What Room is Fifth-Grade English Class?

I was ecstatic for Spring Break, the international college student's Christmas. I use the past tense, because about 3 hours before it started I had received an abysmal grade on a paper that should have been at least a B. I'm by no means trying to suggest that the moldy piece of bread I handed in as an academic analysis was even a "C" paper, but the shock wasn't in getting the grade, it was the realization that, as it was more benignly stated, I'm "flexing a muscle that hasn't been used in quite some time." Like a piece of moldy bread, my paper was small, unappetizing, and yet familiar to me as a college student. I enjoy writing prose, poetry, and don't really mind research papers, but the analysis paper is, itself, the three-day old bargain bread: waiting for someone to pick it so it can turn sour.

I like analytical thinking, just not writing. I'm a science major, and thrive in a scientific, formula-derived world, but when it comes to English comp, I tend to not think in terms of sentence and paragraph algorithms. It is more art than science, and I feel that I am not creative whatsoever, especially when I try to interpret and organize my thoughts according to this format.

I suppose the conclusion here, if one needs to be drawn, is that I really need to stop attempting to reinvent the square (not quite as useful as the wheel).

At some consolation, I did receive a "pep-talk" regarding being infinately older than my "peers." I left a little disappointed, not with my effort, but my overt lack thereof. I can't speak for anyone else, but when I turn in a horrible paper, I usually know why. Statistically speaking one hundred percent of the time, it is due to the fact that I've procrastinated far too long to actually write the paper in the first place. I have also felt the hard slap of its aftermath.

So we make these mistakes; we feel the pains of the growth process. We wipe our tears, put our pride back in our pockets and walk away smartly. The growing isn't in the realizing, it's in the application of it. It's the universal lesson central to all of my problems: "I don't do what I'm supposed to, when I'm supposed to, and how I'm supposed to." The ego swells up, suppressing the id, wiping out productivity and obedience and humility as its casualties.

See, I'm a mediocre artist with a palate of words; I just loath being given laws governing how I must produce the art.

Sleepily,
Shayna