Murray,
In no means is the point of this to be sappy. I respect your resistance to warm hugs and butterflies, but I have to tell you, after graduating and leaving your English class behind, I really do miss it. You taught me how to see things in a new light and, most importantly, how to turn that into a form of expression. For my current writing class, I watched this neat documentary entitled Abstract: The Art of Design. The documentary told the story of a talented illustrator, Christoph Niemann, and every so often I caught a line or two from him that reminded me of some of the best lessons you taught me.
1. "Is it about me or is it by me?"
In your sophomore English class I quickly learned that there were so many more important things than myself as an individual. There's no better example to pull from than the one you never let me forget: the group project with Sean and Lili that went up in flames. It was in that moment that you made Sean and I lead a sinking ship that I realized my part of the project was not the only part that mattered. The project was not about me. It sounds so silly, but that was my first realization that truly working with people to come up with a concept as a whole group is so much more valuable than only doing your part and hoping they do theirs too, because that doesn't work out as often as I'd like. From that point on, I've never forgotten that group projects, and projects in general, are not about me, but simply by me.
2. "Abstraction is getting rid of everything that's not essential to making a point."
This one was a tough concept to grasp. I genuinely enjoy adding lots of detail in my writings, so getting straight to the point was an interesting shift, but you helped me get through it. This point is fairly straight forward, so I'll just say thank you for forcing me to take out all the unnecessary fluff.
3. "The highest compliment you could hope for is 'well, I don't really have a problem with that."
I'm really not sure if it's possible to impress you. That being said, in your class I continued to try and get that sort of response in everything I submitted. 9/10 days of the week one is likely to hear you utter something like "these papers are going to be horrible," which is scary all on its own, yet invites a sort of challenge too. You helped me get accustomed to the criticism and brutal honesty of the real world which is 110% better than sugar coating it, so thank you for that.
This blog post really is not how I envisioned it going, nor is it how it's supposed to go. Normally, I explain a little about the show I watched, discuss some features of the film dynamic and then form some sort of concluding idea, however I've done quite a few of these blog posts and really wanted a change in the flow. The moral of this story is, thank you for making me more of a fearless writer, Murray.
All good things,
Kayla
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