Jellyfish Blob Things

29^th March 2012

Dear Cassi,

       

Of all those things so plainly lost in time one is a folder slim in contents and poorly conceived that had been made of yellow paper and laminated. The teachers had said that in life we would look back to our old ideas and bring them into new use in college.

       

So, they made it a point to teach us how to store ideas. I called my folder ‘Literature Goo’ and drew little jellyfish like goo things with sunglasses on the cover. In this we put our pointless yammering or poetry and hand written essays. I believe the whole thing was less than ten pages however I could be mistaken.

       

I have never looked back at this document and found something useful. I know I wrote a report on hummingbirds that never went in there as well as a report on venomous snakes. I can guarantee that whatever I wrote in those reports would be out of place in a modern paper.

       

If I had then and there become an expert on snakes and hummingbirds I still would have never again had cause to write reports about the subject. Literature Goo was no more to me than another bit of paper. The practice of writing reports was no more to me at the time than an act to fill hours as my malfunctioning brain could hardly atone to the task let alone remember it the day after.

       

When I got to college I would have had to ask teachers if I could use old work even if I rewrote it completely. The school considered that academic dishonestly. Then there were a few times I could use hold research so I guess the idea is not without foundation.

Grow from experience, little sister

Richard Leland Neal