Dear Jack,
One.
Dear Jack,
I don’t know how I should start something like this but “Dear Jack” seems appropriate. I guess I should introduce myself to you first. After all, there is really no point in writing to someone you know absolutely nothing about until you introduce yourself.
My name is Alex Gaskarth, never Alexander. You may have been told otherwise when they told you my name but there are few people I willingly let away with calling me that. I am a 19 year old student and I am currently studying English and Music in Towson University in Baltimore, Maryland. That is how I came about writing this letter to you. I chose it as part of an assignment which accounts for 40% of my final year grade. It was either this or write poetry for the semester. I took a module in poetry last semester and let me tell you it isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. That stuff is hard. Apparently it’s not all about finding words that rhyme and fitting them together in a way that makes some sort of sense. I found that out the hard way. I’m sure you can guess that my lecturer wasn’t too impressed with my attempt at poetry when he made us write a poem from the top of our heads during his very first lecture. My effort didn’t quite cut it and he made sure to read it out in front of my whole class (all three hundred of us) the next day. That day I learned that writing about a fat cat that was wearing a hat and was sitting on a mat didn’t constitute as poetry....at least in his eyes anyway. Personally, I was very proud at my attempt.
Needless to say, I jumped at the opportunity to take this task instead. The lecturer who set it believes that “young people” these days are too preoccupied with their social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter that they don’t understand what it is to sit down and write a letter. I didn’t know what to expect from it at first, but it’s kinda relaxing. I don't know, I must just be weird like that.
All I have to do at the end of this is make a presentation to my lecturer about you. Who you are? Where you come from? I just have to basically tell him your story. That doesn’t sound too bad. Right?
Anyway, I was born in England - Harlow, Essex to be precise - but I moved to Baltimore with my family when I was 10. Yup, for a year or two I was that kid who had the funny accent. I was never as happy as the day my accent started to become “normal” I’m an only child. It sucks at times but at others it's great. I think that’s where I get my love of English and writing from. When I was younger I was brought up to love reading and it carried on throughout my life.
I love music, rock and punk music to be exact but I’ll listen to anything. I sing as well as play piano and guitar. Some of my favourite bands have to be Blink 182 and Green Day. I love both those bands so much, you'd think that I was obsessed with them.
I’m not sure what else to write without this sounding like some sort of ad in a lonely hearts column. I think I’ll let you decide what you want to know about me and you can ask the questions in your next letter. I look forward to getting to know you and I hope that this all works out. Hopefully this letter reaches you without any problems.
Regards – Alex
P.S – that looks way too formal....maybe I’ll just stick with Alex in the future....
~*~*~*~
I sighed as I read over my attempt at a letter. I wasn’t too pleased with my work but it was the best that I could do at the moment. It was tougher than I’d expected it to be that’s for sure. After all, Jack was a complete stranger. All I knew about him was him name and that he was a soldier. I knew nothing else, not even how old he was. I was curious though, to say the least. I wanted to know everything about the person who would be receiving my letters. It wasn’t just for the sake of my assignment either, I was genuinely curious about who Jack Barakat was and more importantly why he chose to be the recipient of some college student’s letters. The support for the troops serving abroad was immense. You’d have to be blind not to see it. While I might not necessarily agree with the reasons these people were being kept away from their families I still admired the work they were doing. That’s what caught my interest though. Did Jack choose to be a part of this for the experience, as a chance to get to know someone new or, was Jack like the many people I had heard about in my Grandmother’s stories from her youth during World War 2? Back then people were encouraged to write to soldiers who had no one else. It lifted their spirits, gave them some piece of hope in their otherwise bleak worlds. These soldiers were either bachelors who had no wife and kids or, even worse men whose families had been killed during the war. I figured that that was a way too personal a question to ask a complete stranger. Personally, I knew he wouldn’t have liked it if I received the first letter from Jack and the first thing I read was asking about my family or why I wanted to get letters from him. No, if for some reason Jack wanted to tell me about his reasons he would do so in his own time. Either that or we would just build up a strong enough friendship where it would be ok for me to ask such a question. I know that I’m being optimistic, but it’s just part of who I am.
It was times like this that I had to stop and laugh at myself. Once again I had let my mind run laps around one single thought. These were the times that I felt reassured that creative writing was definitely my forte. Sure, by the end of my degree I would most likely teach English and Music but that was only as a practical measure. That was what people expected me to do but it wasn’t necessarily where my dreams lay. Sure being a teacher would be amazing and I really wanted to share my love of English and music with others but I had other ambitions too. I’m only human. Perhaps in the future I would become an author or maybe I would open a bookshop. I have a very active imagination, sometimes a little too active. One single thought had the ability to spark a chain reaction in my head. Here I was, painting Jack as some poor tortured soul with a horrible past when he could have just as easily been a happily married man with a wife and kids who wanted to help a student do well in college. Who knows?
