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Danni Colello
my blog will show you the mind of a young developing writer.
"There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you." Maya Angelou
my blog will show you the mind of a young developing writer.
2/2/2019 5 Comments February 02nd, 2019Danielle Colello
Professor Mangini Eng Comp 100 2/2/19 Composing an Emotional Scene My blog post is about the time I move in with my first love and his family, Connecting to the theme of new identity. In the story, “My Name Is Margaret.” Margaret’s identity is taken and she is given a new one however she stays true to who she is and knows her true self. In this post I will show you the single instance that changed my life forever and how my identity was inadvertently stripped, and I was given a new chance to create my own identity and learn who I really am. “Ding-Dong.” I sprung up from the garbage bags I was filling, and raced down the stairs to answer the door, my steps thudded like a jack rabbit on a hot date. “Hey!” exclaimed Josh with the warmest smile you could ever feel. I smushed my face on to his as he picked me up and held me for a moment that I wished could last forever. I could smell his diesel cologne so strongly, as I tasted his sweet lips against mine. We continued back up the stairs and Josh and I picked up separate garbage bags and were rushing to fill them with everything in sight in my bedroom. I could feel my heart pounding as I was sweating and peeking out the window every few minutes. “We have to hurry up before my mom comes home.” I said to josh. He started taking the bags out to the car as I finished packing up the last few things. I began to look around the now empty room and recollected on all of the pain and loneliness I've felt over the years in here. I was beyond ready for this next chapter in my life. “Okay!” I said as i shut the locked door leaving my only key on the coffee table inside. “Let’s go.” I said to Josh, both of us smiling from ear to ear. “Here I come New York.” I thought as we pulled out of my old neighborhood. The conversations didn’t stop the entire ride as I asked Josh a million questions about what he likes, his hobbies, what we could do for fun, what I can do for a job out there, ect. Although nothing really mattered as long as we were together. So finally, as we pass the thousandth exit sign still showing were in Connecticut I asked him, “So what did your Dad say when you asked him if it was okay that I came to live with you guys?” “Well, so about that…” josh stammered. “So I didn’t really actually ask.” He said with a guilty smile smacked all over his face. “What?!” I shouted, “JOSH! Well that if he says no?” The pounding of my heart came racing back. “It’ll be fine!” promised Josh. We both nervously laughed but once our eyes locked all of my anxiety and doubt melted away, and this (whatever this was between us), this felt like home. As time passed I began to see a skyline in the distance, and there it was, ”Welcome To New York State.” Read the sign. We were here. As we drove through the streets, I began to see these giant skyscrapers bigger than anything I’ve ever seen before that moment. In fact, I couldn’t even see the tops of them. The food carts on the sidealks, greesy food filled my nostrils as we passed honking cars and people laughing and smoking sitting on their front porches. We were getting close I could feel it. “Would his dad tell be to go back home?” my subconscious worried as I knew this adventure to Pelham was closing in on an end. The car stops in the driveway, “Were here!” exclaimed josh. We bust out of his black GTI Bags in hand and run up the few stairs to his front porch, and Josh holds the screen door open for me as he pushes open the front door, “Daad!” josh dragged out, “Were homeee!” Joshes dad, Lew walks out from the kitchen, “Well hey guys, what’s all this?” motioning to all the garbage bags we have in hand. “Well, ya see dad, I kinda thought that it would just be better for a lot of reasons if danni just came and lived with us! She’s gonna get a job and we can figure everything out!” said Josh “Josh.” Said Lew, holding his head, shaking it, thinking for a moment that felt like forever. With two fingers resting on his temples he sighed and said.” Alright look I’m not going to tell you to turn around and go the hell back home. This is something we all are going to have to talk about but I guess, we can try this and see how it goes. Your mother hasn’t tried to contact you?” “No” I responded Lew began to nod his head and said, “Okay sweetheart.” A single tear fell from my eye as we both jumped on Lew thanking him from the bottom of our hearts. We ran up the stairs and immediately started dumping out the bags to find permanent places for all of my belongings. The next morning, I awoke and opened my eyes, for a second I thought, “What the?” forgetting where I was. And then I turned next to me and saw Josh asleep, illuminated from the skylight and morning sun. I touch him, and It physically feels good to touch him, like our energies were being exchanged. I’ve never experienced this before. So many new experiences awaited me in this new life. As I nuzzle into Josh he, still half asleep, intertwines his body with mine and I think to myself for the first time in my life,” This really is home.”
