I am still awaiting the response as to whether I will get into the Journalism school here at CU, but thought I'd post my final essay in the mean time. Many many thanks to
SharQ for the suggestions, they were most excellent. Here's the final copy:
Writing is a long standing passion of mine that brings both substance and meaning to my life. My writing became digital four years ago when I first contributed to the everything2.com website. Under the username “dmandave” I slowly began to gain recognition through posting my nonfiction writing. I soon realized that to establish oneself as a writer you simply must toil and tear apart your existing work and reinvent it into something better. With this in mind I began to change. Throughout this development I began also to read hundreds of works from others within the community. At this stage I came across a submission from the user, “iceowl” entitled Things nobody tells you about the south pole. It documents how the physical marker for the southernmost point occasionally gets stolen. Specifically,
“It is not illegal to steal the south pole. However, in stealing the south pole one would inevitably incur the wrath of the local scientists and support workers, known affectionately as polies. And nobody fucks with polies.
Here's why.
Polies don't behave like people fearful of scrutiny. They start out normal as all humans do, but they undergo a transformation few humans will ever have to endure in their lifetime.”
I’ve wanted to experience this very transformation ever since. I got a taste last summer in the frozen lands of Patagonia where skiing and climbing provided me with a sense of inner-calm. This summer I experienced the same feelings while exploring the 14,000 foot mountains surrounding my home. With each new experience, I feel a growing desire to abandon all that I love and face a new challenge of survival and, more importantly, to write about it.
Although I have never met nor even made contact with iceowl, I revere him immensely and want to follow in his frozen footsteps. After extensively documenting his journey south, a follow-up, entitled simply, Other things nobody tells you about the south pole, was posted. Within it is an attempt to objectively answer the question of how one goes about surviving at the Pole Station. The most apt reply was exemplified through the simple act of digging a trench:
“The location was about a 1/4 mile from the station. The temp was about -45F. I went out and started digging. I was in full ECW regalia. Everything from hyper-insulated bunny boots to two pairs of gloves and four layers of poly pro.
When the Polie science tech arrived, he observed what I was doing and pitched in to help. Between the two of us, the job was done in a flash. As I finished he sauntered away and I noticed he was wearing street shoes. Worn-in, black loafers. Leather. Flat heels. Sides and heel of the shoe broken-in to the point the leather had the consistency of a limp towel. The man wore loafers to dig a 500' long snow trench on the polar plateau. I said, ‘Neil. You're wearing loafers. You're going to get frostbite.’
He smiled and said, ‘Yeah.’
He's still down there.”
In the past, I considered writing to be something that I’d use as a tool within another career – a means to an end. But now, after being inspired by the stories of iceowl, I see writing as a career unto itself. I undergo experiences to write, not the other way around. Iceowl, to me, is the ideal journalist, one who writes on their own terms and for their own satisfaction. With each new experience comes an opportunity to share it, and if you share it particularly well it becomes much more than just a diary entry and is instead respected as a journalistic piece. Starting out, I know I’ll be writing stories which I won’t particularly want to, but I also know that they will only help to build the skills that are essential for the ones I do. My contributions to everything2 have enhanced my self-confidence and matured me into a more level-headed person; but my transition into becoming a journalist has only just begun. With the proper training and experience, I’ll be able to put on my loafers and share this passion.
Notes: After much debate (mainly with myself) I decided to stick with the original quotations from iceowl, including the "nobody fucks with".
Here's the old version:
I truly love to write. It’s a passion that brings relief and self-justice to my oft meaningless life. My writing was brought to digital three and a half years ago when I first logged onto the website everything2.com. Under the username dmandave I began, unsuccessfully at first, to gain recognition. What I did not realize at the time was that to establish yourself as a writer you simply must toil and tear apart your existing work and reinvent it into something better. With this in mind I began the slow yet rewarding process of change. Throughout this development I began also to read hundreds of works from others within the community. At this point I first came across a posting from the user iceowl entitled Things nobody tells you about the south pole. It documents how the physical marker for the southernmost point occasionally gets stolen, but further that,
It is not illegal to steal the south pole. However, in stealing the south pole one would inevitably incur the wrath of the local scientists and support workers, known affectionately as polies. And nobody fucks with polies.
Here's why.
Polies don't behave like people fearful of scrutiny. They start out normal as all humans do, but they undergo a transformation few humans will ever have to endure in their lifetime.
I’ve wanted to experience this very transformation ever since. I got a taste last summer in the frozen lands of Patagonia where skiing became a secondary crutch towards an end of inner-calm. This summer I felt snippets among the clouds of the 14,000 foot mountains surrounding my home. Yet with each approach I’ve been left with a deeper underlying impetus to abandon all that I love and face a new challenge of survival.
Although I have never met nor even made contact with iceowl, I revere him immensely and want to follow in his frozen footsteps. After extensively documenting his journey south a follow-up post was made entitled simply, Other things nobody tells you about the south pole. Within it an attempt is made to objectively answer the question of how one goes about achieving success through survival at the Pole Station. The most poignant answer I found was exemplified by the simple act of digging a trench:
The location was about a 1/4 mile from the station. The temp was about -45F. I went out and started digging. I was in full ECW regalia. Everything from hyper-insulated bunny boots to two pairs of gloves and four layers of poly pro.
When the Polie science tech arrived, he observed what I was doing and pitched in to help. Between the two of us, the job was done in a flash. As I finished he sauntered away and I noticed he was wearing street shoes. Worn-in, black loafers. Leather. Flat heels. Sides and heel of the shoe broken-in to the point the leather had the consistency of a limp towel. The man wore loafers to dig a 500' long snow trench on the polar plateau. I said, "Neil. You're wearing loafers. You're going to get frostbite."
He smiled and said, "Yeah."
He's still down there.
Individual stories like these make me want to be a writer. Unfortunately I’d never really considered writing as a career before having exhausted all my other options. I’ve never been too confident with others and my more personal writings and only through everything2 has this changed. Nowadays, as I’ve matured into a more inspired and level-headed person I feel as though, with the proper training, I’ll be able to share my passion.