Attempt 1: August 31st, 2015
The ritual-like beat from the unfitting house music disturbed the historical spirit of the surrounding neighborhood, yet brought together young victims in its grasp into a trance-like state; it was a party of sorts. Unfortunately, it failed to free me from the depths of my pondering. I was stuck in my own mind--an abyss. My college years are no where near in full bloom, yet, the tensions of whomI’m to become have amassed upon my being. My backpack semi-proudly wearing “St. Joseph’s” across the front mixed with an obviously factorized blue slouched over my already heavily burdened shoulder as I scanned the crowd.
The air was humid, but disagreed with the excitement contained within it, none of which I was ready or willing to feel. I stood for awhile, filling myself with what is to be the next four years of my life. As I scanned the open, grassy area I found that there was no distinction--freshmen to senior, because it didn’t matter. Everyone spoke the common language of music and enjoyment; they all “fit in,” except for me. This party-like atmosphere was basking in both the warmth of a welcoming and the glow of the sun. Cardboard boxes were quickly abandoned after all the free food was snatched away by any person with a mind, and there was line after line around the pollutant bombarding barbecue for the much anticipated hamburgers and hotdogs--I wasn’t interested. I was lost in my own thoughts, haunting myself and questioning everything that I’ve ever done. I was mentally adventuring through a quest to find an answer, only to never find an ending. I felt a sharp pang of pain in my heart as though stitches were being made upon it’s fragile skin. Every question set me back further and further, as though I was “de-evolutionizing.” I aged like any child, but I felt like all iPhones or Macs are only created and bought for aesthetics, unfaithful to myself--I was forced to go on “factory reset.” Whilst in this said trance, a figure of a woman who worked in the circus appeared in front of me.
The unexpected shade from the blazing warmth of the sun snapped me out of the alternate universe I had stepped into and it made me look at her. She was pleasant. Her vibes were of happiness and joy, which appropriately juxtaposed with her attire: ballet-slipper pink eye shadow, glitter and rosey red lipstick. Her face was happy, but her age was revealed, despite the makeup, with the wear of time shining off her face, but it didn’t matter. There was a contrasting fiery side to her and it showed from her flame adorned vest. It was coupled with a straw hat decorated with a blue and white flowered bandana around it.This unnamed circus performer blatantly displayed her personality in just her clothing. I envied her confidence and her ability to understand the type of character she was. Despite my envy, her person made me smile. Oh and I forgot to mention she was standing on stilts. This frightened me due to her unbalanced walking, and the small, , silk laced shoes, which were forever ballerina-tiptoed positioned.These stilts were camouflaged with long, summer-white see-through pants with pink frills sewn to the cuffs. I quickly looked up at her as she began to speak.
It took me some time to travel back to reality; it was as though I was drowning, and no matter how hard I swung my arms, I was never really any closer to the top, but with some awkwardness, I managed to surface. She was commenting on my t-shirt, but it didn’t occur to me what I was wearing. I wasn’t ever one to care about my outfit like those crazed "Instagrammers." It was a gray t-shirt which had “Paradise” written across it, but this brand was being stereotypical by adding palm trees to mirror letters to signify that all paradises require sad, slouching palm trees that just appear as sad men with a needing haircut.
“How’s paradise,” she asked with a chirpy voice which left me startled and off guard.
Unable to answer, I just responded with a puzzled look, but with much effort, I managed to stutter out an answer,“It’s..It’s pretty awesome.” Wow, talk about sounding unenthusiastic.
The lack of interest or joy in my voice didn’t seem to bother her and I decided to enter back into my endless portal of questions and add a new one, to only build more self-torture upon my on-the-verge-of-bursting heart. I asked myself “Will I ever experience my own paradise or will I continue to lie to the world, blatantly, by wearing this t-shirt whilst unknowing the meaning and emotions surrounding a paradise?” As I robotically nodded to her next comments, faking a smile on occasion to comfort her, she decided to unsteadily walk away to other partying animals. It left me further broken but fueled an unbreakable motivation--I want to experience my own paradise.
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Canary word: Present
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125,027 Literary Works • 672,768 Reviews
The first section is a humongous wall of text. Split it up into at least two or three paragraphs if you can, you'll get a lot more reads that way.
Looking past that, there isn't much else to say. The narrative itself is really interesting and entertaining. The beginning contains powerful dialect that subtly tells the reader to push on. Beneath that is an easy visualization of what the main character sees and what the main character thinks, thanks to your powerful writing and attention to detail. Hopefully, this is just the start of a longer story, right? anyway, welcome to the site, hope to read more of your stories.
Thank you! And you're right. I didn't look at it before, but it is really daunting to look at due to the length in the beginning. I will fix that. I appreciate you taking the time to help me.
Hey, EfflorescentSmile! Artemis here. I told you I would check this out, remember?
Let's dive in. First off, the first sentence needs some work. The amount of hyphens and dashes and whatnot are a little bit confusing, and I think you accidentally confused yourself. If you take out the hyphenated part it won't make much sense, and you should fix that.
"In the midst of unfitting house music whose bass left a never-ending echo in my ears--failing to interfere with my abyss-like pondering--shook across the historics around the surrounding neighborhood."
The second sentence is alright in terms of sense-making, but the comma is unnecessary.
"My backpack semi-proudly wearing “St. Joseph’s” across the front mixed with an obviously factorized blue, slouched over my already heavily burdened shoulder."
There were some more little mistakes, but other than that, it was perfect. Nice job! It was pretty deep, although I would suggest breaking up the first paragraph because that is WAY long. But otherwise, it's great! Good job and keep writing!
-Artemis28
Oh, thank you! xD. Yeah, I know it needs some work, but didn't know what exactly. Grammatically, I'm not the best at all and have always needed someone to help me with it. Thank you, once again for taking the time to criticize it.
Anytime!