It is almost the end of this semester and now I mark the journals. Always very engaging, the journals of lyric writing students from last two months. My hope is a realization this simple thing pays big dividends for the identities of songwriters. A lot write in very tiny handwriting, like they all took the same course in torture. Or maybe my prescription needs altering. There is a lot of talk about depression in these journals. It’s like they live together in the same room but they do not. I guess it is part of being twenty-one. Some try writing lyrics about every experience. Some write only in stream of consciousness. Some write very little or barely at all. Some make a big mess which I often enjoy. Some add a lot of pictures. Once in a while someone has a profound sense of poetry. It is hard to give anyone a mark, who is to say your journal is wrong? But thems the rules so I have a rubric of just three things. An entry everyday, examples of experimenting with class exercises, being creative in your writing. It seems easy to me to ace this thing but many do not.