please, god, to be lucid is all i ask.

Yesterday, i experienced a revelation. I was feeling exceptionally down and out, because i had just had my art exam. Honestly, the writing skills of a five year old would have impressed more than my incomprehensible jargon. I became so hopeless in my comparitive essay, that i was reduced to:

Image 'a' yada yada yada image 'b' yada yada yada. Over and over and over and over. My conclusion trickled into nothing. I had no argument. It could be summed up with 'dot dot dot'.
Perhaps the reason for this extreme inadequacy was that my stupidity had been finally realised by my lit teacher. Ellen told me Park had just marked our poetry essays, and that they were in 'that folder over there'. Why did i look? Those two numbers hit me first; their minute weight was devastating. Robot-like, my eyes moved onto his first sentence comment. It has tortured me unremittedly.
"kate, this essay was not up to your usual standard."
He then went onto say how i had repeated myself again and again, and had failed to make a coherent argument. Well, i can't say i wasn't expecting a bad result- but i was so vain as to not brace myself for that.
A lovely way to enter an exam.

My dears, please. If you have ever entertained even the slightest notion that i can 'write', please banish it entirely. I simply cannot express myself coherently, other than on the topic that i cannot express myself coherently. I am sure i could write an essay on my own inabilities at lit. Irony at its cruellest.

Desperation drove me to seek help. I went on google and typed in the words 'how to write an essay'. Yes- our teachers drum it into us again and again "state thesis, argue a point, topic sentence, explain, example, conclusion". Whatever. I understand the concept well enough- the structural part of it. But i don't know how. Does that even make sense?

Well, after a good deal of sifting, i found a page, that i pray to a god i dont believe in will mark a turning point in my writing from here onwards. Take a look.

http://www.write101.com/jgconfidence.htm

I read it over at least three times. That's me, i thought. That's me! I wrote this shortly afterwards, in an attempt to order my feelings.

And all this time- how could I have believed that long words were stable indicatives of intelligence? They only achieved in sending me so far from reason, that I failed to be coherent, not only to the reader, but to myself! I cannot express my shock. That I could be so dim-witted! I do declare, an empty piggy bank has more sense! Let us hope, Kate, that this new approach is used prudentially. No more ‘utilised’ no more ‘myriad’. I now know what Mr Park meant by ‘fluffing out sentences’. Do not muddy the water, Kate. Do not cloud sense, overstuff it with useless jargon. Keep it crystal, keep it succinct. Let the words shine. Let them glow- you were smothering them. They were being slowly and surely strangled by their own obscurity, and everyone could realise that but you. Let them breathe. Set them free. By doing so, you are being more empathetic to your reader, and, more importantly, refraining from insulting the very core of the english language.

I only hope that this is the answer. For my lit exam is on Monday, and i am terrified beyond belief that my mind will become paralysed, as it so often does, and i will retreat into old and worn habits. Please...