(no subject)
OOC
Name: jimmy-jam james
Email: butamirror@gmail.com
Something interesting about yourself: i can kick myself in the head.
IC
Character name: Rush Taylor
Played-by: Thomas Penfound
Brief history: Elise Taylor was 19 when she got pregnant by her then-boyfriend Nick, a 23 year old college drop-out with high hopes of succeeding in the underground Ohioan grunge band scene. (In retrospect, she had realized that he was not the most intelligent choice of mate.) As a young, optimistic woman, she thought that the opportunity to have a baby while she was still young and attractive was a blessing rather than a curse, and she gushingly told Nick, who reacted as well as could have been expected by him, which was to be noncommittal; he neither recoiled nor embraced the idea of having a child.
She moved in with him with her parents' tentative blessing and carried her child for 8 months, living modestly and making plans for the future. After a late lunch with her mother on a Sunday afternoon, she went home to their Columbus apartment to find it cleaned out. Everything that she hadn't moved in was gone, and Nick had left her nothing; there was no money to pay the rent due within two weeks, no note explaining his departure, and no way to contact him. Elise called Nick's mother, and received no answer.
She took her abandonment very well, considering she had no money, and nowhere to live; she had always lived in a two-bedroom house with her parents, sharing a bedroom with her sister, and there was no room for herself and the baby on the way. Her parents couldn't afford to pay the rent for her apartment, but could pay for the rent in a smaller town, so she packed up and moved to Lima, where some extended family lived. Elise had not yet settled in her apartment when she went into labor and had her first experience with a Lima hospital.
Having no names chosen for her son, she named him the first thing that came to mind: Rush. Funnily enough, his birth had taken nearly 23 hours.
As a young child, Rush was captivated by nearly everything there was to be captivated by, and as soon as he learned to read, he read everything he could, and absorbed facts that he quickly tried to insert into adults' conversations. When he entered school, teachers said he was disruptive and talked too much in class, was a smart aleck, and thought that he knew more than they did. The thing was -- Rush didn't understand any of this criticism. He wasn't exactly friendly with many kids at school, and didn't understand when it was and was not appropriate to speak out against things that he thought were incorrect. So he ended up correcting teachers and other students at inopportune times and not realizing why it was frowned upon. And when they disagree with him, he can become somewhat annoyed, leading to accusations of him being belligerent.
However, despite the fact that he is often sent to the principal for being seen as belligerent and arrogant in class, he is hardly considered a "cool kid" -- in fact, he still doesn't have many friends. He can get along with people well enough in class, but they don't exactly invite him to eat lunch with them.
At a young age, he showed some proficiency for music, and expressed a desire to learn the piano. As his mother had no skill in it herself, she sent him off to the cheapest tutor she could find, and he was learning the simplest skills at the age of eight, proceeding forward with a rigorous training schedule until the present day. Rush's skill as a pianist is the only thing he is particularly arrogant about, and if anyone feels like challenging him, he will accept. This is his third year playing piano for the Glee club, having begun in his Freshman year.
Although Rush doesn't particularly talk about it to anyone yet, he has absolutely no idea what he wants to do with his life. He has some talent as a pianist, but certainly not enough to become a famous musician, especially considering he has no other musical aptitude, including none with lyrics. And, well, he doesn't know that he'd want to be famous anyway, especially not with the likes of some of the other similarly inclined people he's always around, by playing piano for the Glee club. So he's worried that when he graduates next year, he'll go to college with an undeclared major, and still have no inkling of what he wants out of life.
Rush never wanted to be a stereotype of a boy without a father figure, especially because his older cousins provided male role models, and his mother had male friends he grew up around, and she remarried when he was 13, but there is a part of him that wonders about his father. Even if his father hasn't gone on to do anything particularly amazing, which is probably the case, Rush does wonder where he is -- if he's alive or not, if he is rich or poor. He's looked his father's name up online and tried to pursue it as much as his mother has allowed, but he hasn't gotten anywhere yet.
