I Love Knowing Smart People

Okay, folks.  Remember how I've been trying to find balance and order between all of the many haphazard parts of my life?  Well, I found part of the answer yesterday on the blog of a very smart woman.

Jemi (Just Jemi) described how she's ordered her blog reading with folders in Google Reader.  Totally copying from Jemi, I not only set up folders for each day of the week, but I added a Daily folder (mainly for agents' blogs), and a "Whenever" folder (e.g., for the gluten-free food blogs I follow).  I know this is going to make my life so much more manageable.

Thanks, Jemi!

So, for those of you who I've missed recently, fear not.  I shall return.  I just might not return every day.  But at least this way I get to see you sometimes! :)

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In writing-related occurrences, if you didn't see yesterday's post, I'm excited about my new photo acquisition for a character in my WiP.  I'm still working toward finishing my latest draft of WiP#1 by the end of September.  My current word count holds at about 36K.  I didn't get any time to work on it on Monday, but hopefully I'll find some time on Tuesday.

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Here's a school update after day 1, for those of you who might be interested.  I've gone to my first fiction writing class already, and it was awesome.  The instructor's cool, excited, and adorable.  The other students are a wide mix from campus: seniors and freshman; creative writing majors, grad-me, and psychology majors; an even balance of men and women.

It looks like it's going to be a good class.  For the first few weeks, we'll be focusing on characterization one week, story arcs another, dialogue another, etc.  And at the end of each class she'll give us 5-10 minutes and a writing prompt to get the ol' brain cells activated.  We'll see what comes out of yesterday's prompt over the weekend...

I also had my German for reading class.  It was more or less what I expected.  The instructor said from the get-go that this would be a boring class—monotonous and tedious—but I so sincerely appreciated his honesty about it.  A few years ago I took the equivalent French class, and it was torture for many, many, many, MANY reasons (are you getting how torturous it was??), but the fact that the instructor RESENTED our boredom was ridiculous.  You translate sentences, go around in a circle to talk about your translation, you get a little bit of grammar instruction, go home, prepare, and do it again the next day.  What's exciting about that?  So, kuddos for the German guy for his honesty and bluntness.  And he doesn't care that I bought the e-book, which is good since it was 1/2 the price!

For said German class, I was dreading my hike to the library in the hopes that one more German-English dictionary could be acquired from the shelves, but I didn't have to go :)  My adviser loaned me his German-English dictionary from when he took the class XX years ago.  I'm smiling at it right now.  I love when things are easier than they should be.

In that vein, I get to pick up my books tomorrow, prepackaged and waiting for me at a pick up window in the Union.  How cool is that?

Oh, and finally, after German I went for wine with my awesome friend from the Spanish department—who, coincidentally, suffered with me through the French class.  This woman is so funny that, by the end of my third glass of wine, I was laughing so loudly I was probably irritating the wait staff (who were trying to go home... we were the last folks there...).  It was a great way to end the long first day.

And, today, the gym.  Duh duh dunnnnnnnn....


So, I stink and have no good question for you, my lovely readers, today.  My excuse: I'm writing this Monday night and am an alcoholic lightweight.  Sorry!  I promise for my interesting and writing-related insights throughout the rest of the week.

Happy Tuesday, y'all :)

Taking the Initiative

Change scares the toe-socks off of my poor little feet.**  I like consistency.  I'm not spontaneous.  I'm bordering on OCD control-freak.

Aren't you glad you follow me? Heh.

So one of my most nerve-raking experiences came a few weeks ago.  And before I tell you what I did, please know that this was an educated decision on my part, two to three years in the making.  It was not rash, and I'm pretty sure I have burned no bridges.

I told my adviser that I don't want to take my PhD exams, I don't want to write a dissertation, and I would much rather be able to spend my time writing fiction.

After much promise to help me through the writing process, giving me no less than four possible dissertation topics, and suggesting the difference in employment opportunities between having a Masters and a PhD, he said, "I'm fighting because I hate to see you go.  It would be insulting if I just said, 'Sure.  Okay.  Good luck.'"  Annoyed as I might have been through the whole discuss, I appreciated his efforts to keep me around.  He's been a great adviser for the past few years, incredibly supportive, pushed me to go beyond where I thought I could go, and got me opportunities I didn't think I could get.  I'm grateful for all of those things in ways I don't think I could express to him.

But, with all of that support and all of the push, I've learned a lot about myself.  I've learned that many of my boundaries are self-imposed, and I feel I can better recognize the ones that are real and the ones that aren't.  And I have a drive toward something I love that I didn't know I had.

So, toward the end of the meeting when he said to me, "There are creative writing class you could take..." and continues to tell me how he knows the prof and could take to him to see if I could take the class, I should have been elated.  But I balked.  Why?  Well, it was a 600-level MFA course.  MFA students go through a rigorous process to get in, submitting portfolios and publication references, etc.  It wouldn't be fair for me to walk in, sit down, and say, "Well, I published a short story in my HS writing magazine in 1995.  I'm also working on a novel, but the professionals who have seen it haven't even seen the first 10K."  Can we say "instant resent"?

But it got the idea in my head.  I began hunting through the English department's course offerings for the fall semester, and found a 200-level course—the only prerequisite being E103, or Writing for Those Who Didn't Learn How to Write in HS—on creative fiction.  Of the four or five section, one had one available slot.

So I emailed the contact to get permission to take the course, despite my lack of "How to Write a Thesis Statement" course.  As of about 3:00 this afternoon, I am officially registered in an intro to fiction writing course with a bunch of 19 year olds.

But the bottom line is, I can hear my knees rattling.  Nerves are a beautifully annoying thing.  I'm not sure what's making me so concerned about it, since the last time I took a writing class was 1999.  I can certainly use the pointers.  I want to write more short fiction to have SOMETHING to list in a query letter for publications.

It's just change.  There's no good reason to be afraid of change, except for the unknown.  That's where I'm at, folks.  Wish me luck!

And wish me luck if I don't get in, too.  I need to find three more hours of something remotely interesting to take this semester :)


How do you deal with change?  What kind of leaps-of-faith have you taken for your writing?



**Disclaimer: My feet are far from little, and I long ago got rid of all my toe socks.  My wearing them was said to scare small children due to my overly large second digit.