First post-Lauren

My name is Lauren Kramer and I am a psychology major. I came to school knowing that I wanted to major in this and have found all of the courses to be quite interesting. I like it because I have always like to try to read people and figure out how they think and how people decide their actions. I have also always been very interested in the mental disorders that people develop such as bi-polar disorder and schizophrenia.
I come from a small town called East Aurora. Its about twenty minutes away from Buffalo but is quite different from the city. My town is known for being historic, as the people there seem to hate change. Our town is known for having the famous toy company Fisher Price, and being home to the former president Millard Fillmore. Despite the historic feel, the streets are also lined with small boutiques, ice cream places, and pizza parlors. Over all it’s a quaint town and a perfect place to grow up.
Besides writing, I also I also love swimming, running, and animals (mainly puppies). I used to swim on my high school team but now I just do it for exercise whenever I get a chance. I also really love to run outside when the weather is nice enough. And I have a love for pugs even though I do not have any pets of my own. Some day I hope to be an owner of several.
Overall I have had pretty good feedback on my work in terms of written assignments. My professors have so far had positive and helpful things to say about my papers, which not only encourages me but also lets me know that there is stillroom for improvement. One of the most frustrating experiences in terms of getting feedback on my work is when my teacher did not return a final project, which I had worked extremely hard on. Instead of letting me know what she liked or didn’t like about my project, she merely emailed me my grade. This was quite annoying for me because after spending so much time on an assignment I felt like she didn’t take the time to really look at it, which is unfair for any student to experience.
One of the poets that I really admired when I was little was Shel Silverstein. Even though his poems were simple and always had a great rhyme scheme, it taught me that poetry could be fun and silly. As a little kid this encouraged me to try making a few poems of my own, because I realized that I could talk about anything I wanted. If playing with Barbie’s or getting along with my sister is what mattered to me at the time, then it was perfectly acceptable to write about. Overall, I was able to experience the freedom and power that poetry had, even if it was from my own simple experiences.
One of the things I like about good poetry is that it really makes you think. The answers and the meaning of it aren’t just spelled out for you, and it often causes you to really challenge yourself to figure out what is being said. One of the pitfalls that I would like to avoid is being too literal with my poetry. I would like to make people think and interpret for themselves what they think I’m talking about. Overall in this class, I would like to learn how to use the little details to make my poems stronger. The placement of a hyphen or ending a line at a certain point all influences how the poem is interpreted, and I would really like to learn how to take advantage of these little details to make my poetry as strong as possible, as I am very new at it.