Growing Up and Up

My mom sent me the most amazing birthday package. Included in it was a file, if you will, of many of the writings (done by yours truly) she'd kept hidden away throughout my childhood and adolescence. Talk about opening a time capsule! I was truly overwhelmed (in a good way) and awash in emotions as I relived some of the weirdest, most exciting and revolutionary times of my life. It was (and continues to be, since I keep staring at it) so interesting to look at my own work from a variety of perspectives: as an emerging teacher I critiqued and laughed at some of my funny grammatical errors...lingering over hand-written essays and laughing at a writing portfolio from the 5th grade with a very grown-up table of contents.

I guess I could keep writing about how all of this makes me feel...but it might be more fun for you if I just share.

Take a look at this picture. First of all: the little girl who can't write her s's? She's going to grow up and become an English teacher someday. And that picture? Yes. That's me. I am like a flower - ever growing. 5 year old me can't write a sentence but - damn - my picture sure is worth 1000 words. (You might need to click on it to see it better. The quality isn't great).

Here's another picture from my kindergarten years. I am clearly expressing something important that involves my mommy and a grocery cart.

Next - the first poem I ever wrote. I remember this day clearly. I was 8 years old and had been inspired by a book I'd just read. I just really wanted to create something amazing. Here it is:

Title: Lovely trees scrape my knees

I love trees they
scrape my knees.
I wear pathes patches on my rashes

Now - we jump forward to the 5th grade to my author portfolio :) The table of contents is as follows:

Fiction stories
Poems
Personal Neratives
Rough Drafts

What an organized child I was!

I wrote an epic story about three cats in a kingdom in which I made my real-life arch nemesis "as fragile as an eggshell" as well as born in jail. I wrote another story in which my uncles and aunts steal a bunch of fossils and go to prison. In yet another, my imagination takes me on a wild ride in which the birds on my non-existent wall paper peel off and fly away, and everyone in the world thinks I'm crazy because of one stupid reporter. But my favorite: the story that include MLK Jr. as my soccer coach.

Here are two short poems I wrote in that portfolio as well:

Me
Athletic, Energetic
Running, Hiding, Seeking
In a big bush
Nervous.

My Little Rose

Spikey little rose
Such a pretty sight to see
There is a small bee.

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So there you have it. Some of my earliest writings. I have some others (from my more dramatic years), but those are best saved for the vaults. Instead, enjoy this picture of my cuteness: