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Tess Catalano "Take Back the Night" and other academic essays, 1982

1982-12-10 Ms. Shephard Page 4

I am not sure which came first: my wanting to be a writer, or my wanting to find a war to get to know Ms. Shepard. If she was to be my mentor, then we had to be friends first. 
   After my first class with her I thought up a reason to go to her office to see her. We talked a while about what the class was going to be like and then i left. Granted, it wasn't a staggeringly deep conversation, but it was a start. Gradually, I got into the habit of talking with her every day after class. It wasn't long before I managed to bring up some of "my work" for her to read. The first "piece" I showed her was one I had started earlier that week. It was about my friend Martha. It began with : "Martha and I were the best of friends. She was the first friend I ever really loved. I think she was the only friend I loved." The first thing she said after she read the piece was that she needed to know more about Martha. She couldn't really understand the depth of the piece, until she knew the depth of Martha, as it were. So I sat in her office for an hour telling her about Martha, and this teacher of mine in high school, Rachael. How I adored Rachael and was now afraid because Martha and Rachael had had an affair, and now Rachael thought Martha was crazy. "Sounds like a soap opera. doesn't it ? I just found out about it all last term. But back when it happened I was nuts with suspicion and jealousy." Ms. Shepard just nodded and said what I had was the beginning of a novel and if I wanted to write a short piece, then I would have to "take a small incident out of the friendship and put it under the microscope, as it were." Then our time was up, or she had a meeting, or another class, at any rate, I had to leave. On the way home I thought I didn't like this idea of having to work at writing. They way I saw it, if I was really talented, then it should just flow out on the page, naturally perfect. But then again, if I were constantly "working" on a piece, then I would always have a reason to see Ms. Shepard. So I decided I would work at it, in the popular sense of the word.

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I am not sure which came first: my wanting to be a writer, or my wanting to find a war to get to know Ms. Shepard. If she was to be my mentor, then we had to be friends first. After my first class with her I thought up a reason to go to her office to see her. We talked a while about what the class was going to be like and then i left. Granted, it wasn't a staggeringly deep conversation, but it was a start. Gradually, I got into the habit of talking with her every day after class. It wasn't long before I managed to bring up some of "my work" for her to read. The first "piece" I showed her was one I had started earlier that week. It was about my friend Martha. It began with : "Martha and I were the best of friends. She was the first friend I ever really loved. I think she was the only friend I loved." The first thing she said after she read the piece was that she needed to know more about Martha. She couldn't really understand the depth of the piece, until she knew the depth of Martha, as it were. So I sat in her office for an hour telling her about Martha, and this teacher of mine in high school, Rachael. How I adored Rachael and was now afraid because Martha and Rachael had had an affair, and now Rachael thought Martha was crazy. "Sounds like a soap opera. doesn't it ? I just found out about it all last term. But back when it happened I was nuts with suspicion and jealousy." Ms. Shepard just nodded and said what I had was the beginning of a novel and if I wanted to write a short piece, then I would have to "take a small incident out of the friendship and put it under the microscope, as it were." Then our time was up, or she had a meeting, or another class, at any rate, I had to leave. On the way home I thought I didn't like this idea of having to work at writing. They way I saw it, if I was really talented, then it should just flow out on the page, naturally perfect. But then again, if I were constantly "working" on a piece, then I would always have a reason to see Ms. Shepard. So I decided I would work at it, in the popular sense of the word.