurt yourself.  And you don’t count, anyway.”  He sighed.  “I wouldn’t worry about patients too much, at least I don’t think.  It’s the other people: other doctors, nurses, secretaries, families.”  He shook his head.  “And doctors rarely see their patients, they have so many.  I probably would’ve been a good doctor 150 years ago.”

“Caleb the country doctor?”

“Exactly.”

Caleb can be closely observant. He isn't of everything, but if he tries to observe or truly cares about what he's observing he can interpret it. This has made the academic portion of school incredibly easy for him. It makes him a perfect violinist. It also makes his analysis of Evan even better than Evan's analysis of him.

I'll end with a scene which, though wanting revision, shows some of my favorites of Caleb's and Evan's qualities. They're visiting Evan's parents for Thanksgiving, and these said parents annoy and anger their son so that he consciously decides to intoxicate himself so as to stop caring. But he has a high alcohol tolerance (which he knows, by the way), and winds up just giving himself a killer headache.


When at last my parents tiptoed off to bed he collapsed onto the couch.  “Are you all right?” I asked.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.”

“I think I’ll walk outside a bit.”  

I nodded, then left to take a shower.  When I came back the front door was locked and my door was just slightly ajar.  I had one of those bunk bed sets which had a full bed on the bottom and twin on the top.  Tiffany had her own room, but the bunks had always been useful when friends stayed the night.  Caleb’s shoes were tucked beneath the sloped ladder; he’d slunk up before I claimed the less comfortable bed.  I stumbled beneath the covers, groaned my head onto the pillow.

“Caleb?” I mumbled after some moments.

“Hmm?”

“You are allowed to move.”

“I’m fine.”

“That bunk creaks with breathing.  You’re not moving at all.”

He turned over stiffly.

“We don’t have to stay,” I said.  “We can leave now.”

“Nothing’s wrong here.  It’s only me.”

“Don’t be stupid.”

He leant over the railing so I saw strands of light hair in silhouette against the window.  “Say something else.”

“Hello, Caleb Mithun.”

“I am stupid.”  He hastened down the ladder in two strides.  “You have a terrible headache and I didn’t even notice.”

“It’s my fault.”

“Before tonight I’d never drunk anything.  How am I not sick?”

“You had enough water, and do remember that I made your sunrise.”

“I didn’t think tequila was that sweet.  You drank my dose.”

“I drank it three times over.”

He left the room, then, soon returning with an aspirin and glass of water.  After I ingested both these offerings he bid me lay back with closed eyes, then began to massage my temples with the pads of his fingers.

“All right?” he asked.  I replied with a sort of hum because he helped immediately and immensely.  “Is anyone coming over tomorrow?”

“My dad’s mother and sister, and her three kids.”  My stomach churned audibly.  “Can’t wait for dinner.”

“Morning coffee should help.  And a walk.”

“Good luck dragging me on a walk.”

“Are there any coffee shops here?”

“A million downtown.”

“Are any a walkable distance away?”

“That depends.  But we should go even if we drive.”  His hands curled around my head so that their thumbs rubbed where my neck and skull met.  Apparently I tensed up a bit, because he softly told me to relax.  

“You’re good at that,” I said.

“One of us has to sleep.”

“Maybe we should switch off.”

He laughed a little.  “Sounds fine.  Tomorrow you get the orange juice.”

I was reluctantly falling asleep now, forsaking my friend’s soothing hands for the rough coddling which accompanies holidays.  “You’re welcome to play, if you like.”

“Too loud.  And my violin is in the car.”

“It’s under the bed.”

A thrill caught him to the fingertips.  “No it’s not.”

“I tossed my coat over it and carried it in.  Couldn’t stay outside all night.”

“Really Evan?”

“Of course.”

At the time I thought the tremble in his voice a shiver.  “That was good of you,” he said.  “I can’t play, but I’ll have it near me.”

That’s the last I remember him saying, though he insists more came after.  All I knew was lapping of dreams I pledged to keep, engulfing and beautiful swells and my friend healing me quietly.