More than anything, Rush comes off as somewhat shy and awkward unless he is playing piano. Then he becomes focused on that, and it can be difficult to get him out of the mood, so to speak, once he has immersed himself in the instrument.
Writing sample: First Person
I'm sitting outside Figgins' office. For the third time this year. It's only September. Yeah, I know that sounds pretty bad, but it's not really my fault. My US History teacher has gotten some very important facts wrong. In the first day of class, she insisted that the myth about George Washington and the cherry tree was hard fact, not even up for debate. I calmly explained that she was wrong, and apparently she didn't appreciate that.
And most recently, she perpetuated the stereotype about Native Americans being savages to the colonists -- I politely disabused her of this notion, only for her to become righteously offended and throw me out. I just can't wait for my mother to hear about this one, because Figgins told me he was going to have to call her next time this happened.
I like it out here better than in that class, though. Don't have to listen to her spout lies about the colonists trying to live harmoniously only to have the Native Americans spoil this ideal life.
Third Person
Rush pushed back his chair and stomped moodily out of Figgins' office, which was a harsher show of emotion than he might usually display at school. It was so unfair that his mother had been told that absurd story about him being rude to his teacher in front of students looking on and gasping (he would refuse to admit that he was exaggerating the version Figgins told his mother). Thankfully the wait had been so long outside of the office that the class -- his last of the day -- was just letting out now, and the rest of the students were emerging from their classrooms. Rush pulled his backpack higher on his shoulders and found his locker, unfortunately near his history class.
Just after he had opened his locker, she came out of her classroom and passed by him.
"I hope you can learn to accept what I teach as fact, Rush. I hate to get you in trouble so often," she said, laying a hand on his shoulder.
Rush shrugged her off and shut his locker, pushing past her with a noncommittal grumble. He didn't have time for people who didn't bother to check their facts, and then accused him of being in the wrong. He went straight to his favorite practice room and set his backpack on the floor next to the piano bench.
He could get in at least two or three hours before he had to walk home.
Mixtape song: Colorblind - Counting Crows
Name: jimmy-jam james
Email: butamirror@gmail.com
Something interesting about yourself: i can kick myself in the head.
IC
Character name: Rush Taylor
Played-by: Thomas Penfound
Brief history: Elise Taylor was 19 when she got pregnant by her then-boyfriend Nick, a 23 year old college drop-out with high hopes of succeeding in the underground Ohioan grunge band scene. (In retrospect, she had realized that he was not the most intelligent choice of mate.) As a young, optimistic woman, she thought that the opportunity to have a baby while she was still young and attractive was a blessing rather than a curse, and she gushingly told Nick, who reacted as well as could have been expected by him, which was to be noncommittal; he neither recoiled nor embraced the idea of having a child.
She moved in with him with her parents' tentative blessing and carried her child for 8 months, living modestly and making plans for the future. After a late lunch with her mother on a Sunday afternoon, she went home to their Columbus apartment to find it cleaned out. Everything that she hadn't moved in was gone, and Nick had left her nothing; there was no money to pay the rent due within two weeks, no note explaining his departure, and no way to contact him. Elise called Nick's mother, and received no answer.
She took her abandonment very well, considering she had no money, and nowhere to live; she had always lived in a two-bedroom house with her parents, sharing a bedroom with her sister, and there was no room for herself and the baby on the way. Her parents couldn't afford to pay the rent for her apartment, but could pay for the rent in a smaller town, so she packed up and moved to Lima, where some extended family lived. Elise had not yet settled in her apartment when she went into labor and had her first experience with a Lima hospital.
Having no names chosen for her son, she named him the first thing that came to mind: Rush. Funnily enough, his birth had taken nearly 23 hours.
