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1 Journal Writing Portfolio Spring 2021 MAY 5 2021 BRADEN PATRICK SNIDER
2 Contents Introduction Journal Keeping as a Practice 3 Journals Life Advice 4 Those That Mean the Most 6 Focus on the Good in Life 7 Experience of Others Is Experience for you 8 We Are All Lonely in Different Ways 10 Life s Purpose 11 The Scariest Way to Die 12
3 Journal Keeping as A Practice Throughout the semester I have come to be acquainted with the vast difference between creative writing novels novellas play writing poetry etc and keeping a journal Journal keeping is something much more personal Now this does not mean that the creative writing people make cannot be important to someone but with my writing I find that the journal entries that I have written have the tendency to be more visceral than my fictional stories I do not have to care about metaphors or imagery I do not have to conform to the status quo on how a story is meant to be told I have the ability to write as if I am talking to a best friend free from cares about how it is received This is why much of what I have included in this portfolio is largely unedited I do not want this to be a showcase of my writing ability I do not want this to dictate me as a person as a whole I want this portfolio to show how I feel in a moment I almost never look at the random things I jot down to clear my head This is a therapy session for past Braden Present Braden is in a different headspace than past Braden so I would rather not change anything This portfolio is a snapshot of things that I was thinking about at the time For those who also looked at my Creative Writing portfolio from last semester thank you and you know what you are getting into I have already stated this in this address and in the past portfolio but I want to make sure I can get across how well writing is for the restless mind I believe that everyone should have a kind of journal It can be over any topic in fact those are in my opinion the best kind as you can talk about any issue you may have Even if you are super edgy in your journals it is fine Unless you are like us and must share a few of them nobody will ever read them unless you give them to someone Thank you for your time I hope you enjoy reading my thoughts
4 Life Advice There was a time in my life where I was extremely conscious of what others said about me I tried my hardest to fit other s preferences and didn t focus on what I was interested in or what I believed in Therefore my early middle school life was hell on top of the previously unnamed and still unnamed event that happened around this time I really hated myself though this hasn t changed I just know how to redirect it I wanted to be liked but deep down I know I harbored a resentment towards the concept of popularity This conflict waged war inside of me for a few years until when I was in 8 th grade when I was at my birth father s apartment in Wichita prior to his mental illness completely dropping off a cliff Being in 8th grade and knowing the horrors of humanity already I wasn t afraid of the nighttime life so I walked from his apartment to the park that was on the other side of a nearby bridge Sitting there I was listening to music on my small Bluetooth speaker and was thinking about life I nearly fell off the bridge s ledge when I heard a low raspy voice from behind me What are you doing kid the voice asked me I turned around and saw a rough looking man who was dressed in dirty rags standing there I went to respond but before I could he asked me another question Never mind that mind me sitting next to you I nodded to him and he joined me on the ledge You aren t planning on jumping right he asked I told him no I was just sitting there to relax while watching the moon reflect on the water
5 Oh good this is where I normally sit so I d rather not have to be reminded of a random teen killing themselves any time I came here I laughed Whether from nerves or his nonchalant attitude towards death I m not sure But I laughed He then asked me what was on my mind When I told him that I was worried about how others saw me he turned and looked me in the eyes and what he said next was this to my memory AH well that s a stupid thing to be worried about Look at me do you think I feel shame anymore The moment you stop caring what others think of you is the day you become free He then stood up patted me on the back saying good luck and walked away I never would have thought the words of a random homeless man in a dangerous part of Wichita at 2 AM would have a more positive effect on me than anything my birth father said but since then I do feel freer
6 Those That Mean the Most To me it is not just one person but 12 people I met them a few years ago on a Facebook group of all places We all had similar interests so through the forums we got to know each other Then one day one of them decided to add all 13 of us to a group chat and from there we went from friends that would causally respond to each other to a group of guys who could come to the group chat and talk about whatever was on our mind It is very common for one of us to come to the group chat asking for the other s opinions on something which often leads to all of us giving support to them One of them once joked that the chat was like an AA meeting for mental health It is nice even though I have only met two of them in person I have a group of people that I can go to with anything and hear blunt but supportive feedback Over the years we have seen three children being born and soon to be a wedding Because of this we have a running joke that all our future kids will carry on the group chat after we are all gone and I think that if they could have a similar experience than we have had it would be good if that joke became a reality
7 Focus on the Good in Life Man this is really something that I take for granted too often Out of 7 billion people on the planet I was fortunate enough to live in a first world country I was lucky enough to be born into a family that although can sometimes be dysfunctional when we bring my birth father or extended members into account are very loving and supportive of me I have had many hard times some of which I have gone into detail in past journal entries but I am fortunate to have been born very spiteful The bad things that I have had to endure have done nothing less than mold and shape me into the person I am today My reaction to negative things has been for a long time to embrace them as a part of who I am and to learn from it I am not invincible and often do have very low moments but I remember that even though bad things happen good things happen as well I think that it is typically taught that you should focus on the good things rather than the bad However this is not how I have lived my life so far My blessings are no different than my curses If you know how to deal with them curses simply don t exist only the negative reactions to them For those that do know how to deal with them they can offer valuable life experience that otherwise might not have been attainable
