Ava's Inspiration

Authors Note: Apologies to Mr. Conant for having been such a difficult student. Thank you for the lessons I refused to learn until years passed, and all that you helped inspire. - Al

p.s. I wasn't actually going to pee in your trash, I was just mad you did not want to let me use the lady's room.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mr. Conant was an older, traditional style gentleman- a bit of a bore during his lectures- and he was also who I had my sophomore year as an English teacher. He wasn't too bad. He would bring in homemade apple cider and find ways to joke with students in his own unique ways. For example, he would joke he was Santa Claus due to his appearance, albeit there was a bit of resemblance. A few of our peers (including myself) wrote him our 2012 Christmas List, which were returned ungraded with various inserts, like how we should keep an eye under the tree and see ;).

I do not believe he was the real deal though as I did not get a rainbow unicorn that year.

One thing that came from these academic years, however, was my passion for writing. I bring up Mr. Conant because I owe a lot of that developing passion to him for inspiring me with his prompts, even though I never would have admitted that during those years- especially because of how I felt during and after he reported on me and my first short story.

This was the first piece I remember writing- the one I really put myself and passion into-not one where I just aimlessly wrote Anime character inspired erotica (which really was a just a faze🙄). We had just read The Catcher in the Rye as a class before the school banned it for reasons I’ll never understand enough to agree with.

After finishing the novel, to make sure we absorbed the meaning, we were tasked with creating our own short story that explored the themes presented in the book. For those who have not read the book or just do not remember, these were essentially “coming of age” elements that ultimately leave behind childhood innocence. We were to write a short story that highlighted these elements, and I was immediately hooked on the idea of being able to write about a person going through various tribulations, as this was something I was familiar with from my childhood.

I enjoy writing about the darker side of things. This was the darker side of the prompts Mr. Conant had offered that year, and I was inspired. I got home and pulled out my abused, red Acer Netbook I had bought with my holiday savings and began writing.

I had no outline, and I took no notes. I was a bit of a chaotic writer who enjoyed the act of freewriting, which is something that has not changed. Looking back, I do not remember what I was thinking or feeling, and I do not remember if it was a good day at home or not. I just remember sitting on my bed and listening to dubstep while typing until the early morning.

The story was written from the first-person perspective of the main character, Ava, who tragically loses her twin brother to tuberculosis a year before the story takes place. I decided to open the story with Ava in her broken home, preparing to travel and stay with a cousin for the summer in Manhattan. The way I portray her is casual, depressed, and exhausted. She has no real motivation other than to get from A to B and is overall a rather dull character. It is the year anniversary of her sibling's death after all.

She gets on a plane, overthinking and overanalyzing during her trip. When she arrives to her bubbly cousin that is welcoming her with open arms, she is almost frustrated that her cousin is so peppy while things are seemingly so dark for her. She finds her cousins behavior to be insensitive in her jet lag and uses it as a means to shut down. When they arrive at the apartment, she resorts to taking a nap instead of going out to dinner as her cousin planned.

Ava wakes after almost two days of broken sleep, feeling guilty at the new sunny day on how she treated her cousin who she now understands was only being hospitable. She agrees to her cousins request to go out later that day, which takes Ava to an ice-cream shop. There she meets Roy, a charming young adult that is only a year older and showing interest even after she opens up about her grief. She agrees to meet up for a movie with him after feeling seemingly better than she had prior.

As her cousin drops her off at the theatre, and after waiting for a few minutes, she understands she had been stood up. She goes into the movie anyways, although the depression is back. During the opening credits, she finds it hard to hold on to the hope that things will get better, making her anxious. This takes her to bathroom, where she hears a woman crying through a window connecting to the alleyway next to the theatre. Going to investigate, Ava discovers a man trying to force himself onto the woman she had heard crying and Ava intervenes.

The woman escapes and the man in a careless and drunken stupor beats on Ava until the woman returns with help. Upon helps arrival, Ava is in critical condition and is taken to the hospital to be treated and recover. She eventually wakes from her weakened state to see the man that she presumed stood her up to the movie waiting alongside her tremendously worried cousin. She discovers she was not stood up; the man was just caught up in Manhattan traffic. The woman had coincidentally gotten his attention after Ava intervened on the assault, and it was he who called the cops. He felt guilty and intended on helping her get better and to maybe resume with their date plan, and it is here Ava begins to find relief.

She had actively stepped out of herself to help a woman in need and faced the challenge with bravery. She came out of it with support from her family, and from a man who had showed interest in who she was even in her dark state of grief. She had been more than just the girl who had lost her brother, she was the girl who saved a woman from a life of grief herself, although the woman would clearly remember the night with her own shadow of fear and darkness from the event.

