A Thousand Words

Bullets be as bullets do. Shatter the wall, go right through. Blood spills over the ground. All so quiet, can't hear a sound. No tears to cry. Hate watching it die. Anger burns deep inside. Do not know how much longer I can hide. Hide in the shadows. Hide behind a face. Hide behind a veil, thin with lace. So many times, I let it be. Let the sword kill me. Lies, hate, misunderstood. I would change it, if I only could. Never easy to lose something lost. Especially at such a great cost. Standing my ground, being me, Has become important, can't you see? Never let myself shine before. Never let my heart soar. Escape from the pain, the abuse, Will not let you accuse, Accuse me of acts I would never take, The last thing I would ever be is fake. Hurt that you can't see beyond your nose. So splitting apart goes as it goes. No words said, That haven't been read. Love still lingers, warm and true Taken for granted, by you.

With the upcoming election, I feel it is only appropriate to address my own view on it all. You see, I am about to turn 20, and have not registered to vote. Not because I do not care, but because I do. I can honestly say I do not support either candidates that are running this year. I dislike them both a great deal and honestly cannot choose one above the other. This has brought on a lot of judgement. People saying, "Oh well you HAVE to vote because it is your right!", "People FOUGHT for your right to vote!", "It is your DUTY!". Honestly though, it is just as much a right for me not to vote. That is the thing about America, the power of choice. I am obtaining from the vote because I do not want to say that I supported either party, honestly. I feel like, if I am going to vote, some part of me should support them in some way or another. I cannot say this about either candidate this election. I really cannot. To all the people judging others for not voti...

If there is anything that I have learned in life, it is that putting myself first is ok. I have always struggled with putting myself before others. I have always been that tiny piece of roadkill on the highway that gets constantly run over because it is too small and hard to see. This, I have learned, has gotten my heart into lots of trouble. I have always had an assortment of crappy friends, honestly. People with strong emotional issues. Those are the people I am naturally drawn to. I want to help others and be that one person they can talk to. Unfortunately, when you only support someone else, you eventually drown. In most friendships I have had, it has been all about keeping that person above water. And when those few times came around that I needed to breathe, I was shocked to find that person shoving my head back under the surface. Eventually, I realized I wanted someone to hold my hand while treading. Someone who can hold themselves up, like me, but still be able to connect wi...

I have just completed my first year at George Fox University. This is a Christian school, just like my high school, Portland Adventist Academy. However, one of the bigger differences I noticed is the dress code for girls. When I came to GFU, I felt relieved that I no longer had to worry about shorts coming to my knees and tops coving most, if not all of my shoulders. I would never consider myself a risqué dresser. All my life I have been interested in clothes and fashion. I have been interested in creating outfits that made me feel like myself and utterly beautiful. When I started growing long legs and breasts far over the average size of a girl my age, I began to get criticized for my features I had no control over. Suddenly, skirts were always too short for me. Tops were too low or straps were too thin. Luckily, my parents had raised me to value myself and look at myself as attractive, inside and out. However, thats not to say when one of you teachers approaches you and tells you tha...

Dear anyone who has ever hurt me, I forgive you. I forgive you not necessarily because you deserve it, but because I do. I have spent too long being angry at you, having revenge fantasies about you, and avoiding you whenever I see you in person. I forgive you because I am tired. I know that you can only change on your own. I give up. I will not let you in again. You have your own life to figure out, as do I. I have grown, and I have changed. I am finally at a place in my life where I can fully move on. I don't have to see you everyday, or hear your name brought up in random conversation. You have been cleansed out of my life. I am done being angry. What is the point in wasting time being so distraught? You do not deserve my anger. I forgive you because it is my best form of goodbye. Forgiveness means you are completely cleansed out of my body. Out of my heart and out of my mind. The wounds you inflicted have healed, and I do not care about the scars they left behind. You were a p...

In life, our family are the groupings of individuals we just can't refuse to be related to. You love each other no matter what, and stick together even when you disagree. Now, I am not saying this is a terrible thing. Personally, I love my family. Sure we have some intense fights now and again, but I love being a part of my family.  There of course is your immediate family, and then there are your other relatives. The people you may or may not go see over the holidays and vacations in the summer. The people who may or may not send you cards and gifts on your birthday. Depending on the person, the extended family relationship varies. Some are extremely close to their other relatives, others hardly know who they are. I have always been fairly close to my extended family. More on my mom's side than my dad's however. When I think of an extended relative, I think of my mom's mom, my grandma Phyllis.  When I say the word grandma, what do you think of? Grandma can mean ...

