Creative Writing is a department where you can’t get by without always participating. Everyday you are sharing your opinions and interpretations and your own pieces. For me coming into and environment like this was somewhat challenging. I have never been a big sharer in class. At my old schools I was able to get by without sharing as much, but that’s not the case for this department.

So by the time our Fall poetry and prose show came around I wasn’t ready. Throughout the show everyone in the department goes up and shares either a poetry or prose piece. Also, skits written by a few of the seniors in the department are performed. So naturally I was freaking out a little inside about this. But I somehow convinced myself to do a longer prose piece and to somewhat face my fear.

My piece was one of the longer ones in the show. So of course this made me nervous. I was thinking about changing my piece, but by the time we started rehearsal and staying at school till about 6:00 every night, I realized it was too late now.

The night of the show came around and I was absolutely terrified. Throughout the day there were just scenarios of ways I would mess up playing throughout my head and what the chances of me passing out on stage were. Luckily it was a small chance.

Once it was my turn I walked up and stood on the podium, trying to center myself and stand up straight. The whole time I was up their my legs were trembling, and it was out of my power. About half way through my piece I realized I had to stop worrying so much. So that’s what I did and I stopped thinking about pauses and looking up and just did them naturally. By the time I walked off stage I was so relieved. About the fact that it was over and I did not terribly fail, and that I got a good response from the audience. It was very reassuring when a couple days after people would tell me that they really liked my piece, and that made me believe my friends and family when they told me I did well and it wasn’t just them feeling obligated to tell me that.

Paloma Fernandez, class of 2022