Nick Giokas Journal 1

I have a very love hate relationship with writing.  I do believe it is an amazing way for expression and creativity, but I also feel that sometimes it can be more of a pain than it can be fun.  I learned to read and write as a young child, being taught several things throughout preschool, at home, and eventually in elementary school.  My parents used to read to me and I used to read by myself on rare occasions.  I think that because of the teachers I had and the school program I grew up with, I developed a dislike of reading and writing.  I went to a catholic school all of my life and the reading choices at school largely reflected their beliefs.  Many times great books were passed over by English teachers due to controversial content.  I understand that went cannot read certain books but there were plenty that the content was stretched too far for my liking and personally I thought it was overkill.  Because of the novel choices I never much got into reading until recently.  Personally I had always been a fan of the mystery novels and the detective stories.  I love the stories and the hidden clues throughout the book.  I feel as though those types of stories truly make it hard to put the book down.  It is a very relaxing hobby that I am glad that I picked up.  Books are sometimes the best way to get away for a while. 

There are not many things that inspire me to write.  I am biochemistry major and my writing skills easily show that.  I feel very comfortable writing science-based papers, and long lab reports.  I find it easy to express scientific topics in an interesting way.  I think that where I struggle is creative writing.  It seems so hard to me to simply think of a topic and start writing. I think my strong background in science has really hindered my creative writing abilities. I think very logically now and most of the writing I do is on topics that I have researched and learned about.  I am semi confident in my research paper writing skills.  My high school had a tough writing program and constantly had us writing research papers.  I understand that a college level paper will require more thought and skill, but it is still good to have some sort of background going into the class.  I am looking forward to this new level of English and I am hoping for the best!