Initial Mess.
This is where it all starts.
Mix a feisty gay high schooler and a conservative government teacher and what do you get?
A fucking hot mess.
Writing about sexual education was exciting. It was inspiring. I willingly wrote page after page. I wanted it to be perfect. I had fun.
I called for sexual education reform. Specifically, I wanted more LGBT education. There wasn't a single mention of homosexuality or bisexuality in my health class freshman year - which had the only sexual education unit we were taught. Oh, wait. Just kidding. There totally was. In my health class, when addressing same sex attraction, it said "If you find yourself attracted to the same sex, don't worry. It'll pass eventually." That terrified me. Imagine a closeted freshman in a rural town reading that. Now imagine a closeted freshman in a rural town who has been desperately trying to be straight for a few years reading that. The 1980s-health book, which was already incredibly damaging, just got 100x worse. My revenge? The sexual education paper, which was ironically submitted in the classroom next door.
My teacher hated it.
I mean I still got an A, but the point was he didn't like it. He didn't believe me. I brought up dozens of governmental papers, unpackaged loads of evidence for the benefits of teaching sexual education, and he found the most specific thing to critique. Okay, maybe I'm being defensive and he was being objective. Regardless, I wasn't satisfied with my paper. It was the topic I cared about, but not presented in the way I felt that it needed to be.
This repurposing gave me the ability to change that.
I decided to try fiction mainly for two reasons: 1. It was something I haven't done before and 2. I could tell a story. The problem with my paper is it dealt with numbers. I couldn't relate to my teacher on a personal level. (Still not sure that's possible.) I wanted to show him that sexual education can impact us outside of school. Sexuality is all around us and we need to know what we're doing before it's too late.
After my repurposing I was more satisfied.
I felt my story was finally told.
I mean, Connor's and Lex's, but we can always dream.
It's not really important to read the paper. This website has a lot of stuff you don't really need to get the full picture. Don't worry, I'll help you out.
Things to read:
1. We Break Up At The End. (Repurposing)
2. A Lesson On Being Good. (Remediation)
3. Why Do I Write? (Reflective Piece)
The rest is just white noise. Literally.