Back-to-school special.
Yesterday I went to the nearest IKEA, two and a half hours away. The goal was a drying rack and some bookcases. I returned with the bookcases, a pair of chairs, some drawers, a new bedspread -- and no drying rack. K-Mart it is.
My first workshop was Wednesday -- fifteen of us (which seems large) in a circle, folded into the school desks that have attached writing surfaces, aligned for the right- or left-handed. Yes, back in school, but workshops are different. Whatever the environment, I am familiar with workshops. There was reading, there was conversation, there was a sense that in a short hour or two many of us would be wrapping ourselves around beers at Mitch's across the street. I left with a schedule, a handful of stories to critique for next week, and the confidence that, yes, I can do this.
First proper class was Thursday. Sociolinguistics; American dialects. It was nearly the same environment: the same school desks crowding a carpeted floor, the concrete walls painted ivory, the afternoon light fading though high windows. I was given a syllabus and a set of basic definitions I didn't understand. This time I left scared. Can I do this?
And then, because (despite the desks) life at grad school is not life getting a B.A., there was nothing all weekend, nothing until tomorrow evening at six. I make my own schedule. I plan my own work. I decide whether climbing or reading Mission of Gravity for the 216th time is a legitimate break or procrastination. I can't drift to the Lion's Cage at the student union and assume someone, someone, will turn up to amuse me before I have worked too hard.
This is part of why I am here. To learn, yeah, definitely. To prove I have the chops for the intellectual work, yes. To write. To teach. To get the degree I need. Yes. But also, to not spend quite so much time in coffee shops and watching kitten videos. To write because I have the space in my life, the echoing moments that turn into words.
That's the plan.
My first workshop was Wednesday -- fifteen of us (which seems large) in a circle, folded into the school desks that have attached writing surfaces, aligned for the right- or left-handed. Yes, back in school, but workshops are different. Whatever the environment, I am familiar with workshops. There was reading, there was conversation, there was a sense that in a short hour or two many of us would be wrapping ourselves around beers at Mitch's across the street. I left with a schedule, a handful of stories to critique for next week, and the confidence that, yes, I can do this.
First proper class was Thursday. Sociolinguistics; American dialects. It was nearly the same environment: the same school desks crowding a carpeted floor, the concrete walls painted ivory, the afternoon light fading though high windows. I was given a syllabus and a set of basic definitions I didn't understand. This time I left scared. Can I do this?
And then, because (despite the desks) life at grad school is not life getting a B.A., there was nothing all weekend, nothing until tomorrow evening at six. I make my own schedule. I plan my own work. I decide whether climbing or reading Mission of Gravity for the 216th time is a legitimate break or procrastination. I can't drift to the Lion's Cage at the student union and assume someone, someone, will turn up to amuse me before I have worked too hard.
This is part of why I am here. To learn, yeah, definitely. To prove I have the chops for the intellectual work, yes. To write. To teach. To get the degree I need. Yes. But also, to not spend quite so much time in coffee shops and watching kitten videos. To write because I have the space in my life, the echoing moments that turn into words.
That's the plan.