savstjohn-blog

[savstjohn-blog]

A

Anatomy books were something that I have been drawn to since I was young. Every day after school before soccer practice my mom would take my brothers and I to the library to do homework. I would rush to finish homework and then find myself scrambling to the nonfiction section of the library. Even though the books were way over my head I would sit and read for hours. Some of the books I would dive into I would convince my mom to take me to the bookstore and let me buy them so I could have them for forever.

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B

Bookstores have been a place that’s close to home for me for years. I remember going through a very hard time my senior year and spending a lot of time at Barnes and Noble or a bookstore downtown. If I was having a bad day I would hop in the car and go to the nearest bookstore. I love the quiet atmosphere and being enveloped in the smell of coffee around me. I would go there as a “safe haven” to just relax and sit in the silence by myself. I could sit and read a book and escape into a new place.

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C

Creative writing was one of my favorite classes in high school. I took creative writing first period my freshman or sophomore year.  My favorite thing in the class was the writing prompts. We would walk into class every morning and there was a prompt on the board. We would sit at our laptops or paper or anything you wanted to write on and just let your mind flow, never being expected to share or to be graded on what you wrote, just graded on the fact that you did write. It sounds like people would blow off the class and just write something stupid but no one ever did. Most of us thoroughly enjoyed being able to set our mind and creativity free for an hour every day.

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D

“Dear diary,” was how I started most of the things I wrote throughout my middle school days. If it was not a school paper, it was a diary entry. I think this started my whole fiasco with journaling, but also every middle school girl ever had a diary. I was looking back at my diary the other day and Lord, was it a mess. Even though I did not use proper English or correct grammar I think it was a positive way for me to become comfortable with forming my thoughts and language on a piece of paper in front of me.

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E

Every book I have ever read has either affected my literacy positively or negatively. If it affected me negatively then it made me uninterested in reading. If it affected me positively, I would have been entranced and wanting to read more but never wanting the novel to end. An example of novels that have affected me positively would be The Divergent Series, any John Green novel you could imagine, or a novel about mystery or adventure. The types of stories that made me not want to read would be boring and overly informational. For me, reading was an escape from my day-to-day life. I wanted novels that would leave me asking myself, “Why do I not read more?” or, “How can I schedule time to read into my everyday life.”

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F

Ms. Freel was one of the worst teachers I have had. She was my junior English teacher and let me tell you, this woman loved Ole Miss, Disney, Starbucks and her son. Personally, I believe when I am in class we are supposed to be working. In her class we barely did anything. Class started at 8:45 every morning. She would stand up and tell us about her life until at least 9:20, not very effective when we get out of class at 9:35. It was even worse that we were not allowed to do homework while she rambled on about her life. I spent my junior year sipping iced coffee and not learning any English.

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G

John Grisham’s books were something that I hated growing up. My grandparents would continuously gift me his novels even though I did not enjoy them. The furthest I ever read into any of them were around a couple pages. The way he wrote just bore me, there was nothing actually wrong with the story. I find it interesting that the way someone says something can turn you on or off an interesting story. Maybe part of it was that I was too young to understand his literature and so it put me off. I am curious if I tried to read one of his novels again if I would like it now that I am older.

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H

Hollywood influences the way people look at people who like to read. In movies the “nerd” character is almost always caught with a book, meanwhile the jocks never touched one. Personally, I do not think that being dumb is something that makes someone popular but that is what Hollywood says, right? Society today makes spending time with your head in a book seem like it’s the “lame” thing to do. Obviously, everyone has their forte and some kids aren’t the best at school but that doesn’t mean we have to criticize the kids who enjoy learning by calling them “nerds.” But is there really even such a thing as a nerd? Or is there only such a thing as smart and dumb?

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I

I am the only person that can push myself. If you cannot use yourself as your greatest means of motivation you will never go far. At the end of the day you only have yourself and I believe that if you cannot have your own back then who will. Especially with transitioning to college and starting a new life with more independence a person needs to learn how to push themselves. I think that making myself read has given me the quality of teaching myself to push through even if I do not enjoy what I am doing.

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J

Journalism is something I was interested in for a long time. I wanted to major in j0urnalism and be a news broadcaster. I shadowed Amy Speropoulos for a day to see the behind the scenes of ABC news. She showed me how the broadcasters edit their speeches, she even let me write a section of her news article. I enjoyed being a part of the broadcasting process. The whole team had such a good attitude and it was extremely exciting to be there. It was fun to see how people work together behind the scenes, even though I’m a biology major now.

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K

Knowledge and the expansion of knowledge. I strongly believe that the statement “knowledge is power” is true. Never stop trying to push yourself to learn. I love to read because it makes you smarter, and who doesn’t want to be smart? Being able to increase my knowledge and know more is something that has driven me to read. Picking up random books and knowing that there is something within the book that I can learn intrigues me. I grew up liking to read random books about rocks or space or animals. If you have the chance to expand your mind.

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L

Looking for Alaska is one of the first deeply emotional stories that I read. I remember reading it maybe in the eighth grade and being completely entranced by it. I was so amused by John Green’s novels that I decided to read all of them. I loved that he could so effortlessly blend humor and tragedy because that is how I usually deal with difficult situations. Humor is not usually the best way to go about “fixing” things but I was happy to see that I am not the only person who uses that approach to make myself feel better.

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M

There is never enough money to support a reading addiction. I wanted to buy every book I touched. I needed my house to look like a library with tables and countertops overflowing with books. Forget decorative shelving, I thought all storage should be stuffed with books. But sadly, my bank account does not allow me to go negative and there are far more important things to buy than books, like food or water. If I had an endless amount of money, I would definitely have a house full of books and journals and all sorts of reading and writing utensils.

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N

Nobody knows how to leave you alone while reading. I pick up a book and sit down to enjoy myself for a while. “Savanna!” I hear someone scream from the other room. It’s my dad, of course. He wants to ask me a question that I probably already had told him the answer to before I walked out of the room. I walk into the room. “Where did your mom go?” he asks. “I told you earlier that she went to show a house,” I tell him. I go back into my room and sit down in my corner to read again. One chapter down and no one has bothered me yet, we are doing pretty good. As soon as I get into the next chapter there’s a knock on my door. Here we go again… I told you, nobody knows how to leave you alone while reading.

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O

Opening my eyes to new things is not a difficult thing to do. I would not consider myself a close-minded person. Whenever my friends recommend me books or music, I am usually the first one to go out and read or listen to what they have recommended. I know your question is, “Do you always like the book or the song?” The answer to your question is no. Usually, I do not like what my friends recommend. Mostly because they have awful taste, but I am always open-minded to trying it. From time to time they do recommend something that I love. Usually, though, that is not the case.

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P

Poetry has always been a very positive ventilation system in my life. When I go through difficult times in my life I can sit down and just put my feelings into words on a piece of paper. I like to look at my emotions and think “it cannot come off this page, it cannot hurt me.” I love poetry when I am the one writing it. In class, I think that they assign too many rules to it. I do not think it should have to rhyme, have to have stanzas or syllables. To me, poetry is feelings. It is ventilation. It is freedom.

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Q

“Quit being embarrassed that you read.” That is something that I have told myself so many times growing up it is crazy. Personally, I do not think that anyone should have to be embarrassed of something that they enjoy doing. I always hated watching kids or getting called out for reading. “Ew, you’re reading a book? What a loser!” or “Who even reads anymore?” Reading eventually became something that I would not tell people I enjoyed. To this day, I still would not write it down as something that I enjoy to do during my pastimes or just for fun.