As a young child, Rush was captivated by nearly everything there was to be captivated by, and as soon as he learned to read, he read everything he could, and absorbed facts that he quickly tried to insert into adults' conversations. When he entered school, teachers said he was disruptive and talked too much in class, was a smart aleck, and thought that he knew more than they did. The thing was -- Rush didn't understand any of this criticism. He wasn't exactly friendly with many kids at school, and didn't understand when it was and was not appropriate to speak out against things that he thought were incorrect. So he ended up correcting teachers and other students at inopportune times and not realizing why it was frowned upon. And when they disagree with him, he can become somewhat annoyed, leading to accusations of him being belligerent.
However, despite the fact that he is often sent to the principal for being seen as belligerent and arrogant in class, he is hardly considered a "cool kid" -- in fact, he still doesn't have many friends. He can get along with people well enough in class, but they don't exactly invite him to eat lunch with them.
At a young age, he showed some proficiency for music, and expressed a desire to learn the piano. As his mother had no skill in it herself, she sent him off to the cheapest tutor she could find, and he was learning the simplest skills at the age of eight, proceeding forward with a rigorous training schedule until the present day. Rush's skill as a pianist is the only thing he is particularly arrogant about, and if anyone feels like challenging him, he will accept. This is his third year playing piano for the Glee club, having begun in his Freshman year.
Although Rush doesn't particularly talk about it to anyone yet, he has absolutely no idea what he wants to do with his life. He has some talent as a pianist, but certainly not enough to become a famous musician, especially considering he has no other musical aptitude, including none with lyrics. And, well, he doesn't know that he'd want to be famous anyway, especially not with the likes of some of the other similarly inclined people he's always around, by playing piano for the Glee club. So he's worried that when he graduates next year, he'll go to college with an undeclared major, and still have no inkling of what he wants out of life.
Rush never wanted to be a stereotype of a boy without a father figure, especially because his older cousins provided male role models, and his mother had male friends he grew up around, and she remarried when he was 13, but there is a part of him that wonders about his father. Even if his father hasn't gone on to do anything particularly amazing, which is probably the case, Rush does wonder where he is -- if he's alive or not, if he is rich or poor. He's looked his father's name up online and tried to pursue it as much as his mother has allowed, but he hasn't gotten anywhere yet.
More than anything, Rush comes off as somewhat shy and awkward unless he is playing piano. Then he becomes focused on that, and it can be difficult to get him out of the mood, so to speak, once he has immersed himself in the instrument.
Writing sample: First Person
I'm sitting outside Figgins' office. For the third time this year. It's only September. Yeah, I know that sounds pretty bad, but it's not really my fault. My US History teacher has gotten some very important facts wrong. In the first day of class, she insisted that the myth about George Washington and the cherry tree was hard fact, not even up for debate. I calmly explained that she was wrong, and apparently she didn't appreciate that.
And most recently, she perpetuated the stereotype about Native Americans being savages to the colonists -- I politely disabused her of this notion, only for her to become righteously offended and throw me out. I just can't wait for my mother to hear about this one, because Figgins told me he was going to have to call her next time this happened.
I like it out here better than in that class, though. Don't have to listen to her spout lies about the colonists trying to live harmoniously only to have the Native Americans spoil this ideal life.
Third Person
Rush pushed back his chair and stomped moodily out of Figgins' office, which was a harsher show of emotion than he might usually display at school. It was so unfair that his mother had been told that absurd story about him being rude to his teacher in front of students looking on and gasping (he would refuse to admit that he was exaggerating the version Figgins told his mother). Thankfully the wait had been so long outside of the office that the class -- his last of the day -- was just letting out now, and the rest of the students were emerging from their classrooms. Rush pulled his backpack higher on his shoulders and found his locker, unfortunately near his history class.
Just after he had opened his locker, she came out of her classroom and passed by him.
"I hope you can learn to accept what I teach as fact, Rush. I hate to get you in trouble so often," she said, laying a hand on his shoulder.
Rush shrugged her off and shut his locker, pushing past her with a noncommittal grumble. He didn't have time for people who didn't bother to check their facts, and then accused him of being in the wrong. He went straight to his favorite practice room and set his backpack on the floor next to the piano bench.
He could get in at least two or three hours before he had to walk home.
Mixtape song: Colorblind - Counting Crows