The final product that I produced for this assignment is very different from the initial freewrite I did. As I mentioned in my first annotation, my freewrite was structured as a response or meditation on what I had just read. I discussed questions I had when reading the novel and the content of the novel itself. There was no narrative structure to it. My decision to develop what I had written into a narrative structure that mirrors Lewis' work came to me much later. I thought the most effective and enjoyable way for me to develop and present my ideas would be to do exactly what Lewis did: to tell a story. Lewis sees our turn away from God and our decision to choose hell over heaven as a result of our attachment to earthly possessions, desires, and appetites. My answer to the question ends up being that I don't know why. The man in my story has no reason not to open his eyes and join the world around him, yet he continues to be inexplicably obstinate and follow the path that ultimately leads to eternal misery, not eternal happiness.

I chose to continue working on this freewrite because of both how much I enjoyed and was intrigued by The Great Divorce and because I wanted to get creative and do my own spin on Lewis' idea. Creative writing is easily my favorite form of writing and I wanted one last chance to produce something memorable. I wanted to tell my story.

This piece originated from a freewrite I did after reading a book written by C.S Lewis called The Great Divorce. The central theme of Lewis’ novel is that all those who are in hell choose it. We choose to live according to our selfish desires and wants instead of turning to the truth and letting go of the things that hold us back. In my freewrite, I discussed my response to the novel and also offered up some additional questions. I wanted to get to the root of this choice Lewis repeatedly portrayed. Are we making this choice because of our enslavement to our appetites and our pride? Do those who profess to be Christians continue to sin and turn away from God because of some lingering doubt in their mind? Or is it something different altogether? In short my freewrite dove more into the reasons why we make these choices from a more general viewpoint, something I felt Lewis failed to develop enough.

This sentence is nearly identical to the one in my first draft, but I made one important change. In my rough draft, I used the phrase "ignored by the passive listener" instead of "people who are too busy with life to notice". I made the change to this phrasing for the simple reason of it being a more accurate description of what I wanted to say. Much like earlier in my essay when I used the term "west coast bias", the term "passive listener" is too vague. I wanted to emphasize the point of people being too distracted and busy with their lives to notice this beautiful thing, so I said exactly that.

In my rough draft, I began this paragraph by immediately talking about about the "image in front of me". The problem was that I failed to mention what I was doing in the moment while these thoughts were racing through my head. Without this sentence, the reader not only is unaware of whether I am standing, sitting, or still running, but they also could potentially lose focus in all the description of the surroundings. This addition was crucial in allowing the final essay to flow more smoothly and feel less like a long list of descriptions and more like a story.

Much like the section where I talk about my Shire fantasy, this section of text was not in my first draft. Instead, I simply ended with the sentence about my "west coast bias" and moved on to what I expected from Hammond Pond. This is easily one of my worst writing habits. I simply don't explain/elaborate on subjects enough if even at all. So when it came time to edit the draft, I decided to take the vague phrase "west coast bias" and give it meaning. I wanted to show exactly what the term meant in the context and also give more context to the area where I grew up. Without this edition, this paragraph felt very short and lacking in detail and personality. This addition was essential in helping to fix those problems in order to keep the paragraph and paper as a whole exciting, specific, and personal.

This section of text did not exist in my first draft of the essay. Instead, I ended this paragraph with a sentence stating that the feeling of the wind on my skin was powerful in connecting me to the natural world. The primary reason I decided to edit and add to this section was to give more specificity and detail to the work. Simply saying that something was "incredibly powerful with connecting me with the natural world" is vague and boring. It doesn't give the reader anything to work with. So, I decided to spend some time thinking about how the wind actually made me feel and why I even mentioned it in the first place. Eventually, I settled on this peaceful description of the Shire seen here. As someone who loves "The Lord of the Rings", The Shire has always been practically synonymous with peace and serenity. It is usually the first thing my mind goes to in moments like these. Therefore, I thought it would be the perfect addition and clarification to the description of the wind. This section allows the reader to see much more clearly how I experience the feeling of the wind, not just as something that is powerful with connecting me to the natural world, but as something that can vividly transport me to another world.