Published (III) and Writing Opportunity!

I’m really digging writing for The Black Sheep Articles at ECU this year.

I’ve been able to improve in my humor and satire and branch out enough to connect more with people my university. Also, the team is pretty awesome.

Alex Lewis has their live days on Mondays, I have my live days on Tuesdays, we currently have no live days on Wednesdays, Caitlin Rosenberg has her live days on Thursdays, and Sophronia Knott has her live days on Fridays.

If there are any ECU students interested in becoming a staff writer to fill our Wednesday slot, apply to The Black Sheep Articles on their site under East Carolina University at http://theblacksheeponline.com/jobs

If you want to read old and new articles, visit theblacksheeponline.com/east-carolina

It’s a whole lot of fun, please check it out!

The Black Sheep Articles @ ECU

Back in June, I received an email about a new internship opportunity.

It was described to me as “like the Onion, but for college campuses.”

I would receive internship credit for turning in articles and attending content meetings every week for The Black Sheep Articles @ ECU. I received my first two assignments yesterday.

I’m actually pretty excited about it! It gives me the chance to write more than I usually do, it’s an opportunity to reach out to my campus, and it gets me further along in my English degree. What is there to lose? Also, it will push me to want to write in other mediums when I’m not working on an article, that way my creative juices can still flow properly.

Here’s to a good year with The Black Sheep.

What Am I Going to Do?

I have been watching YouTube videos and podcasts all day…

About possible jobs that I want to pursue.

Right now, at East Carolina University, I am studying Social Work and English. Afterwards, I plan to go to grad school.

Plans always change, I know that, it’s just, what am I going to do after undergrad?

Primarily, I hoped to just work at a non profit, do counseling, community outreach, write grants, and write on the side for myself. Then, Expressive Arts Therapy really attracted me. It made my two majors at the moment actually click so well with one another, it made me so excited! I could do outreach with poetry, reach out and counsel people through poetry, performance, journaling.

Then the Interfaith Youth Core Conference happened. You can see the post titled “Better Together” about that.

Interfaith Studies would give me perfect creative space and outreach space to reach out to so many people because interfaith is so broad and open.

However, in terms of making sense of transitioning from my undergraduate to graduate school, there are also programs that offer an MSW in conjunction with an Expressive Arts certificate or a Social Healing Through Arts certificate.

I interned at the Creative Aging Network in Greensboro, North Carolina and loved it. I did workshops there on poetry and expression for elder adults last summer and over winter break. I have been teaching poetry at Third Street Community Center in Greenville, North Carolina for almost two years, and I taught creative theater for two months; I enjoyed, and still enjoy, them immensely. I look forward to do outreach and teaching poetry at Restore One in Greenville, North Carolina, an anti-human trafficking group; they’re also really for interfaith collaboration and LGBT collaboration and they are a Christian organization.

All in North Carolina.

For grad school, two years from now I know, my top five are The California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco, California (Expressive Arts Therapy), Claremont Lincoln University in Claremont, California (Interfaith Studies),  University of California Los Angeles (Social Welfare and Social Healing Through Art), Appalachian State University in Boone, NC (Social Work and Expressive Arts Therapy), and East Carolina University (Social Work).

The list is always bound to change. It always changes.

I also may have an idea of what to study set in stone, only to change.

I want to branch out, but what if I am more than satisfied where I am in North Carolina two years from now?

I know that I won’t get in to every grad school I apply to, but that doesn’t take away the pressure. Is it true that you can’t change your mind as easily with your master’s as you can with your bachelor’s?

Today’s Tangent Day.

I don’t know.

But what I do know is that I want to make people feel good through writing and provide awareness through artistic platforms.

I keep telling myself, and it’s quite clear, that it’s okay not to know. It’s just irksome having to think about stuff like this all the time.

I’m already trying to figure out where to get tutoring for the GRE. Geez.

After this summer, I go into my junior year of college.

And I’m struggling with whether or not to take the phrase “Take your time” seriously.

I once deleted these post because of all of the rambling, but it’s good to ramble. It helps with planning and assertiveness, surprisingly.

My Response to Pirate Rants Today

The East Carolinian have a section titled “Pirate Rants” in their Opinion section, where students can anonymously comment on whatever they please online to have published the upcoming issue of the paper.

Today, on February 24th, 2015, there have been Pirate Rants on the renaming of the Aycock dorm. Click these following links for more information: http://www.witn.com/home/headlines/CHANCELOR–Aycock-name-should-be-removed-from-ECU-dorm-292096921.html#.VOdoKUDIitI.facebook  http://media2.newsobserver.com/content/media/2010/5/3/ghostsof1898.pdf    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/19/duke-aycock-hall_n_5511580.html

The majority of the rants made me uncomfortable. Not because they were opposed to renaming, but because there was ignorance regarding the Black Student Union, the Board of Trustees, and why there were people for the renaming of the dorm.