When I had finished this short story, I ended it with Ava and her newfound sense of individuality. She had been inside the adult world as a lost child and reemerged with restoring ambitions despite the long path ahead of recovery.

I felt so proud of this story and feel guilty for not having done more to keep my writings with me long-term to have it still today. I had printed one copy and turned it in to my teacher the following day knowing that what I turned in met the criteria. It felt good to finally hand something in with confidence.

So, when my guidance counselor called me in to the office the next day to discuss how I was doing, I was confused. At home, things were not entirely smooth, but they were good enough at the time, so my behavior had not been too out of line. I had asked why I was sitting with her at that moment, and that is when she placed my story with ‘EXCELLENT!!!’ circled in fat blue marker in the right-hand corner in front of me. She wanted to discuss my paper and why I was falling behind.

I felt backhanded. Many kids in my class were great academics and they were told they had futures for their success and given a gold star, yet I was being mentally questioned for mine within the confines of a counselor's office. Turns out Mr. Conant found this story to be, and I quote “the most astounding piece I have ever read from a tenth-grade student.”

It is to date the best reaction I have gotten for my writing.

When I had handed it in, it seemed almost impossible that a work of this level came from me, someone who was barely getting by and at the bottom of the class. As a matter of fact, as she pointed out that day, I was not getting by at all and was actually failing the course. My writing was the only thing getting good grades in the class, which was drawing concern from my teachers and advisors.

This- for reasons due to my upbringing and mental instability- only upset me more. I was being placed in an uncomfortable setting to discuss my shortcomings because of something I had done right. It felt like to me, in the whirlwind my life was at the time, like I was stuck between a rock and a hard place because of something I had passion for.

My guidance counselor explained with this story, I had displayed clear English intellect and skill that was not being applied to my routine coursework. This was true and hard to argue, but I still felt like I had to explain myself for doing something good, and I did not want to do that. I pouted and simply answered my way through all of her questions until I was out of her office.

I did not speak to Mr. Conant about the paper, or thank him for his kind comment, and I failed the class. I had taken his method of congratulating me on my work as an attack and I held on to it until the year after, where I fell under a different teacher who used different methods that helped me harness my love for reading and writing again, just not like I had before.

What I had gained from the entire experience of the Catcher in the Rye assignment, is quite a bit. I had learned that I was capable of writing more than just provocatively. I had clearly displayed a skill, and those who read the story while there was still access to it enjoyed it immensely. I discovered that people's critique’s matter, yet how I handle them matters more. Some of it is fundamental to being a better writer, and some of it is gibberish. The criticism that gets under our skin more than others, however, is usually affecting us for a reason- and this was hard for me to grasp. I could have taken the session with my counselor for what it was, a way to understand my placement and work harder and become really good at what I enjoy. Instead, I took it as a reason to give up and remain comfortable in my place of teen angst.

After I had graduated, it took me almost eight years to be able to write again. I graduated the summer of 2015 a handful of peers away from bottom of the class. Now I am currently an undergrad with SNHU to obtain my bachelor's degree in creative writing and English with a focus on fiction. I started college earlier this year and am currently an honor student. Being an online academic has offered me an outlet to get back into my writing and focus on the fundamentals of what will make me a better author. Writing is something that I am passionate about. Something that allows me to connect the deeper parts of me as a person to an audience.

I have since posted some of what I have written here on Vocal, for example, a story inspired from Ava’s character, as she is one that has always stuck with me.

If you are interested:

The story 'Soul of Soles' was inspired by a writing prompt in a club I am in for school that said, 'write about a pair of boots'. My life has been fairly full of grief as my partner and I have both experienced loss this year, so I found it hard to write positively about boots. All the loss brought Ava to my mind, and inspired La, the main character of SoS [Soul of Soles]. My writing group loved it, and I won writer of the month with the help of this story- eventually inspiring me to share it here on Vocal. It is my hope that readers here will enjoy it too. 😊

The Catcher in the Rye assignment showed me what I am capable of presenting or feeling as a writer and opened my mind to the importance of feedback. I learned areas I am strong and weak in, such as being a better fictional writer than a poet for example (although I occasionally dabble and enjoy attempting that too). The biggest lesson for me that I learned from this unnamed story, was to let myself go as I write. There was minimal effort to bring Avas’ story to paper. When I try, good things happen, but it is not who I am as a writer. There is so much pressure to accommodate to what the audience wants, but I feel that life is so raw and relatable, and sometimes pouring out who we are first as people, gets the best material down on paper. I look forward to harnessing these lessons and sharing more as I evolve.

Thank you for reading!

If you enjoyed, consider letting me know! :)