As I have said in previous posts, this year has been a struggle. Adjusting just does not seem to be a task I can do very easily. However, the one thing that frightens me most, was at the top of my goal list for this year. I had grown in a world that was beginning to cave in on me. Like being trapped in a cage with hundreds of other people for eighteen years. By the time I graduated high school, I knew everyone and everyone knew me. It was exhausting. Everyone always knew every little thing about you. Rumors traveled fast and easily. If you broke up with someone, you would most definitely see them and might even have to talk to them everyday. There was no escape. Now, I am not saying it was all bad. Such a small environment encouraged me to form solid and meaningful friendships quickly. However, I disagreed with a lot of the culture I was being raised in believed in. My parents were done too. I knew I wanted to get out. I wanted to move on as much as I possibly could. I knew college w...

I actually had lots of fun blogging this semester. However, I have found it difficult to keep it up every Wednesday and comment on others' posts as well. I definitely think on the other hand, that I will be keeping up writing on my blog because I simply love it. It is stress relieving and there is something about publishing it online. Even if no one ever sees it, I know I put myself out there. That is the best part. I forgot how much I loved to just write my thoughts out before this semester's blog assignments. Now, I will be sure to keep that up.

Silver skies became the norm. Soaking socks, muddy soles, damp cloth. Walks to class turned into month-long journeys. Miserable. The gray possessed every item around. It was in the earth, it was in the trees, it was in the sky, it was in the hearts. Fashion choices become whatever is warm and water resistant. The joy was on vacation, leaving exhaustion and dreariness to substitute. Will it ever end? Suddenly, golden light bursts through the clouds. It kisses the face, makes it glow. Off come the soaking socks, muddy soles, and damp cloth. Visions of colorful dresses dance around at the sight of it. The world shines in all its vibrancy. Joy comes home from vacation. Ocean colored blue stretches from horizon to horizon. Who ever knew it existed? Smiles flash brighter than it all. The heart is content again, eager for adventure. Even if it only lasts for a moment, the light becomes worth the dark filled wait.

Many elder generations whom did not grow up in the world of technology find it to have tarnished the so called good name of life's offerings. We could sit around and argue all day about if new technology is healthy or not for our society, but honestly, there is no point. Life moves in a forward direction, never back. Every aspect of everything we know is changing, including our world of writing. Nowadays, information is at everyone's fingertips. It is able to be retrieved in seconds. It is no wonder how that changes the way we write. If anything, it has made it more competitive. Since information can be so quickly created, published, and retrieved thanks to the internet, becoming a fully functional writer has gotten much more difficult of achieve. However, this does not mean that the internet has not aided with such a goal either. It has become much easier to get your works out there. You can post, create websites, and contact others in the blink of an eye. All it takes is a ...

Fui a la luna. Pensé a tu. Fui al oceon, pensé a tu. Asique, llevaré una estrella para ti. Y un piedro especial del ocean para ti. Te quiero. Tienes mi corazón. ¿Puedo tener su corazón?

Surround me like an ocean. Engulf me in Your love. Sun beams reach down. Their warmth hugs me gently. Keep my head above the waves. Afraid of becoming fully submerged. What lies under the surface is murky. Creatures lurk below, only in my imagination. Frantically swimming in search of You. Fear of finding the bottom. Fear You're there too. An easier world lies above. A place to breathe. A place to float. However, it is ordinary. Water does not touch the sky. Not the way I want it to. Fear of the unknown. A world down under I have yet to see. Knowing I'll find You, but not willing to. Must accept that I must drown before I can breathe.

Clearly grammar is a big part of writing. Knowing how to punctuate, what tense to use, and so on shows the professional aspects to a piece of writing. However how necessary is it? Does it need to be stressed in the classroom? Or does it all depend on the type of writing being taught? I have a minor pet peeve. One that definitely exposes my writer's heart. That pet peeve is poor grammar. The many times that I have been asked to grade/review someone else's paper, I get joy and feel disgust at fixing the many many grammatical errors in it. Is this because I have been taught that grammar is everything? And when one does not possess the proper grammar skills, they are less intelligent? Sometimes I think to myself, "What is this monster they made me into?". Obviously, grammar does matter. Knowing the difference between your and you're can simply solve many miscommunications. It is important to know the language if you are going to be wielding it at the tip of your p...

