Toledo 1

Gwenyth A. Toledo

Dr. Warwick

Writ 2

7 February, 2024

A Bus Full of Emotional Writers

Amy stepped onto the bus, too distracted to notice how empty it was for a Friday night.

She sat down at the first seat she could find, phone sandwiched between her shoulder and her ear

as she flipped through a stapled sheet of papers. She tried to hide the bright red “D-” that seemed

to cover the entire front page from the rest of the bus riders. “I just can’t believe it”, she whined

to her sister over the phone. “Why would my professor do this? I worked so hard on this paper,

and it’s not like it's just some random persuasive essay. It’s MY life. I mean, how could I get a D-

on my parent’s divorce?” Amy tried to stay quiet but her frustration was getting the best of her.

“I’m never writing about my personal life ever again”, she says with defeat.

She couldn’t help but notice some faces staring at her out of the corner of her eye. Amy’s

sister was rambling on about something she couldn’t care less about. “Hey I gotta go” Amy ends

the call and hangs her head low. The bus rocks her back and forth as she imagines herself going

off on her professor for what he did. Doesn’t he realize how hard I worked on this? She thought.

I put so much emotion into this paper, for what?. She shoved the paper into her bag, hoping to

forget about it as soon as possible.

Her thoughts quickly got interrupted by a tap on her shoulder. “Excuse me”, a man sitting

to her right says, “I couldn't help but overhear your conversation” he gives a nervous chuckle. “I

don’t think you should let this ruin personal writing for yourself” Amy raises her brow in
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confusion. He puts out a reassuring hand and continues, “While your teacher should not have

given you this assignment as a grade, writing about trauma privately and on your own terms is

beneficial”. He stretched his arm farther to shake Amy’s. “I’m James by the way” he says with a

smile.

Amy shakes his hand and gives a polite smile back. “Thanks for the advice, but I just

don’t think I can even bring myself to write about that kind of stuff anymore. At least not for a

while”, Amy shrugs and looks down at her feet. “Well, my studies have shown that writing about

traumatic experiences, for even a short period of time every day, can improve one’s health both

mentally and physically” James elaborates. Amy turns her head to James in surprise. “Really?

Like…journaling?”, she asks. “Precisely”, he nods.

The bus was quiet for a moment while Amy thought to herself. Maybe he’s right, she

thought, maybe this was just one bad experience. Suddenly, a person across from them chimes

in. “Sorry to eavesdrop, I’m Benjamin” the man leans forward and puts a hand on his chest,

“While I completely agree that writing about emotional events can be extremely helpful, I think

the classroom is one of the best places to implement this. Writing about personal experiences can

be very beneficial as a student. I personally started doing this with my own students, and

practicing emotional writing has shown to be helpful for future academic writing. Students even

talked about how they felt encouraged to express their thoughts more after the class”, Benjamin

smiled proudly. Amy was nodding her head in intrigue while James stayed silent.

A woman sitting a few spots down from Amy scoots to a seat closer. “Hi, I’m Lucile”,

she looks past Amy to find James. “I really respect your work, and even created my own

experiment inspired by yours”, she adds, looking at James with admiration. “However, my

studies have shown that these ideas may not be entirely true for everyone. I ran an experiment
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with elementary students where half the children wrote about negative experiences, and the other

half wrote in detail about what they did that day” she explains, “Although working memory was

improved, there seemed to be no significant difference in mood for children after they finished

writing. This writing style may be more appropriate for academics than you think". Amy looked

at Lucile in amazement. She had no idea that so much research was done on this topic.

A man to the right of Benjamin raises a hand. “Hello, Guy here”, he starts, “While I also

can’t attest to the emotional aspects, I will say my students have become significantly more

confident after I encouraged them to write expressively about their own experiences. Writing like

this may have its place in the classroom, and can be useful to both students and teachers. It’s

possible that Amy needs some improvement on her writing, and that’s perfectly okay”. Benjamin

nods in agreement. James protests, “Yes, but imagine you write something so deep and personal,

only to receive a bad grade? Amy here seems like good enough evidence against this teaching

style to me”. Amy shrinks down in her seat a bit, embarrassed by the direction this conversation

took. She was so distracted by the thought of James’ study, she had almost forgotten about her

D-.

