meredithsell

  • 11:51 pm. MONDAY, MAY 19th. I’ve been in writing mode all day. I haven’t written much, but my mind has been super focused and soaking up everything. My thoughts are toward the future, as in next week, when I come back from my college commencement and return to my bedroom in Queens, my food service…

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  • This is the third in a new series of weekly posts recommending well-written narrative nonfiction/longform articles. This week’s picks: The Undefeated Champions of Defeat City by Kathy Dobie, GQ Artfully written, this piece introduces North Camden, New Jersey, a city known for drugs and violence, and Bryan Morton, a North Camden native who decided to combat decay by starting…

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  • Read last week’s post here or view all other New York City posts. This week, after a long, drawn-out research process that often had me missing the forest for the trees, I finally finished my internship piece to my editor’s satisfaction and he published it on City Limits’ web site. It is by no means the best thing I’ve…

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  • This is the second in a new series of weekly posts recommending well-written narrative nonfiction/longform articles. This week’s picks: Ra’Shede’s Road by John Rosengren, SB Nation Ra’Shede Hageman, senior defensive tackle at the University of Minnesota, has the potential to secure a bright future. But he also has a past and a temper to overcome.…

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  • Read last week’s post here or view all other New York City posts. I’d just settled on the bench, purse and my bag of leftover food from work on my lap, one per leg. Done with work, time to wait for the F train and go home. “Meredith?” I looked up to see a familiar face, soft round features…

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  • I read a lot of articles every week, and I try to focus my reading on the pieces I want to write, meaning longform or narrative nonfiction. This is a genre that’s published all over the place: in marketing materials (typically company magazines), consumer and trade publications, newspapers, web site — even BuzzFeed publishes longform.…

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  • Read last week’s post here or view all other New York City posts. It’s a battle I’ve been losing. Sure, I ran 1.4 miles today in 10:38. Sure, I followed it up with sprints and crunches and pushups. Sure, I got my heart rate up and didn’t feel awful. But I am not where I was three months…

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  • Read last week’s post here or view all other New York City posts. Time is currency. And this week, mine was spent — in research and at work. With it went my energy, so rather than sitting at my desk for three-plus hours, badgering myself to write something worth reading, I present the following: a conglomeration of thoughts,…

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  • Some things shouldn’t change. My first job was one that did. Last week, I posted this piece on Medium. I wrote it last semester for Advanced Creative Writing and have been holding onto it, waiting to be sure I wasn’t returning to my old job and wanting to be careful about where I shared it…

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  • Read last week’s post here or view all other New York City posts. The Ironclad Building on Main Street in Cooperstown looks well-kept from the outside: two clean, windowed storefronts on the ground level, second- and third-floor windows surrounded by if not fresh, at least not peeling paint. You would never guess, from looking at the outside, that…

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