8 Experience of Others Is Experience for You My experience with certain people during my youth prepared me for the troubles that can inflict a person throughout life Addiction is a hard thing People can go from just trying something out to being full blow addicts faster than they realize It can be something small I mean caffeine is technically a drug and lord knows I am an addict But in my case it was something a lot greater I have experienced this with my birth father my uncle and most of my closest friends up until high school It s almost like the influence of drugs are so powerful that they kill the user and take over their bodies and minds creating this zombie that craves not brains but their desires It was hard at the time to have a parent an uncle and most of my friend group choose hard drugs over me I specify hard drugs because even though I do not smoke weed doesn t have this affect unless you really let it I am talking about the class A drugs something that middle schoolers should not have access to Yet they did and did not think twice when I told them to get help For someone who is under this influence help is what they want the least It seems like their brains are rewired entirely It is not food and water than sustains them but their addiction Even though it was difficult seeing these people I cared about neglect my pleas I had to move on And because of their choice I learned that sometimes people you want to help do not want to be helped Some people are going to choose their own desires over you And I think that is alright It s sad sure it s never nice to be rejected or witness people you care about make selfdestructive actions But it is an important lesion to learn that even if you put so much effort into a relationship it doesn t mean it will be fruitful It doesn t mean that you or they are bad people But it is important to not allow others mistakes to trip you up as well The best
9 lessons I ve found are learned from the actions of others whether that be mistakes or successes
10 We are All Lonely in Different Ways I think it s fair to say that everyone has felt loneliness The sharp cold danger that pierces the inner parts of a person Some are driven insane by the bite others learn how to lick their wounds and continue on The pain of loneliness comes in many ways some from loss being the loss of a loved one by death or an end to a relationship Some are lonely from events that others may never understand Some are lonely and don t understand it themselves I lay here in the dark of my room The glow from my phone reflecting off my glasses and onto my ceiling The cold half of my bed that I never sleep on is raised about an inch higher than the side on which I lay The gelid silence of the darkness makes the atmosphere of the room lonely no Would it be correct to call this mood loneliness I am unsure of the answer to that question Everyone does indeed experience loneliness different I personally confide in literature I read and read and put myself in the stories to get away from the blight that the real world holds Some people I know fill the hole with substances I can t say I haven t tried that However substances lack the staying power that I long for I know others that fill their loneliness with hobbies I don t think I am particularly good at any one thing There are some in my circles that are in relationships or even married But then I ask does one have to be alone to be lonely I don t think so I believe that I am lonelier in a large group than I am when I am alone in my bed at night I wonder how many feel similar to me I wonder if my late night ramblings even made sense as I do not really feel like rereading this
11 Life s Purpose I like to believe that my life s purpose is to positively impact as many students as possible My future goal and a teacher is to help all my students not only with learning academics but about themselves I think that a lot of the time kids can go unnoticed in schools and when they graduate have yet to figure out who they are or who they want to be So to counter this I want to help facilitate not necessarily introspective thought but narrowed down thoughts I think the most important thing to leave behind to accomplish this is monetary desires Of course teaching is a job so being paid is important But what I mean by this is that I can t predict where I will teach I have preferences of course but if something happened and I had to resort to teaching in a small town that doesn t pay very much I would have to accept it and still follow through with my earlier goal statement I think that I am already on the path towards it I have already done by student teaching and almost two years later still get approached by those former students in a positive way which makes me think that I succeeded in leaving a positive impression on them As for continuing this I will just be myself and not become jaded by the position however I am confident I won t because that is not how my personality is
12 The Scariest Way to Die Life is something that can end abruptly I recently saw a forum about the worst ways to die On there were the typical answers like drowning being burned alive or cancer I kept reading and eventually I found a different answer Alzheimer s This hit me hard as I have been faced with this for the past few years My grandmother was the sweetest lady I have ever met She lived her life for others in a way I have not seen since Anywhere she went she looked for way to make the days of those around her better When I was young she treated me as if I were her son rather than her grandchild Sometimes however she would call me by my uncle s name As a kid I didn t understand why she did this but after I noticed that it made her look confused or uncomfortable when I corrected her I began to just accept it This went on and being that I was young I had no idea what was wrong and thought she was just in a hurry Then I started to notice that she would leave sticky notes around her house Reminders of people s names and phone numbers reminders to make her medication reminders of who some people were and where they lived Then she began to tape pictures of me and my siblings as well as her parents who had passed away already on the walls of her bedroom As I got older I began to realize what was happening to her Her brain was changing her memories distorting I could see her begin to forget the most basic things Forget the names of her children and grandchildren Forget who she was to people No grandma you aren t my aunt you are the woman I nicknamed Nee Nee as a baby No my mom isn t your mom Her status began to worsen in early 2020 We were lucky that we were able to get a hospital type bed in her room for her just before the pandemic started because she soon
13 lost the ability to walk on her own and then progressively not be able to eat or drink without assistance Around the middle of February 2021 it was obvious that she was not going to last much longer My mother and I stayed the whole week leading up to her passing alongside her Trying to comfort her in any way She would have random moments of clarity where she would tell me things about her past but it was only ever a few sentences In this moment of clarity I tried to ask her a few things She answered a few of them but often just shook her head The last thing I asked her was if she remembered who I was and she said You are my precious boy I love you so much Don t forget that After hearing her say this I couldn t help but start to cry I didn t want her to see me cry so I tried to hide my face but I think she knew because she used a little bit of her remaining strength to move her hand on top of mine before falling asleep Her last day was rough for her I could see her in pain and even though she spent most of the time asleep when she woke up either my mother or I would try our best to hold her hand and comfort her any way we could I always carry around a small paper prayerbook that my grandmother gave me many years ago I can t remember when she gave it to me as It was well over 5 years ago but I have always kept it with me I know it is from around 2006 because I remember her keeping it with her in her wallet since around then before giving it to me at some point I brought it out and read the prayers to her and she seemed to smile I like to think that she heard me but I won t ever know for sure After having been with her all that time I think my answer to the question of what the worst way is to die IS Alzheimer s You die before your body does You aren t alive like
14 you were You can t remember the things you did And that scares me more than anything else