A woman from across the bus, who has been listening intently from the beginning, speaks

up. “Actually, I think you’re looking at this all wrong”, she says, looking straight at James. The

bus goes quiet as Amy looks between James and the woman, who seems quite frustrated. “The

idea of private writing may work in some scenarios, but the truth is people need to be heard.

Having an audience gives us the voice we’ve been searching for” she argues. She then turns to

Amy. “I’m sorry about your grade, my name is Wendy” she gives Amy a sympathetic look,

putting a hand over her heart.

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James turns his body to her, more engaged in the conversation than before. “What about

the power struggle this creates between a student and their teacher? Isn’t this dangerous?”, he

waves his hands, as if offended by Wendy’s idea. Wendy takes a deep breath, fighting the urge to

roll her eyes at James. “That’s why an ethical audience is important. We must think of ourselves

as audience members to serve the speaker, not the other way around”, Wendy shakes her head.

James sits back in his chair, trying to come up with a counterargument. Amy, agreeing with both

of them, feels torn. She sees Wendy’s point about the importance of sharing your story and

having a voice, but she also feels like some things should be kept sacred rather than turned into a

grade. Maybe there’s a better way to do this, she thinks. Amy clears her throat, trying to break

the tension.

Ready to provide her input, Amy gets interrupted by Benjamin. “You know, I totally

agree with you”, Benjamin says to her, “In my classroom, I even talk to my students about MY

own struggles. It seems to really strengthen my relationship with the students, and inspires them

to open up as well”. Wendy smiles at him in approval. Amy finally speaks up. “I think you all

have good points”, she looks to the fellow bus riders, “I can admit I felt very angry at my

professor for giving me this grade. However, thanks to you all, I can understand what he

intended this project to be. He wanted us to look deep into ourselves as writers and persuade us

to write from the heart”, Amy nods, reassuring them. She continues, “I know I’m not a teacher or

any kind of professional, but in my opinion, I think the best way to go about personal narratives

in the classroom is to assign it as a free write”. The rest of them look to each other and nod,

intrigued by her input. “That way”, Amy elaborates, “The students can benefit from this kind of

writing without worrying about making it ‘good enough’ for their instructors”. Benjamin smiles.

“You make a good point, Amy.” he says, and the rest of them nod in agreement.
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The now silent bus then comes to a stop. Amy, realizing how long she’s been talking to

these scholars, grabs her bag in a hurry. “Well,” she says, throwing her backpack over her

shoulder, “It’s time for me to go. Thank you all so much for your help” she waves, walking to the

open bus doors. They all wave back, wishing her good luck on her academic journey. As Amy

walks home, she smiles to herself, feeling inspired by the conversation she had with those five

strangers.
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Work Cited

Moran, Molly Hurley. (2013). Writing and healing from trauma: An interview with James

Pennebaker [interview]. Composition Forum 28.

https://compositionforum.com/issue/28/pennebaker.php

Ryden, Wendy. (2010). From purgation to recognition: Catharsis and the dialectic of public and

private in healing writing. Journal of Advanced Composition 30.1-2, 239-267.

Allen, Guy. (2000). Language, power, and consciousness: A writing experiment at the University

of Toronto. In Anderson, Charles M.; Marian M. MacCurdy (Eds.), Writing and healing: Toward

an informed practice; Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English (pp. 249-290).

https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED436788.pdf

Pennebaker, James W.; Janel D. Seagal. (1999). Forming a story: The health benefits of

narrative. Clinical Psychology 55.10, 1243-1254.

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Batzer, Benjamin. (2016). Healing classrooms: Therapeutic possibilities in academic writing

[Special Issue: Emotion]. Composition Forum 34.

https://compositionforum.com/issue/34/healing-classrooms.php

Chanquoy, Lucile; Fartoukh, Michael. (2020). Expressive writing in school children: Effects on

well-being and working memory. Journal of Writing Research 11(3).

https://doi.org/10.17239/jowr-2020.11.03.04