B'Gosh and B'Gore · The Unlikely Son

FROM DEBBI

By the second week in Dublin I had already fallen into a routine. I woke up early and went to the newsstand down the street for a USA Today. On the way back up to the room, I made some oatmeal and a cup of tea in the kitchen, which I ate while I caught up on what was happening back home. Being away for so long had peaked my curiosity about what was happening back home. In truth, I mostly read the Life section, but I skimmed the major headlines and picked out a few interesting articles to read in depth.

I was shocked to learn that, while hidden away in Oban, I had missed the recall election in California, and Arnold Schwarzeneggar was now my governor. After learning that tidbit, I became addicted to at least knowing a little bit about what was going on.

With my stomach full of warm tea and oatmeal to arm me against the cold, I pulled on running gear and jogged through the streets of Dublin. Mostly I ran along the quays that sat above River Liffy, watching the streets change names every few blocks as I journeyed through the length of the town. Every once in a while, I would veer off my normal path to vist the castle, St. Patrick’s Cathedral or the gardens at St. Stephen’s Green. I usually ran four or five miles, depending on how my body responded to the pounding of my feet on the sidewalk.

When I got back to the hostel, I took a hot shower and got dressed to go find something to eat. I had taken to frequenting the pub next door for Irish stew or fish and chips. Although the greasy food still held my deepest affection, the warm stew usually won out with its ability to warm me from the inside. My California blood detested the cold.

After lunch I walked across the river to a huge cineplex a friend and I discovered on my premiere visit to Dublin. Ireland was the first country we had been to in almost five months that spoke English, after studying in Spain for four months and then traveling all over Europe for three more weeks. We were amazed at all the English around us and became addicted to going to the theater to hear more and to catch up on all the movies we had missed while we were away from home.

I found myself longing for some connection to home, even if I didn’t want to be there physically. Plus, I hadn’t been to the movies since I left home, other than that disastrous trip in London, and I missed them. I missed the connection I felt with him by going. And even though I didn’t sit there with a big tub of popcorn and he wasn’t sitting next to me, talking through all the previews and asking questions during the movie itself, I still felt his presence with me.

By the third week I had stopped feeling much of anything. I wasn’t writing in my journal much; I just didn’t feel like it anymore. I had felt so much so fast and went through so many different emotions in such a short amount of time. I felt like I had gone through just about every emotion that existed. Shock. Disbelief. Anger. Hate. Betrayal. Sadness. Depression. The list was endless. I never knew I was such an emotional person. Each and every day brought a new emotion, a new series of thoughts, a fresh set of tears. It was all I could do to just get through the day.

All that time, all those emotions - and then I was just numb. I didn’t feel like I cared about anything anymore. Each new day dawned and I went through the same routine. And even though I went through all the motions, I couldn’t really say that I cared about where I was or what I was doing. I was in Dublin, an amazing city, and, other than when on my runs, I never went out and saw any of the sights. After the movies I would come home and read a random book that I picked up off the bookshelf downstairs or, if there wasn’t anything I wanted to read, I went and bought one at a bookstore on Grafton Street.

In the emails I got from my friends, they all told me that I sounded like I was down. I kept assuring them that I wasn’t. I was not depressed. It wasn’t a lie - I was not depressed. It wasn’t until I had been in Dublin for almost a month, after an unusually long run - almost two hours of beating myself up, refusing to give in to the exhaustion that plagued me with every step - that I realized I was numb. Emotions didn’t run through me anymore. I didn’t cry. I didn’t laugh. I didn’t even think I missed him that much. I just existed in this constant state of nothingness.

I knew there were stages of grief. I guessed that this was just one of them. But how long could I continue to be numb before losing everything? What if I stayed numb forever? Did the people in my life really love me enough to wait it out? As those thoughts ran through my head, I wished I could say that I hoped it true. But I couldn’t hope; I was too numb.

CRITIQUE

Your excessive use of “to be” and “to have” weakens the writing. Just ridding the writing of those two empty verbs would strengthen it to a great extent. You also use dull verbs and imprecise language. Use simple past tense throughout, like this:

While hidden away in Oban, it shocked me to learn of the recall election that elevated Arnold Schwarzeneggar to governor of California. After digesting that tidbit, I decided to bone up on current events.

Note that it could not shock her to learn that she missed the election, since she was away; the election results shocked her. And “addicted” is not an adjective to coincide with “at least” and “a little bit”. You see how much tighter and stronger just those two sentences become when you rid them of empty verbs and add more interesting and precise ones? If you edit the entire piece in this way, you’ll reduce words by about 20% and harvest a cleaner and more engaging story.

Also, you exhibit what I call a “hammer” mannerism. You use a word initially, then hammer the reader with it, or a variant of it, several times more in a short time. You used four or five hammers in this short little piece:

To learn – 2
To miss – 4
To feel – 7
Emotion – 6
Numb - 5
Depress – 3

So, get rid of be, being, been, am, are, is, was, were, have, had, and has at the very least, and work on more interesting and precise language, particularly verbs.