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1/29/2019 0 Comments The Proust Questionnaire__1.__What is your idea of perfect happiness?
Finding gratitude in everything and thriving in a perfect harmony of your life. That would have to be my perfect idea of happiness. __2.__What is your greatest fear? My greatest fear would be having absolutely no one and being utterly alone. Although solitude can be a beautiful self-exploration opportunity, once you have too much solidarity it can become a very sad lonely existence. __3.__What is the trait you most deplore in yourself? I hate the trait that I have of taking things too personally (like if I her someone laughing is it directed at me? If my friend is upset, is it something I could have done differently?) When in reality, none of it has anything to do with me. I’m aware that I do this and am working on it but still absolutely hate it about myself. __4.__What is the trait you most deplore in others? Ignorance and desensitization to actual catastrophic real-world threats of our planet and the living things on it, like the ice caps, how horrifyingly awful our oceans are, the increasing levels of species extinction, the natural disasters happening all the time that no one knows about, ect. __5.__Which living person do you most admire? My God Father; both of my biological parents aren’t active in my life. My God Father is by far my only actual parental figure and I admire him for so many reasons. He is by far the smartest individual I’ve ever met, he evaluates things in ways I never would even consider. He absolutely shapes who I am and who I want to be and opens my mind to new ways of thinking. Also he never gives up, even after losing his only son he has so much drive in life to keep pushing and reaching for the mountain tops, because if we don’t give this life all we have we are doing a huge disservice to the ones we love& lost. __6.__What is your greatest extravagance? My greatest extravagance would be music festivals, because they are expensive but having those bonding and learning experiences with people you care about and new people you meet at these (but become friends with instantly.) is so important and beautiful, where everyone just loves each other and has no pre-conceived notions about anything about you. Also, I have a really bad addiction to buying clothes. __7.__What is your current state of mind? Content/ open-minded is my current state. I’m finally back in school after 5 years of procrastination. __8.__What do you consider the most overrated virtue? Blind Faith in religion. I respect people having spiritual beliefs, but I don’t think blindly following any religion without learning other ones or discovering what spiritual beliefs you truly believe for yourself is a good virtue. __9.__On what occasion do you lie? When I stall the car I’ll usually lie. Even though its clearly obvious that I did I just won’t make eye contact and say, “nope, wasn’t me!”. __10.__What do you most dislike about your appearance? I feel like I look unapproachable to a lot of people; not many people ever come up to me and just start conversation. Also, I dislike how indented my eyes are, a lot and for some reason I hate my mouth. __11.__Which living person do you most despise? My old boss Pat from a dog boarding place in Jersey. He kept a husky on four “doggie Klonopins” a day and when he found it hard to find her a forever home, he seriously considered the idea of just putting her down. __12.__What is the quality you most like in a man? Maturity is the most important quality in men, in my opinion. Its hard to have an engaging conversation when they can’t maturely converse on topics. __13.__What is the quality you most like in a woman? The empowering energies that we have. I believe you can strongly feel it when women support and love each other. __14.__Which words or phrases do you most overuse? The phrases I use the most are, “Literally”, “ahuh sista girl”, “say less”, and “namsayin”. These are essentially like my auto pilot words. __15.__What or who is the greatest love of your life? Joshua Lee Borofsky; my first love whom I intended on sharing my life with, but he has passed on. __16.__When and where were you happiest? Age 18-20 was the happiest time of my life, I just graduated highschool, met my first love, and moved to New York. The physical place I feel the happiest is Arizona. __17.__Which talent would you most like to have? Hand eye coordination because I have none. It would be nice to have the ability of throwing and catching things. __18.__If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? That I am an introvert when I meet people. I wish I could put myself out there more. __19.__What do you consider your greatest achievement? Going back to school after being out for 5 years. It was just time for me to bite the bullet. __20.__If you were to die and come back as a person or a thing, what would it be? I would probably come back as a fox. I pulled my cards with a medium and determined a fox is my main spirit animal. __21.__Where would you most like to live? I would love to live in Arizona or New Zealand. They are both such beautiful places. __22.__What is your most treasured possession? My pup, Keira Mia is m most treasured possession. She is a 2 year old Shiba Inu. __23.__What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery? The lowest depth of misery would have to be in my opinion, when someone genuinely does not care at all about themself or know their worth, self-love always comes first before you can care about anything else you need to love yourself and know you have worth. __24.