So here I go! It’s my first blog for class. I’m still not sure about this whole thing and will have to work on it a lot more this week.

I’m realizing how beneficial this class will truly be for me in my career (hopefully with a women’s organization, non-profit, or health clinic). I have a habit of not letting anyone read anything I write (aside from close family and friends for proof-reading purposes), so this whole blogging idea is a big step for me. I think it’ll be a great skill to have in my choice of career fields. I’m hoping to have confidence to be able to write for newsletters, even in mass emails and other such form of communication.

I have been touched and inspired by so many of the stories we read for this week. I find them engaging, and moving. The article that most spoke to me was Pattern of Migration by Trish O’Kane. This piece really spoke to me, mostly I think because I could relate so well. The writing brought out the voice of the author. While she has had no where near a mundane everyday life, she’s not writing about all the adventures she’s had in her life. She just fighting with this idea of “home” and brings the reader with her. Banaszynski says in Stories Matter (pp. 5), “Stories are histories. Write and edit and tell yours with accuracy and understanding and context and with unwavering devotion to the truth.” I think O’Kane does a beautiful job of that by not giving too much detail about all the back stories (which I would have loved to hear more about), but rather states enough to educate the reader of her history, give her story the necessary context, and drive at the truth of “home.”

I was so moved by this piece, and it made me think so much about my own life, that I’ve been thinking of using this idea for my personal narrative. It just seems so unoriginal to me: You mean another college senior is troubled by what “home” means to her? Therefore, I’m going to just grapple with it now, here in my blog: Up until last year, I’ve lived in more houses/apartments/rooms than years I’d been alive. This year ties me up 21 houses/apartments/rooms and 21 years, but with another move in a few months and another birthday, seems as thought I’ll never get a lead in years. While my story is not the same as O’Kane’s, I understood her sense of not knowing where home is. Growing up, I have always had many places I can home. Home was where ever my family was- where I could find my older sister and parents and friends. Home was also where my bed was, once I started living by myself. I have always loved my own space, and I love my bed. So dorms, my current tiny rat-whole of an apartment, have been my “home” as well. Home was never a house to me. I never understood that idea really. I have many places I call “home” at once. Luckily for me though, in all these moves my family never moved far. We mostly stayed in the same town with a few exceptions. Now that I’m getting ready to start “my own life” and in eventually (in a long while) my own family, this is something I think about a lot. Do I want to move? I’m crazy good and packing boxes and cars full of stuff to make the most stuff fit in the space. And I don’t need to be able to see out the back of the car to drive. It does have its benefits. Or do I want to plant my roots firmly? I can empathize with O’Kane’s struggles to find home. I struggle with where I want to be next year. More than anything I’m ready to move and stay put for more than one year. My older sister (who is a psychologist, by the way) and I often talk about what kind of influence all the moving had on us. For instance, I blame my pack-rat nature on that I was always moving, so attached myself to more “stuff” than necessary as comforts. My sister, on the other hand, will never leave Chicago. The site of boxes and moving vans and the mere thought of moving makes both of us both sick to our stomachs. Not is a sad, nostalgic way, in an “Oh god, here we go again…” way. I know I get my idea of home from my parents. When my Dad dies, he wants to be cremated and scattered and sea, and my mom wants to be where he is. We don’t even have a “homeland” we have each other.

I’ll wrap up this week’s blog with a few questions I’ve been thinking about:

What makes narrative journalism, journalism, and not ethnography or autobiography, or creative nonfiction short stories? What defines the journalism aspect especially when you’re writing about your self? And how should I approach writing the profile and explanatory pieces differently than writing an ethnography or personal history for sociology?

How am I ever going to keep a submission to around 800 words? This blog is already over the word limit and its just a blog! I’m truly worried about word limits. As an HDSR major, I’ve been trained in a lot of ways to be long (detailed usually, but extremely long and wordy). So this whole idea of telling the whole story in just a few pages worries me. Something I’m really going to have to work on.