It seems like a logical, but ancient idea that our genders influence the way we write. Someone might say that women write more emotional and men write more logically and factually. While in some cases this may be true, it cannot be said for men and women writers as a whole. The truth of the matter is that it is our culture that influences the way we write. If we grow up in a culture where men are not emotional and women are, the roles will be assumed by each gender. This is not because they simply feel they are emotional or not, it is because they want to fit into society and not be deemed a strange and unique person. Gender roles and personality traits are simply just a part of culture. Honestly, men can be very emotional, and women can not be at all. It all depends on the individual. This is what makes writing so beautiful. The individual gets to speak, not the gender, the race, the country in which they live, but them. The one person gets to have a voice different than anyone else...

Maturation is something all humans go through in some form or another as they grow. However, there is something very different between physical maturity and emotional maturity. While psychical maturity is something the vast majority of individuals undergo, the emotional part does not seem to reach nearly as many.  Now, I am just speaking from personal experience. From the world I have gotten to know over the past nineteen years, I have discovered that many people I am growing with are not as mature as others. This can be especially hard when forming relationships. Not having the emotional maturity to deal with certain situations like stress, new people, and jealousy can seriously hold someone back from forming a healthy relationship with themselves and others.  When I was in 6th grade, I made an insecure friend. Since I had not matured yet, I became insecure with her. However, after she hurt me enough times, I discovered myself and gained a great deal of emotional maturity....

I have only found myself in one or two writing group projects. I am never one for group projects. Not because I don't get along well with others (I am quite the opposite), but because often times one person ends up doing most if not all of the work while others slack. Often times, I am the one leading the group, and end up doing lots of work somehow. It is very frustrating under normal circumstances, but in a writing group especially, it is hard to work. Sharing your own writing, your thoughts, your words, with others to help make them flow is perhaps on of the most impossible tasks. Everyone has a different mind and writes differently. So, I honestly prefer to write alone. Showing my work to others is fine, but collaborating with others is something I do not want to have to do.

Nothing has bothered me more about growing into a young woman than the fact that I have to be extra cautious. I cannot count how many times I have felt uncomfortable or been hit on by some creepy guy when I was out in public. It does not matter the age, but guys seem to think they can just say whatever they want to and it will not have any consequences. It seems that our society puts the word sex and woman together far too often. For instance, in many of Carl's Junior's ads, they have featured beautiful women in bikinis seductively eating a burger. One day, I stumbled upon a video titled, "If Men Were Featured In Ads The Same Way Women Are" and I found myself laughing at a shirtless, six-pack man seductively eating a burger. However, this is not a joke. Why does it seem, even to a woman like myself, so odd when a man is sexualized in an ad but when women are it just feels normal? It is because of this and countless other reasons that men feel that it is "normal...

College is a tough transition. I think we all can agree on that. You move away from home, live with other people your own age 24/7, and you actually have to try to be a functioning adult. It is quite the jump from our high school days just goofing around. However, no part of college has been more tough for me than living without my favorite dog, Brutus. Brutus is a large boxer/hound mutt. He has droopy ears that flop around when he runs, a long nose that directs him to any interesting smell it picks up, a howl that even the moon can hear, and a heart as sweet as cotton candy. He is one of the greatest friends I have ever made. All my life, I have had a dog. When I was born, a chihuahua/Boston terrier mix named Bosco was my companion. After the 16 year old passed away, my family eventually decided it was time to get a new dog. I will never forget the day we saw Brutus at the Oregon Humane Society. He seemed shy. He was only 6 months old. He was not as energetic as most puppies I had...

In the video I found on youtube, the author goes through series of serious inspiration and motivation and complete boredom, anxiety, and procrastination. That is a big part of my writing process. I will start something and finish it, then come back to it and change it up. However, most of the time, I put the writing off until the last minute, and then finish it all in a night.

Here is an author's writing process: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oL_4SpGQo1k

For all my life, except for Kindergarten, I went to a private school. All of these schools had a limit of 300 kids or less. It never felt that small to me. Perhaps it was because it was all I had known. However, I did develop normal social skills. For a long while I did not feel sheltered. But then, college hit. I decided my junior year of high school that I was sick of the small school feel. Everyone not only knew my name, but my whole life story. Rumors traveled twice as fast, drama happened more easily, and escaping a bad friend or an ex was almost impossible because you had the same friends or the same classes or saw each other in the halls everyday. I was also done with the Seventh-Day Adventist bubble. Their beliefs just never agreed with mine. I yearned for a new taste on life and view on God. So, my senior year I finally decided to attend George Fox University. Before school started, I felt pretty confident with my decision. I knew it would be bigger than I had been around ...

