Published August 28, 2007
God has made me weak: physically, mentally, spiritually... in all forms I can think of. But only crazy people go around asking the sky "Why God, why?" So I asked my friend.
"Why Alyssa, why?"
"Why what?"
"Why has God let me get this deep into trouble?" I asked. She knew exactly what I was talking about. The scars on my wrist burned into my flesh, criss-crossing patterns of pain. It's amazing how much harm a little safety pin can do to one person's life.
"Because God can't make your decisions for you," she replied.
"Then why did He make me so stupid and weak?" I was thinking about all those times I could have stopped. And didn't. I was thinking about how I lied to my friends; how I traced the pattern over and over again. Kids today have no idea how much time it takes for scratches to close up, do they?
"Because... because God needs something entertaining to watch from up in
the clouds."
Did she know how sick she sounded to me?
"Well," I told her, "then God is an asshole."
Now, before you get all Freaky Christian Warrior on me, in my defense, I was really angry. My mother, who was in a terrible mood after finding out my secret, was finding every excuse to yell at me. And besides, wouldn't you be angry at God when he was being portrayed to you as someone who made you stupid and weak-minded, just because he needed something entertaining to watch?
As I sit here, trying so sincerely to finish this piece, all hyped up on rebellion, thinking about God, I wonder why I can't finish this piece. It's probably a bad case of writer's block. But... somehow, in the heat of rebellion, I can't help but think that God is holding me back.
If you think about it, God, or the idea of God, has always held mankind back. Try as you might to believe otherwise, we're afraid of God. And why not? I mean, who in their right mind wouldn't be afraid of a huge, mysterious being with the power to make or break you, every second of your life? Who isn't a little overwhelmed by the fact that if you don't completely accept God and Jesus and this whole Christian religion, you will be damned to a horrible eternity of pain and suffering? Why wouldn't He, said to have endless love for all mankind, be a little more understanding?
Now, maybe it was just the way I was raised, to question society. To challenge these rules. Maybe it's just my age. They tell me it's normal to wonder about my religion at this age. What I'm wondering is what age has to do with this. Why is this the age of discovery? Maybe it's because it is after the age of stupidity and before the age at which adults seem to think they're too mature to think such thought provoking things. Or maybe they just think that if you don't question it, the problems just go away.
Problems don't just disappear, and with God as an issue, who's going to help us out?
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141,255 Literary Works • 674,330 Reviews
Disclaimer--this critique is purely stylistic. If you agree with the comments, use them. If not, do NOT take my opinion as law.
On to the critique. ^_^
Ah...it seems to me that you could use a short halt–in the form of a colon–in order to strengthen the statement, rather than letting it flow unimpeded.
Translation: Put a colon here. “God has made me weak: physically, mentally, spiritually...in all forms I can think of.”
I agree with Snoink, here. “Referring to my wrist” is a cop-out. I think there needs to be an action here. The pulling up of a sleeve to reveal the scarred wrist to your friend perhaps.
Excellent point. Until the last sentence, which makes the entire thing sound juvenile. I would change it to something with more power, and less angst.
Weak ending. I think I have a way to fix it. If you quote a religious text earlier, maybe leading into the piece, backing up the idea that God loves you (or everyone, for that matter), then your ending will have a bigger impact when you question it.
–ME
Snoink- Thanks for the constructive criticizm. These comments are like *AAAH (terrible)*more terriblenesses*and then (chorus of angels) applause*more applause*and finally... dum dum dummmmmm! WHAT CAN MAKE MY WRITING BETTER!!!*
Again, thanks. I'll get more support for my argument and try to explain things better.
PS, I love Spiderpig XD
Sue me. I thought it was a fiction story at first. So I was looking at the dialogue and the description coming with the lines with the dialogue, thinking, "Wow, she can describe more."
Which actually sounds slightly sadistic because now I know it's not fiction, but... yeah.
Oh well!
Things that would make it more interesting to read:
For instance, when you say, "referring to my wrist" I think that's a cop out. Describe the wrists. Describe your friend's reaction to the wrist. This does a couple of things. It helps identify who you are and it can give you a better basis for this argument. Because really, your argument isn't very strong at the moment, not because your reasoning is necessarily weak, but we want more background on why you think it.
Anyway, based off the comments, it looks like you have improved it, so I hope that this comment will help it further. Good luck on your edits!