__What is your favorite occupation? World traveler would be the best occupation. Getting paid to see the world, yes please! __25.__What is your most marked characteristic? My most marked characteristic is that I have pretty good balance. I do yoga a lot and that obviously helps. __26.__What do you most value in your friends? I value their loyalty, love, and artistic abilities. My friends are all so loving and inviting and majority of them produce art in some way, & they are all so talented. __27.__Who are your favorite writers? Billie Ellish or Stevie Nicks are my favorite writers. They both write such beautiful, poetic music. __28.__Who is your hero of fiction? Louise belcher from Bobs Burgers is my fictional hero. She schemes so hard and is hilarious I aspire to be as great as she is one day. __29.__Which historical figure do you most identify with? I guess Emilia Airheart, because she wanted to explore the unknown. I also want to venture out into the world and learn and explore. __30.__Who are your heroes in real life? I would have to say my god dad. He’s so inspiring and helps me thrive so much in life. __31.__What are your favorite names? The name I like best for a boy is Dillon. The name I like best for a girl is Charlie. __32.__What is it that you most dislike? That I lost my best friend in life. I never imagined I’d truly ever lose him in this life. __33.__What is your greatest regret? Either not seeing my family more or not going back to school sooner. I’ve been out of school for years but finally bit the bullet and wanted to better myself. __34.__How would you like to die? Painlessly would be the ideal way to die. Passing over should be a peaceful process. __35.__What is your motto? We don’t go back, only forward. You must progress to thrive in life and going backwards won’t get you there. 1/29/2019 0 Comments Writing Process RoundtableDon, Mary, Anne, and myself were all waiting for our orders as we stood at the end of the counter at Starbucks. As we began to discuss our own beliefs of the writing process, one by one all of our coffees were being called out by name, except for miss Anne who wanted her tea. We ventured outside to find a nice place to sit as the spring weather was refreshingly warm and inviting. Mary continued the conversation by starting,” In the beginning, when there are zero pages, you have to cheer yourself into cranking stuff out, even if it later lands on the cutting room floor”. As Don and myself sipped our Starbucks, Anne nodded in agreeance and said,” The only way I can get anything written is to write really, really shitty first drafts.” All four of us bursted out with laughter however Anne wasn’t wrong in saying that. Don chimed in saying that the first process, Prewriting will, “usually take about 85 percent of the writers time.” And also that the “prewriting may include research, daydreaming, note making and outlining, title-writing and lead writing. “So essentially its okay for your first draft in writing to be a piece of garbage but just getting started (however you personally do so) is just as important as what your writing. I chimed in that my initial beliefs in the beginning stage of writing stem from Terry Pratchett in that “The first draft is just you telling yourself the story.” “Yes, that’s very true” replied Don as Mary nodded and Ann sipped her tea. Don continued that the next step in the writing process would be actually, writing. That,” Writing is the fastest part of the process, and the most frightening, for it is a commitment.” Ann retorted that,” The writing is about filling up, filing up when you are empty, letting images and ideas and smells run down like water- just as writing is also about dealing with the emptiness.” We all took a moment to allow what Anne had just said to set in, such a true statement. Mary responded, “Yes girl!” and went on to say how she believes,” Each page takes you somewhere you need to travel before you can land in the next spot. “ What a wonderful sentiment, I continued,’ Mary, I couldn’t agree more. “And then Finally of course,” Don began, Rewriting is reconsideration of subject, form, and audience.” So we pretty much are completely reassessing / restructuring (if needed) our work entirely. This last part of the writing process is so very important. As Mary finished her coffee she nodded and replied,” I can honestly say not one page I’ve ever published appears anywhere close to how it came out in first draft.” And Anne went on describing how you need to find someone who will not just criticize your work but will constructively encourage you to revise it by saying something like, she continued, “I think it’s going to be great, I think its really good work. But I also think there are a few problems.” So you don’t become completely discouraged to finishing your work. I agreed that you should always have your work checked because when you’re so deep into your writing you may not notice small errors, as Mark Twain put it, ‘The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.” “I love Mark Twain!” shouted Anne. We all chuckled as we started to gather our things and empty Starbucks cups and begin our departure. No matter what, I thought to myself, It will always ring true that if you want to write,” You can, You should, and if you’re brave enough to start, you will.” -Stephan King. We all made our way to our cars as the sun’s rays shined down on us,” Huh, what a beautiful day to start writing.” I thought, as we went our separate ways. |
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April 2019
CategoriesAll Identity Narrative Reflection Research Project Writing Process |