personal_statement epitome of incomprehensibility I don't know why it's so hard to write a 500-700 word "personal statement" for a scholarship application. Here on blather I've written enough about my own silly life to fill several small books. Maybe it's the whole impersonal nature of the endeavor. Or trying to be all honour-student squeaky-compliant. 231022 ... epitome of incomprehensibility Dear Awards Committee, So, I study linguistics. Why is linguistics important, you may ask? Well, suppose I told you the following: "I used to be a child molester." The notion of semantic ambiguity may serve to lessen your shock, since I only mean that I was a molester when I was a child - an entirely true statement, if you define what I did at age six to a kindly sixtyish teacher as molestation. I lusted wildly after her. Convincing myself that what I'd seen once accidentally was the crack of her round bottom and not the line of her pantyhose, I would crawl up to her during storytime and try to put my head under her skirt. Perhaps that wasn't the best way to go about things, and it's important to acknowledge that not all bisexuals are crazed sex demons. Sometimes they are shy adolescents attending a repressive Christian school who come out to their parents using the metaphor of electrons being attracted to other electrons as well as to protons. You can tell that such a person is destined for a career in STEM! Okay, that was me as well. Wait, "that was me?" Don't you find it interesting that over the past couple of generations, "this is me" has replaced "this is I" as the accepted construction? The other possibility is that I learned a less privileged version of the language due to my slightly underprivileged upbringing. I do need to convince you I need money, after all. My father has a PhD, but not in a rich way. He got me exactly one of my jobs: researching and proofreading a book written by his former principal, Dr. K. It was about Karl Barth's World War 1 sermons. My takeaway from that: everybody's_attacking_Belgium. Or at least they were attacking Belgium. There's been a distinct lack of Belgium-attacking recently. Anyway, the man was unlucky enough that his recent cataract surgery had scarred more than it healed. Regardless, he had clear, striking brown eyes that I almost fell in love with, except I was no longer prone to falling in love with people 55 years my senior. He was mentally sharp but almost blind. Most of the work I did was simply transcribing what he said. I did have a couple of off-topic tasks, including ordering him a hall rug. He asked me to do an online search and then describe the choices for him. I learned something important about myself that day: I am not adept at describing the colours and patterns of rugs. "Sort of red and beige, like with swirls," was pretty much the best he got. Nevertheless, he seemed satisfied with his choice. He just didn't have long to enjoy it because an infection landed him in the hospital. The next month I was back working with him in his new apartment in a retirement home, he and his children thinking it'd be too dangerous for him to continue living alone. He wanted Oxford Press to publish his book. They found it too niche. The second publisher he contacted accepted it, which meant my work was over. One of my last memories of him was visiting him with my parents. We were helping him move some books to his new place. I remember sitting at a table with them and tuning out the conversation, focusing instead on the jellybeans in the glass bowl in the middle. I ate a few and felt guilty when he looked my way, but he was just wondering what those small blobs of colour were. "Jellybeans," I said. "Oh, okay. My daughter brought them, then." Or something like that. Non-famous last words. He died after he knew his last book would be published, but before he got to see a physical copy. I had a USB full of files from his computer. I tried to give it to the jellybean daughter but she never answered my email. ...There. That's more than 500 words. And it's more personal than you wanted, especially since it's about more than one person, but that should be a good thing, right? Right? Yes, it should. Thank you. Give me money. 231022 ... raze i think what i've always struggled with in these situations is the whole "condensing the quilt that is you into a few hundred words" thing. it's sorta like plucking a few songs from a greatest hits album and hoping that'll give someone an idea of the music you make, knowing it's only one small part of a story still being written. we contain multitudes, dammit! (and undigested food, usually.) but if i were one of the decision-makers, i would gladly give you money — and jellybeans — after reading that. 231023 ... epitome of incomprehensibility I imagine it's even harder on the art side - picking out songs to represent the music you've done since you were a teenager, for instance. I'm guessing you speak from experience. But yes: life is a mess, and it's hard picking out Points To Cover. My actual statement stressed the parts about accumulating experience and working through obstacles. Boring, but on-topic (I think). But I should have been all, "How have I grown as a person? Well, I no longer try to look under teachers' clothes to see their ass cracks. Progress!!" (Okay, but why did I do that in the first place?? I was six, not two. I'm glad it's physically impossible for me to meet my past selves. We'd probably get into a giant fight.) 231102 what's it to you? who go blather from