By the way, I love the piggy.
Graesch- I had my doubts about that sentence too. I was gonna try to rework it, but... I'll just have to try a little harder on it. I'm glad you liked it ^_^
Charlotte- Lol. I like to think of myself as clever.
I'm also glad you changed it. Way better now ^^ I just found one sentence really weird :
... maybe you could make it clearer by making two sentences out of this one ? 'Cause it truly is quite confusing.
I bet you would but its good that you think about these sort of things, it means your curious which means your clever. (well, that's what I say anyways)
Charlotte
No I don't. My school pretty much avoids conflicts of all kinds because they're too lazy to debate about things like religion. Knowing me, Id pull this out and everyone would turn into a huge violent riot and kill me.
RE stands for Religious Education, Don't you have one?
You guys all helped so much
RE teacher? whats that?
*Applauds*
Much better Iquippie!
I like the way you gave your views on God at the end, it was quite interesting. (Will definetly need to show my R.E teacher.) I am Catholic (just so you know)
Well done on the ending and I hope we all helped you!
Charlotte
it's edited. Tell me what you think now...
The start was very gripping! It was quite funny although I don't know if you intended that. The ending confused me. What on earth did she mean bye this?:
"Because God needed to take away something from her so that you could live all those times that you fell at the playground. He needed to take something away from her in order to give something to you."
i didn't understand that but it was still pretty good.
Charlotte
(love the avatar by the way)
Ok, just to clarify, she (me) doesn't have a bad wrist. She (I) had some... err... problems... anyways, thanks for the advice.
I don't think this is bad. You've got an interesting point; I haven't heard it before. It sounds a little preachy, but I think you could fix that by expanding this into more of a story. Add some physical description, to start. Also, you could add a bit more to your characters' histories. The MC has a poor wrist and hip. That doesn't sound like he/she's weak in all forms. If that's what you want the narrator to be, you should show it.
It would be more funny if you capitalized all three words in "Freaky Christian Warrior." I know that's not technically proper grammar, but it would make your story better, I think.
I agree with the people above me who said you should double space your paragraphs. That makes it look generally easier to read.
Thanks for posting!
Edit: You should capitalize your title, too.
I'm an atheist, so I don't really care what you think of God. But still, you could make your moral a bit less "preachy". And above all, try to make it logical, because here, this "he took something out of me to give it to you" doesn't make any sense. If it isn't ludicrous (but I doubt it), it really is faaaaaar-fetched.
So what, you people want me to think that God's an asshole? Whoa... the wonderful world of literature ^_^
Um... the begining is what caught me. That's good! But the ending... let me put it this way- It. Was. Sad. Keep trying and improve.
You know, I just about didn't critique this piece; but then I thought of how closed minded that made me, to let differences get in the way of the point, which is to critique as a piece of literature. Just so's ya know.
I did like this line:
it was nicely ironic.
Eh, I suppose I liked the ending, but it was almost too... simple, like those preach-y chain emails you get sometimes.
In all, this is almost pure dialogue with some thoughts thrown in, which is fine, except that body language is something like two thirds of communication. I think that could add something.
Yeah, you've put your finger right on it ! I love you. ^^
well, it wasn't that bad.
Like Lucy said, paragraphs would be nice.
This did start off well, but I was sort of disappointed in the end. The ending felt almost like those little sayings you get in fortune cookies.
But regardless. I thought for the most part it was well done
Yeah I agree. *Points upwards*
I was just like huh? when it came to the end. Thats how it ends?
I think you had a fantastic idea here and it started out great. It kind of confused me from the start, in a good way and then it was just confusing, confusing. Rework the end because I liked this and I think the ending needs to be more meaningful. Or even just add a bit more to the end.
Sad, truly. It began so well, so promising. And then this sentence, arriving like the yelling of an alarm clock waking you out of an erotic dream :
Nooooo. What is that ? Some kind of right-thinking sanctimonious stuff ? And the following is even worse, illogical and weak. I really am frustrated, the beginning was so awesome, but this ending ... raaaaaaaa, you got me disappointed, I'm sure you could have made it a lot deeper if only you hadn't added that schmaltzy sermon at the end. It really spoils everything.
**cough** Biglongchunksyndrome **cough**
Paragraphs, people!