Madeline Weinberger

Dr. McLaughlin
Multimedia Writing and Rhetoric
11 September 2015
The Writing Process of Creeper
Every time I am required to write a personal essay, I become scared and stressed.
I do not like writing about myself because I find it awkward and strange, so this
assignment definitely challenged me. When assigned this project, I could not think of
what on earth to write about because all that I could keep thinking is that I am not a funny
person, so humor does not play that big of a role in my life. After free writing in class, I
was still pretty stumped; I decided I was going to write something about my Ursuline
Soccer team because I have some great memories that definitely made me laugh then and
still put a big smile on my face. I still found it difficult to find one event that I could base
an entire narrative off of. I contemplated writing about the creeper, my final topic, but
I originally thought that it would be too serious of the topic, and I was not very
comfortable writing about it. After attempting multiple drafts based on the Ursuline
soccer team, I surrendered and wrote about the creeper, and realized that it is relatively
easy to write about something that has greatly impacted my life.
I wrote multiple drafts of this essay as well, and I was struggling with the
structure of the essay. I could not figure out how to structure it without it being a bunch
of telling rather than showing; it was also too long. Dr. McLaughlin suggested that I
start off with a good team experience, and then work that into the bad experience so that
the listener can recognize the difference in team, and it allows for the story to flow. This

allowed me to delete my long introduction that was just telling the listener about the
various people involved. After this change in structure, I became much happier with how
my essay was coming together. By starting off with the scene from my Ursuline Soccer
team experience I was able to contrast that with the other less favorable experience,
which allows me to not just to say that they were different, but the listener contract the
two experiences by imagining the stark contrast. After having an essay that had a flow, I
began trying to add more detail throughout to give the listener a clearer picture of the
actual experience and making it more engaging.
Recording was an interesting experience because the first time I tried to record it,
I attempted to go through the entire essay, but I realized I lost emotion shortly after the
beginning, so then I decided to record in bits and pieces, but then my voice sounded
different every time, especially because I am sick and the throat is just not holding up. I
tried once again to do it in bits in pieces because it is very difficult not to stumble in the
middle of the recording. I did my recording in the library sound room, which was
awesome since I knew that I did not have to be worried about background noise or people
interrupting me. I reserved an hour and a half and thought that was excessive, but I used
the entire time.
The experience of writing this essay made me more confident when it comes to
writing personal narratives. I have learned that as long as I pick a topic that is relevant to
me that the process will go much smoother and the end result will of better quality. In
addition, it became apparent that the more impact the event had on me, the more
powerful the essay will be. By putting myself out there and writing about this topic, I feel
more empowered to write about other topics that I tend to keep to myself.