    

Evan Black: September 20th

Throughout the story, Evan (my narrator) fluctuates between the ages of nineteen (although very late nineteen) and twenty-six.  He is five foot ten with fairly broad shoulders.  His eyes are deeply dark brown, his hair is light brown, and his complexion is rather ruddy.  That is, compared to Caleb, his complexion is rather ruddy.   He is a bit of a cynic and an adept quipster.  He can feign no tolerance for apathy.  He reads, both prose and poetry, constantly; his favorite authors vacillate between Ernest Hemingway and Robert Louis Stevenson, while his favorite poet is decidedly Ezra Pound.  He is quite the poet himself, although his verses usually wind up crumpled on the arm of the couch until Caleb discovers and rescues them.  His wordiness leaks into his speech; he uses what my public address teacher calls ‘SAT words’ regularly, for which Caleb loves to tease him.


   “I’m wretched,” [Caleb] said. “Utterly abhorrent, odious, repulsive, ghastly -- I’m also a Lit. major, and do use such words in everyday conversation -- hateful, boorish...” He settled the instrument beneath his chin. “And, now, I’m performing.”

And, my personal favorite:


   “What about me, though?” [Caleb said.]   
   “That you were ridiculously tall.”
   “I was sitting down.”
   “Yes, but when a person’s legs stretch eight feet across the floor one makes assumptions.”
    He relaxed now, rolling the scarf about his hand.
   “What did you notice first about me?” I asked.
   A smirk lit across his mouth. “When a person’s robe reaches only to one’s knees--”
   I pushed him into the wall and we were happy.

Evan has never been close to his family: i.e, he doesn't know that he frequently talks in his sleep until Caleb tells him.  At one point he visits his parents over the Thanksgiving holiday, but his parents annoy him even more than they used to.  This is primarily because he has Caleb with him and can be quite protective.  Not weirdly protective.

   “Don’t ask him about that scar. If you unearth his life story, leave that scar out.”

   “You know how he got it?” [my mother asked.]
   “No.”
   “Then how do you know it was bad? You have a scar on your knee, and that’s just from falling on broken concrete.”
  “I know it’s bad because he never speaks of it. He never motions toward it, he never touches it, he never lets anything else touch it.”
   “That means nothing.”
   “When he puts on a sweatshirt he holds his head sideways, works one arm in, eases the collar over his head and pulls it down until the other arm is in and able to arrange an air pocket around his neck.” I clenched my teeth a moment. “For mercy’s sake, just don’t ask about it!”

Protective like that.  When he says this he is actually running water over his hand at the kitchen sink, because his mother did ask about the scar and he promptly burned himself, securing her immediate attention.

Hi Mom and Nana!  Yes, laugh away.  I know Evan and I had the same mishap with broken concrete.  It was more interesting than falling of his uncle's bed, and less interesting than climbing over a low rock-and-barbed-wire fence to escape angry Sardinian sheep dogs.

Also, Mom and Nana!  Evan does talk in his sleep because Matty talks in his sleep and it's the CUTEST THING EVER.

Sorry, I'm back now.  Evan, from the moment they meet, easily knows what would pain his friend, and can't at all understand how other people do not.  Sorry for that sentence: it refuses to be clear.  I trust you see what I'm trying to say.

Evan enjoys teasing Caleb as much as Caleb enjoys teasing him.  Although most of his teasing is entirely serious and only barely disguised as teasing.  He says stupid things while doing caring things.


I pulled a metal rod from his hand. “What do you think you’re doing?”
My friend assumed an admirable look of utter confusion.
“This is my bed. Go mess with your own stuff.” I pushed him to his violin case.
“We have to put the house together.”
“In silence? Do you really expect me to work without music, Caleb?”


You know what I'm finding difficult?  Writing just about Evan.  He is one of those people who is brought out by others; in this case, by pulling someone else out.  He becomes himself through his friendship.

Things I Know

But do not necessarily tell you.  I just read a post on a blog I recently discovered.  Here's the link:

http://cj-wordpainter.blogspot.com/2012/12/nullifyer-cast-part-i.html

Yeah, just figured out how to actually make that link work like, you know, a link.

