Personal Narrative Nonfiction

Creative Nonfiction is arguably the unit I struggled with the most this year, and in general. Writing about myself has always been hard for me, and when given the chance I always seemed to go too far. I came into the school year fresh-faced, however, and ready to take chances. As the first unit of the school year, it feels right that it open my portfolio, since this is basically a polished and reviewed summary of my year in writing. I also love to lead strong, and I am confident my nonfiction pieces are amongst the strongest I write all year, at least to me personally. During this unit, I learned a lot about myself and about writing about my personal experiences. I also began dedicating myself to the development of my voice and emotional truth,
one of my goals for this year.
I have been through some rough times; since middle school, last year, and even since the beginning of this year as well, none of which are exactly easy to write about. I started challenging this, with my piece “On Intermissions and Handsy Strangers.” The topic itself was not very private. I had discussed it with a few friends before, and though it had not been blown over, it hadn’t been lingered on either. I chose to write about it not because of what happened, but because of the realizations I came to about myself and about intimacy. Last year, it was easier to write about more mild emotions, like childhood sadness and dreams. And as important as these things were, and still are to me, I knew I was holding back more important subjects I not only wanted to write about, but needed to; one of them being my comfort zone. My experience described in this piece was a perfect opportunity to use my uncomfort to my advantage, and to challenge myself. My actual execution of the piece, writing wise, I excelled in as well. I used suspension to my advantage, and I captured my emotional truth well in the words. I left the reader with an idea, and achieved what I set out to do. Last year, it was also easy to write small, to use issues that occurred when I was little, to paint myself as perfect, or at least perfectly understandable.
I challenged this “requirement” of my nonfiction last year in my piece “Little River Rocks.” I started arguably easy, with a memory from over eight years ago, but it was still a difficult topic for me. I originally wrote this about “home,” in this case the place I have felt most at home, and how I felt like I failed the memory of this. I’m proud of the elements of this, and how I made the assignment my own where I could. I have edited it since the assignment to turn it into a more “self discovery” piece, focussing the place within myself, and less on myself in the physical place. Some more strengths in this is my development of place and character, specifically in my own. There are also a lot of little message I include, showing instead of telling, very rarely jumping in as my current self to reflect and letting the symbolism and imagery do it for
me.
One of my favorite pieces is “Off To The Races.” It’s hard, as someone who has grown up in such a conservative household, to write about things such as this I feel strong about (something you undoubtedly will notice I challenge often throughout this portfolio).
This piece originates from my “Delving Into Place” essay, but I moved away from that and more towards a complete, immersive piece, trying to recreate the evening I spent with my dad. I am enthusiastic to end my nonfiction section with this piece, with strengths in imagery, tone, mood, and specifically my voice. This is the piece that I feel really begins the development of my personal voice for the year, and hopefully for the future. I will not talk about it too much; I would rather it stood for
itself.
Since last year, I have learned a lot about myself, and I still do every day. These three pieces are my strongest as a writer and as a person from this year’s nonfiction unit. I hope to continue my improvement through the next two years and challenge myself more, push myself even further out of my comfort zone.