Hmm Updates

So I feel bad for never updating this, though I feel that currently it has no common viewers. The reasons for no new updates are, well, I haven't had much to put here. Plus I have been busy, with what? School, multiple forms of it. From play, to the college hunt, to crazy changes.

Anyhow in fantastic news I was accepted to Knox College. Plus a $10,000 renewable scholarship if I go there. I also sent in an application for Hope College in Michigan, they are sending back the first results Dec. 15th so I should hear from them after that. I think I am going to stick with just applying to those two colleges. I am more the happy to go to either one. Deciding is going to be the problem.


So anyhow back to the blog. I have somethings to update this with, I also think I am going to take down the Sewers Of Change Story it is not made for a blog, and I lack the HTML skills to make it into a sort of website. I may pull excerpts from it however. So hopefully I can get back on track with updates. Oh and if you do read this, feel free to comment, it is nice knowing someone is there, and I enjoy constructive criticism.

Finally, for those out there who wish to know what I am doing at every waking moment. It is finding out how my day was, without actually asking it. You can check out my twitter account www.twitter.com/tonuchi

Sermon

This was a sermon I wrote and read at church last year for Youth Sunday. I meant to post it last week but things happen and I became very busy. The sermon is about the passage John 9:1-41 

The first time I heard this story was about a month or so ago during Sunday school. Then last weekend during the youth winter retreat we found out it would be our scripture text for youth Sunday. We went through several exercises and different methods of learning the text, including acting it out in two different groups. I will never forget the long awkward pause as Jeff rubbed imaginary mud into Jordan’s eyes. But for the first time I had spent a weekend really looking over one story of the bible. And with each reading you look deeper into it and see things that may not have jumped out at you the first time around. 

The second time looking at the text that weekend we were told to get into small groups and answer some questions. Among the list of questions  was : who in this story is blind? Well the first thing to pop into my head of course is, well the man. That’s what the story is about. But as it was brought up in my group. I took another look at it. I made a sort of jokingly rebellious mark about how it was the Pharisees who were blind to Jesus when I realized there was actually some truth to that. 

While the Pharisees may not have 20/20 vision they can most likely see. But as I am sure you can tell I am n not talking literally about their sight. But more so their inability to welcome a new idea, one that while it goes against a lot of what they believed, offers hope. When they first hear of this man being healed some say that Jesus cannot be from God because he worked on the Sabbath, while others think that no sinner could perform such miracles. For me nowadays I have always found it hard to imagine no one working on Sunday. So it requires a strong imagination for me to understand that this guy is doing a big no-no worthy of one heck of a time out.. But even so couldn’t they get over themselves and realize: man was blind - now sees - happened on a Sunday. They were so deeply rooted in that he did one wrong, they completely overlooked the right. 

It was a year or so ago when I heard what was at the time dreadful news. The Followers were to switching rooms. We would be leaving the room that I and am pretty sure at least 15 years worth of followers have found a home in, to go the kids room. There were a few reasons why, a big one being that the group would be getting larger. But I and a few others wouldn’t stand for it. Sure I had only been in there for four years but that’s not the point. It’s the Followers room, our room, the room we would try to sneak peeks in before we were in the group, only to be shoved out by that age of Followers. Not to mention the walls adorned with writings of Followers past. We can’t just switch rooms. I was quite against the idea and that showed during Youth Council meetings. Although against my wishes the switch happened any way. I just couldn’t realize small room, big group, we won’t fit. 

We need to open our eyes. Change is all around us and will be for the rest of our lives and we don’t have time to get hung up on every little bit of change that is wrong. We need to open our eyes and look at what good change can bring about. What if the Pharisees looked deeper and noticed this man who walked the earth with the ability to heal the weak. The could have helped spread his word like no other. It has been 6 months since Followers practice started this year. Now I can safely say, thank god we had a bigger room available. With high turnouts and way bigger youth group than before there would have been no way we could have fit everyone in the other room comfortably. Change happens, lets open our eyes and be a part of it.

[News] Plans

I was thinking it might not be a bad idea to share some more plans for this site. As mentioned in the first post I am really wishing that somehow this will spread and many people can read my works and respond, letting me know what does and does not work. However there are many different things I write that could very well fit on here and I feel that I will over time post them. Here are some categories (Will also appear as labels):

Creative Writing Assignments: These are stories I have written for class such as "Knock Knock" there are too many of these right now.

Original Creative Writing: Things I write without an assignment and just for fun. In all honesty there aren't too many of these but thousands of ideas in my head. I might write some simply for this blog.

Newspaper Assignments: I have written many of these assignments but not many fall into the creative writing area. I might upload a few on a case by case basis.

Sewers of Change: My choose your own adventure epic. Too big for one post so it will be split up however check the labels underneath and click Sewers to view only those stories. These I will probaly upload once a week.

Timed Writes: Short snippets from writing 10 minutes straight. I have done some for class and I think I will make some original ones as well. Just to keep me on my writing toes.

Everything else: There are other forms of my writing that I have a want to put up. Check back Sunday for one.


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Now for how to upload I would like to hopefully update this 3-4 times a week. Eventually falling into some form of a daily schedule. So check back often.

A New Way

Thanks to some great advice from a friends father I have decided to start a blog filled with my creative writings and other writings. Mostly this is to test out a public opinion on my stories and get a feel for what works and doesn't work. I plan on uploading stories from high school along with writing original pieces weekly to keep me practicing. I have thousands of ideas and here I feel I can finally put them to good use.

A bit about me- I am 17 and a senior at a small highschool in Minnesota. Ever since I was little I have been building elaborate stories in my head and depending on my age put them to use, mostly in the form of playing with Legos and little homemade comics. With my passion for art I had seen myself maybe growing up to be a cartoon/comic creator. It wasn't until 10th grade during a creative writing class that I realized that more than art, I had loved creating the stories behind it. I have since settled on a career in creative writing. From there I plan to take my abilities and write for Video Games, Movies, Televison and hopefully write a few books or short stories on the side. As time goes on I will probably write a bit more about myself.

[Edit] I should add that while I try hard I am not the best with grammar and punctuation. I do plan on presenting my older work with as little edits as possible as to maybe show improvement. If bad grammar disturbs you I apologize and am trying to get that down.