I don’t know how I should start something like this but “Dear Jack” seems appropriate. I guess I should introduce myself to you first. After all, there is really no point in writing to someone you know absolutely nothing about until you introduce yourself.
My name is Alex Gaskarth, never Alexander. You may have been told otherwise when they told you my name but there are few people I willingly let away with calling me that. I am a 19 year old student and I am currently studying English and Music in Towson University in Baltimore, Maryland. That is how I came about writing this letter to you. I chose it as part of an assignment which accounts for 40% of my final year grade. It was either this or write poetry for the semester. I took a module in poetry last semester and let me tell you it isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. That stuff is hard. Apparently it’s not all about finding words that rhyme and fitting them together in a way that makes some sort of sense. I found that out the hard way. I’m sure you can guess that my lecturer wasn’t too impressed with my attempt at poetry when he made us write a poem from the top of our heads during his very first lecture. My effort didn’t quite cut it and he made sure to read it out in front of my whole class (all three hundred of us) the next day. That day I learned that writing about a fat cat that was wearing a hat and was sitting on a mat didn’t constitute as poetry....at least in his eyes anyway. Personally, I was very proud at my attempt.
Needless to say, I jumped at the opportunity to take this task instead. The lecturer who set it believes that “young people” these days are too preoccupied with their social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter that they don’t understand what it is to sit down and write a letter. I didn’t know what to expect from it at first, but it’s kinda relaxing. I don't know, I must just be weird like that.
All I have to do at the end of this is make a presentation to my lecturer about you. Who you are? Where you come from? I just have to basically tell him your story. That doesn’t sound too bad. Right?
Anyway, I was born in England - Harlow, Essex to be precise - but I moved to Baltimore with my family when I was 10. Yup, for a year or two I was that kid who had the funny accent. I was never as happy as the day my accent started to become “normal” I’m an only child. It sucks at times but at others it's great. I think that’s where I get my love of English and writing from. When I was younger I was brought up to love reading and it carried on throughout my life.
I love music, rock and punk music to be exact but I’ll listen to anything. I sing as well as play piano and guitar. Some of my favourite bands have to be Blink 182 and Green Day. I love both those bands so much, you'd think that I was obsessed with them.
I’m not sure what else to write without this sounding like some sort of ad in a lonely hearts column. I think I’ll let you decide what you want to know about me and you can ask the questions in your next letter. I look forward to getting to know you and I hope that this all works out. Hopefully this letter reaches you without any problems.
Regards – Alex
P.S – that looks way too formal....maybe I’ll just stick with Alex in the future....
~*~*~*~
I sighed as I read over my attempt at a letter. I wasn’t too pleased with my work but it was the best that I could do at the moment. It was tougher than I’d expected it to be that’s for sure. After all, Jack was a complete stranger. All I knew about him was him name and that he was a soldier. I knew nothing else, not even how old he was. I was curious though, to say the least. I wanted to know everything about the person who would be receiving my letters. It wasn’t just for the sake of my assignment either, I was genuinely curious about who Jack Barakat was and more importantly why he chose to be the recipient of some college student’s letters. The support for the troops serving abroad was immense. You’d have to be blind not to see it. While I might not necessarily agree with the reasons these people were being kept away from their families I still admired the work they were doing. That’s what caught my interest though. Did Jack choose to be a part of this for the experience, as a chance to get to know someone new or, was Jack like the many people I had heard about in my Grandmother’s stories from her youth during World War 2? Back then people were encouraged to write to soldiers who had no one else. It lifted their spirits, gave them some piece of hope in their otherwise bleak worlds. These soldiers were either bachelors who had no wife and kids or, even worse men whose families had been killed during the war. I figured that that was a way too personal a question to ask a complete stranger. Personally, I knew he wouldn’t have liked it if I received the first letter from Jack and the first thing I read was asking about my family or why I wanted to get letters from him. No, if for some reason Jack wanted to tell me about his reasons he would do so in his own time. Either that or we would just build up a strong enough friendship where it would be ok for me to ask such a question. I know that I’m being optimistic, but it’s just part of who I am.
It was times like this that I had to stop and laugh at myself. Once again I had let my mind run laps around one single thought. These were the times that I felt reassured that creative writing was definitely my forte. Sure, by the end of my degree I would most likely teach English and Music but that was only as a practical measure. That was what people expected me to do but it wasn’t necessarily where my dreams lay. Sure being a teacher would be amazing and I really wanted to share my love of English and music with others but I had other ambitions too. I’m only human. Perhaps in the future I would become an author or maybe I would open a bookshop. I have a very active imagination, sometimes a little too active. One single thought had the ability to spark a chain reaction in my head. Here I was, painting Jack as some poor tortured soul with a horrible past when he could have just as easily been a happily married man with a wife and kids who wanted to help a student do well in college. Who knows?
Notes
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4/27/15