These are my responses to some of the rants. This is not to make anyone angry, this only to bring light to the current situation on my campus.

“I am still confused on how the White Student Union Rant caused so much sh** but the BSU [Black Student Union] can push for something that renames a pirates home and people celebrate.”

The White Student Union Rant last semester was because East Carolina University is a predominantly white university. Because White people are the majority, that is why it was offensive. Maybe the person who wrote that rant did feel underrepresented as a White individual, and I am sorry if he or she felt that way. However, a White student is granted more opportunities at ECU and in other places in this country more than people of color. For example, when minority organizations ask for funding from SGA (Student Government Association), the first thing SGA asks is whether or not they have asked for funding from the Ledonia Wright Cultural Center. Majority organizations are not asked this question. Although affirmative action has been in effect for quite a while, a White person is still more likely to get a job than a person of color. The majority of the staff, the Board of Trustees, and even SGA are White. Although it is growing, there is still not enough representation for minorities on our campus, and other places off campus. The Black Student Union, other minority organizations, and members of the majority regardless of which organization they are in,  have been standing up for the renaming because it is a step in moving forward. It is a step for minorities to feel welcome in their dorms and throughout the college campus.

“Is it possible for students of other races to join the BSU? If not I don’t think they should be allowed on campus.”

Yes! Of course students of other races can join the BSU! Students of other races can join the Student Association for Latino Spanish Affairs (SALSA)! Straight students can be a part of the GLBTSU (Gay Lesbian Bisexual Transgender Student Union), hearing students can join Silent Pirates, the list goes on and on! In my experience, I am not speaking on behalf of all students of color, cultural organizations have been more accepting of other people, including White students. That is because there is excitement in getting to know people who want to truly get to know you after experiences of rejection and being ignored. In my experience in majority organizations, I felt the need to change my way of thinking and change my mannerisms in order to be accepted, in order to avoid being a token, if you will. I have a tendency to be aware of whether or not certain mannerisms of mine are “too black” or “not black enough” regardless of who I am with, whereas most people of Caucasian descent do not have to worry about their mannerisms or their color until they are in a room where they are the minority.

“I’m proud of ECU’s history, so I erased the uncomfortable parts–Everyone who was for the renaming of Aycock.” “The Board of Trustees have no backbone.”

The Board of Trustees made an effective compromise on behalf of all ECU students. They did not just make the decision to rename the dorm, they also made the decision to represent Aycock and his contributions inside Heritage Hall, along with other contributors of the school. They do have backbone, and no one is erasing parts of history here.

I hope my statements have been taken into account. Thank you for taking the time to read them.

Short Story/Flash Fiction: Guy Walks into a Bar

So a guy walks into a half empty bar, and he snickers at me. Looking all smug, ruining the only chill I had tonight in this space. Not too busy, but not a complete ghost town. Respectable people in corners talking at a normal voice level about politics and art sitting on wobbly wooden chairs at scratched, wooden tables, and he just rolls up in here with a few “buddies,” I presume, as if this were a sports bar! I hate guys like that.

The guys that brought me to my knees crawling and reaching around a dirty tiled floor for strayed, wide-open books and poetry journals as he smirked and chuckled at me. My horn-rimmed glasses weren’t a symbol of intelligence in high school; they were a symbol of my poor choices in shields against these kind of people that roamed throughout high school.

I twiddle with my mechanical pencil as if I’m twirling a baton for a small, yet focused, marching band. With each pat it makes on my thumb, almost to the beat of a moody type of song playing, and then my notebook paper, I’m trying to beat away any past thoughts of teenage angst in my writing. I’ll be twenty-two soon, it has to. I wish it were the cider giving me the headaches instead of the writer’s block.

“Freakin’ nerd,” he said, walking down the hall in satanic triumph.

The frat-faced guy today releases a monstrous belch as I take another sip of my drink. Dribbles plop on my face and shirt imminently.

Was it because of my shirt? Was it because of my glasses? The guidance counselor said it was probably because of jealousy. What did his stupid pretty face have to be jealous about? Why did God decide to bless him with the charm of angels for the faculty and sporty kids and charm of demons for the science and art kids? She also mentioned possible personal problems at home. Like what? Boo hoo, it’s so hard to be pretty and get away with stupid stuff?

“You all right over there?” the guy asks, trying to swallow his last few snickers.

I take the counselor’s advice to breathe, and shout “Yeah. I’m fine. Thanks.”

A Different Perspective

It’s all about how flavored wine coolers are better compared to beer; beer tastes like urine. Rancid, carbonated urine. It’s all about being one of the few sober people in the room, sitting uncomfortably on a crowded, beat up couch, watching everyone else in their inebriated foolery. It’s all about either the one sober friend checking on you, or the one drunk friend, or acquaintance, or someone you just met, checking on you, hoping to see you get on their level of fun. It’s about finding amusement in observing everyone’s temporary insanity, finding out how many would want to stay in that temporary, intoxicated insanity forever.

