Hopefully Some Foreshadowing...

I lowered myself into my chair, feeling the nerves starting to kick in.  It was time to get back our most recent in class writing, and I was not emotionally prepared.  I had a feeling it just wasn’t my best.  The day of the writing had been one of many “moment[s] of mental abstraction” and, although I did not do anything as foolish as leaving a child in a handbag, it just wasn’t a wonderful day for thinking (Wilde 51).  But this is AP English, and the stress and the anxiety were familiar at this point.

The day after pretty much every in class writing had gone pretty much like this.  I always recalled the day before, the amazing point that I magically thought of that would not go down on paper, no matter how hard I tried.  I would, without exception, look at my paper and think to myself, “You fall short, inevitably, inevitably” (Currie 288).  So, as the paper landed on my desk, I braced myself for the simultaneous disappointment that would soon fill the room.

I flipped to the final page and slowly opened my eyes.  My mouth fell.  It was the best score I had ever gotten!  The purple 7 practically jumped off the page.  In my head, I was screaming, dancing, making an utter fool of myself.  And then a thought hit me, straight from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest: “What was to stop [me] from doing it again, now that [I] saw [I] could?  Or keep [me] from doing other things [I] wanted?” (Kesey 305).

This was our most recent in class writing.  Tomorrow is our next.  I’m emotionally preparing myself for defeat as usual, but this day remains clear in my mind as the magical light at the end of the proverbial tunnel.