Anyway, in the post the author introduces the main characters of her in-progress novel, Nullifyer.  Which, by the way, I can't wait to read.  I absolutely must learn more about Bryn Hogan.

The thought of writing little snippets about my characters was too great a temptation.  Although I'm rather bad at snippets.  Let's take snippet in a relative sense.  I wanted to write about some little things I know about my characters but may never actually write.  I thought that, maybe, the excerpts I post here will be less boring if readers know upfront what is learned by reading the whole book.

Okay, I won't tell that much.  I'll say that Caleb received the scar on his neck in an extremely traumatic way.  I won't tell what actually happened.    

I wrote of four characters from Dreams We Remember: Evan Black, Caleb Mithun, Sabella Cotter, and Anna Mithun.  Evan is coming right up.

"Fog Spill" Introduction

My children's story (I guess, rather older children's story), Fog Spill, contains one of my favorite plots of the stories I've written.  At least part of the plot.  Somewhere around the middle the whole thing died.  I don't know how.  It reads as if I tired of the story and just wanted to finish it.  But this is so untrue!  Anyway, I decided to break it into chapters, so instead of a long short story it is now a fairly short chapter book.  I'm considering new scenes, a new antagonist of sorts, altering my own assumptions at the story's beginning, etc.  Also: the title.  Love the title.  But I almost want to coin my coined phrase into a word. Fogspill.  The problem is that this could break up as either fog-spill or fogs-pill.  I will probably leave it as a phrase, but please post any input!  (You all know I crave input, right?  "love it" and "burn it" are equally useful to me!)  

Having rambled, here's the first chapter.  I tend to write short chapters (especially introduction chapters), so don't be too alarmed.  Once again, there have been only minuscule revisions.  I can guarantee that, come next week, I will re-read this chapter and think, "Did I really post that?!  Ugh!  It's horrible!  EWWW!!!"

         

Have you ever wondered about the fog?  A sea in the valley.  An avalanche over the hills.  You’ve squinted through it on early mornings; tried to push it from your eyes.  Makes the traffic lights blurry.  Thick and billowing when far away; light and lingering when all around you.  Shy thing.  Almost lets you touch it, but only almost.  

 
Have you ever wondered if maybe, were you to sit very still and very quiet, you could touch the fog?  Maybe it gets tired, sometimes.  Seeking its way through all the bustling and the noise and the severity.  Maybe, once in a while, it wants to rest.  If you sat still and quiet and small, maybe it would nestle down beside you and lay against your shoulder.  Or pass slowly by, taking and kissing your fingertips.  Or maybe it would surround you with all its great quietness--wrap tightly about you because you’re not alone and it’s not alone and you’re together.  Perhaps you would even laugh for the fog.  Laughter soothes all cold things.  The fog must get cold: scorned by serious mouths, pushed away by turned-up collars and turned-down hat brims.  If you are happy it will know.  If you laugh it will laugh with you.

I fear these are silly ifs and maybes.  As you grow people say, ‘The fog is not a person.  It is not shy.  It does not get tired.  It does not kiss.  It does not laugh.  It cannot have joy or happiness or love.  It does not know; it does not feel.’  For these people never meet fog.  It never taps upon their shoulders.  Never whispers into their ears.  

But you are real.  If someone didn’t believe in your realness, would you try to tell him?  If shy,

would you turn up your head to callous faces?  If tired, would you ask safety of one certain to shove you away?  Would not you recoil from those who’d rip out your heart to prove you cannot feel?

I can offer no proof.  All anyone cares for now is proof.  Rather a funny sounding word, isn’t it?  Proof.  Such a funny word for something so serious.  Maybe it’s not all that serious.  Who are we to ask for proof?  To say that we can prove or disprove?  It is when we look for proof that we forget what is real.  What is good.  What is true.  It is then that we begin to fade into that great solid shadow, where life is worth only its measure.

I have no proof.  I have no measure.  I have nothing solid.  I only have stories.  Just stories.  A whisper, a song, a heart pounding with love and trust and fear and sorrow and hope and joy.  A voice that cries.  A hand that reaches.  But I leave this to you.  This choice.  This test.  Place a man against a meter stick, and tell me which is real.