It’s all about how you’re trying to stay above conformity while craving it at the same time, wanting your awkwardness to be swallowed whole with just a couple of bottles, three or four tops. It’s about being referred to as the “good girl,” about wanting you to get drunk already and let loose, and your definition of “loose” is a more contained and acceptable version for yourself compared to the stupid, very sexually active, über emotional individuals around you, crashing into you as if you were invisible, because you are. It’s about realizing how alcohol can make one blind to reality, that piece of reality that includes you, and forgetting that sometimes, as you wonder why that guy chugging a whole keg upside down believes it’s a talent important enough for Carnegie Hall, or why two heterosexual female strangers believe that making out for the hell of it to please hormonal heterosexual men will fulfill them, or why that jerk keeps flirting with you when you clearly stated that you weren’t interested for the hundredth time!

It’s how you see what that character in It’s a Wonderful Life meant when he said that youth was wasted on the wrong people. It’s about how you just want to go home already! It’s how you wonder “My God, why did I come here in the first place?!” It’s how you realize that it was because you already took the sip of conformity you claimed earlier you would never take.

Moments in 2014

2014:

I met three lovely and groundbreaking artists: Andrea Gibson, Mayda del Valle, and Indira Allegra.

I participated in my first protest against racism and injustice towards people of color.

I received my very own “Gay? Fine By Me” t-shirt around the same time gay marriage was officially legalized in North Carolina.

Friend and fellow poet Mia Willis was my partner in crime and a fantastic group piece and while hosting an open mic for the first time.

I lost a friend to suicide.

I got to see The Fault in our Stars and Guardians of the Galaxy in theaters and loved it!!!

I saw the second season of Orange is the New Black, and enjoyed it like the first season in 2013.

My family and I moved into a new place.

I met Laverne Cox, the first transgender actress to win an Emmy for her role in Orange is the New Black. Fun fact: she first studied Creative Writing in college before studying Dance and pursuing acting.

I began teaching poetry at Third Street Community Center in February, which led to more workshops with different schools and non profits. I even got to intern at the Creative Aging Network to teach a poetry workshop and participate in community outreach. I was asked to come back in 2015 to teach a two-day workshop, and I did.

I made the Dean’s List in school.

I donated nine inches of my hair for the first time in March, which led me to cut my hair even shorter after a couple of months. I love my hair short.

I went to InterVarsity Christian Fellowship’s retreat in Rockbridge for the first time. I took the Identity Track where we talked about race, family, sexuality, and gender in terms of identity with the Lord. It was fantastic!!!

I got to perform spoken word for events and competition.

I created this blog.

Resolutions (not the cliché kind I don’t think) for 2015:

More writing on this blog, but include short stories, not just prose, poetry, and rants.

Express genuine joy, not force joy or happiness out of me.

Attend a missions trip for the first time.

Participate in more interfaith events.

More praying.

Try painting over the summer.

Complete the Star Wars series and the Lord of the Rings/The Hobbit series before the year is out.

Do more research as I read the Bible.

Happy New Year everyone! I’m eleven days late, however, I still hope and pray that this year is a good one.

Budgeting at a University

This past Thursday, I went to go see a counselor for the second time at my school, ECU, to be told that I wouldn’t be able to meet with her once a week. I would have to wait one to two weeks to see if I can be part of a group session on campus, or would have to pay to see one off campus. My tuition already pays for counseling services, so I thought, “Why would I have to meet someone off campus and not a counselor here? It doesn’t have to be the same person.”

I asked the counselor this, and she explained that there aren’t enough counselors at this university to meet that kind of need for everyone. The budget needs to increase to hire more counselors and to make a larger space for them to come in. I tell her that I would try the group session and see what happens.

There isn’t a high enough budget to care for the mental health of students on campus.

It is fascinating where the heart of ECU truly lies.

Every year, they renovate or create a brand new stadium for sports teams. Every year, there is construction all around campus to improve the appearance of walkways and transit stops. However, four years ago, they were supposed to renovate the Mendenhall Student Activities Center. Movies, club meetings, speakers, panels, food, studying, and showcases for student life happen there all the time. Many students go there at least three times a week. Yet, there just hasn’t been time to improve its conditions. There are professors who stay all day in an office to advise students, when they truly don’t have to. Nevertheless, a lot of their offices need to be fixed, and that hasn’t happened. For student organizations, seventy percent of funding goes to Greek Life and other majority organizations, while cultural organizations that fight to have minorities recognized receive thirty percent of the funding.

I don’t care if I am overreacting or not.

It is amazing that officials would rather spend money on a stadium rather than truly provide for their students. Providing a voice and help for students seems trivial compared to trying to gain more fans for ECU.