"Wouldn't wanna be anybody else...yeah..." My alarm blasts off at the highest decibel possible each morning. I never let Who Says by Selena Gomez get much further in her song before I shut it off. The time I get up depends on the day. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays I tend to get up at 9:15 am. Plenty of time for a shower, including shampoo and conditioner, picking out a cute outfit for the day, brushing my teeth and hair (with different brushes of course), my acne cream, and mascara and eyeliner. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, I have to sleepily fall out of bed at the miserable hour of 7. Then I proceed to throw on some pair of jeans I wore earlier that week (or the last) and grab a baggy sweatshirt I wouldn't mind never wearing again. No college student needs to dress nice at 7 in the morning. Each morning however, taking my medicine and grabbing a bite to eat just before I have to leave does not change. I usually am out the door 10-8 minutes before my first class...

Most people know the terms Extrovert and Introvert and often times they identify themselves to be one or the other. Generally, an extroverted person is someone who is energized by being around other people, and introverted people get more exhausted when surrounded by others. For the longest time, I considered myself to be an extrovert. I figured this because I love people. I love talking to them, getting to know them, and making them laugh. However, as I got older, I discovered that I get very tired and irritable sometimes if I am with people a lot. By the end of a long school day or class trip, I was so ready to be by myself, in my room, relaxing. It was not until I came to college that I found out why. Moving into a dorm is a different transition for sure. You are always with people your own age. You even live with another peer. I found myself getting exhausted every now and then by all the energy, but being energized by it all the same. I felt like I was in identity crisis. I sw...

I define a piece of my writing as successful when I have fully encapsulated my thoughts, ideas, and emotions into it. When the writing speaks in my voice, and my voice only. This may sound utterly simplistic, but writing is an art form. Every artist has to be inspired and stay true to who they are to feel complete with their work. Often times, I find that I am using other voices and influences in my life to create a piece of writing that just isn't me. When I re read through a piece of my work, and just feel empowered by it, I know that it is my true heart's words and not anyone else's. It is so easy to write like anyone. To copy lines of poetry, a style of writing by your favorite author, or even song lyrics you heard once upon a time. I have always been a huge advocate for authenticity of an individual. In a world where everyone is trying to copy someone else, or be something they are not, I find someone who is real and genuine to be the most refreshing part of life. ...

  You would not be a normal writer if you did not think about how your readers will react to your writing. Often times, that simple correlations leads to the change in the creative process and organization of writing.   In my life, I have noticed that I always write differently depending on what situation I am writing for. When I write a paper for class, my professor is always the person I have in the back of my mind when I form sentences. I often ask myself, "Will they enjoy it?" "How will they respond?" "Will they be impressed?" This sometimes causes me to leave out or change certain parts of my paper to better fit the teacher I am trying to impress. It is worrisome to me that I am more of a sellout than I considered before. Now, I am not saying that forming your writing to fit an audience is all bad. In many situations, such as writing a speech, it is most important to consider them first and yourself last. However, when speaking in a general sen...

Ever since I could retain conscious thoughts, I knew that I was creative. However, I did not realize I was in love with writing till much much later in my life. When I was in fifth grade, our class was required to read Hatchet by Gary Paulsen. When I read the book, I found an odd feeling bubbling up inside me. Every little description Paulsen wrote pricked me as well like a voodoo doll. When Brain, the main character's, ribs cracked, I felt mine crack. Something about the descriptions clicked in a part of my brain I had not met before.  After I savorily read the last page of Hatchet, I sat down to write a book review on it. I found emotions, flowing paragraphs, and beautiful descriptions pouring out of my pain and splashing on my paper. When my teacher handed back my paper, she asked if she could speak with me for a moment. I was so afraid that I did something inappropriate in my book review. Much to my surprise, my fifth grade teacher bursted into praise about how impressed...

Anna Kennedy is my name. I apologize if this post is kind of lame. Just give me a moment to describe, Who I am on the inside. I love animals, anything from dogs, To little tiny green frogs. I am obsessed with the ocean. I believe in expressing emotion. Food is my everything.  But I easily say the same about anything. I am loyal to my friends.  I am partial to writing in pens. I daydream all day long.  And I enjoy singing songs. I take life on, but go with the flow.  God is my Father, this I know.