A former student was given an assignment by her English 101 professor to ask a teacher the following questions:
1) How do you feel about writing?
2) Why is writing important to you?
Following is my response:
Cess-
Ok, I'm back. Here goes. It gets a little weird, so stay with me. The simple truth is that most people think I am a lunatic when I tell them how I feel about writing. I recognize that normal people aren't wired this way, but I feel about writing the way most people feel about, say, air. Or skydiving. Or the mountains, or hot fudge sundaes, or God. No, not God exactly, but religion maybe. I knew when I was five years old and used to play with my sister's little blue plastic manual typewriter that I was going to be a writer. It's not that it was the only thing I could do (though there were pitiful times in eighth grade gym class when it felt like that) but I always knew that it was kinda my secret superpower. The world could be the most messed up place, my parents could be fighting, the boy I liked could tell me to drop dead, I could have no friends, my cat could barf all over my homework, and when I opened a notebook and wrote about it, everything got ok again. For Christmas in eighth grade, my parents got me a copy of "Writing Down the Bones" by Natalie Goldberg, and it changed my life. Suddenly, I was allowed to write, and allowed to write about anything. My parents, and the book, had given me permission. Writing was comfort at the end of a hard day, a way to keep me sane in school and in my own head as a teenager, and it was freedom. I could be anyone. I could be me (whoever that was). I could try on all sorts of things, and not get in trouble. I could work out all the stupid things that people said and did, and fix them. I could tell a story the way I wanted it to end. I could get the guy, run away from home, climb mountains, hop freight trains, go to college, solve mysteries--all while sprawled across my bed with a black-and-white marbled notebook. (The green ink thing also started in eighth grade, as a way to piss off my English teacher, who already disliked me because I was smarter than she was....but that's another story.)
Writing for me now is a ritual of peace and centering; a way to touch base with myself, my emotions, whatever divinity exists, the world. It's a way to keep track of where I'm going, not to mention where I've been. It's a sort of road map. Still, if the world or my marriage or my health threatens to fall apart, I can open a black-and-white notebook and uncap my green fountain pen, and everything will seem all right. If I didn't have that--and there have been times I have been unable to write, either physically or emotionally literally unable to write, for whatever reason--I would be a most unhappy sight. It's not pretty. If I don't write, I get cranky. My husband once threatened to lock me in my writing room until I had written enough pages that I got out of my funk! (the threat itself made me laugh so hard it did the trick, but I went and wrote for an hour anyway). If I don't write, I can't figure anything out. Why I think something, why I feel a certain way, or sometimes even what I am feeling or thinking in the first place. I am not the world's best debater with the spoken word--my thoughts get tangled up unless I have a pen in my hand. I express myself so much more clearly in writing than I do out loud, in part because I used to be self-conscious about the sound of my voice, in part because you apparently use entirely different parts of your brain to write than you do to speak. Who knew? Sometimes I have to go back to one of my old journals to prove a point in an argument. If I've written about it, I'm usually right (and sometimes I'm word-for-word right, which pissed my husband off no end). If I didn't write about it, I may forget entirely. I probably will, in fact. My brain can be a notorious sieve. Without writing, nothing makes sense. Certainly not this weird life we're in.
This is probably way more than you bargained for, and not even close to what your professor is expecting. But he should have known better--he's a writing teacher, after all.
Be well.
x
FireCat
27 August 2008
23 August 2008
Operation Alphabet Soup, Fall 2008 Edition
This time last week, I was prepped to teach five classes at two different colleges, and ramping up for my upcoming GRE. I took the GRE once, to get into my MFA program. Fifteen years ago. Since GRE scores are good for a maximum of five years--though some schools have shorter windows, as if our intellect, like sour cream, gets rancid after sitting around unused for extended periods of time--I was due for another set.
Let's just point out that it's been twenty years since I've taken a math class, and the last time I took the GRE, I actually had to use a pencil. Needless to say, "ramping up" roughly translates into "experiencing recurring bouts of unmitigated panic".
First I got a mysterious message from College A, from the new department secretary, saying that the new Dean had given her my resume and wanted to know if I was interested in an adjunct position at College A. This mysterious message was quite troubling mostly because last time I checked, I have an adjunct position at College A. In fact, a syllabus from no fewer than three classes was likely in the new secretary's inbox as she dialed. One of them turned out to be utterly useless because COM101-M4 has a late start date, but that's another post altogether, and not worth getting into.
Two days later, one of the part-time assistants from College A also called, wanting to know when I was going to email a copy of my current syllabus to the department. After pointing out that the answer was, indeed, "two weeks ago" I asked to be transfered to the new full-time department secretary. The one who had tried to give me my own job, as if I should be grateful for it.
Eventually, we got things straightened out at College A, blaming most of the kerfluffle on the new Dean.
Then College B called.
College B is notoriously wonderful. It's a small, Catholic college; it engages in service learning on a regular basis in which even the College President participates alongside freshmen and volleyball coaches, bends over backwards to accommodate my particular insanities, and just generally has its shit together on a pretty consistent basis. In short, I often want to kiss College B on the mouth. Sadly, College B was calling to cancel ENG104, my favourite class of all time, for the second consecutive semester due to underenrollment. The department chair and I spoke at length about our desire to see this course fly, and plans are underway to revamp some other things in the department requirements (including a core course that is much less effective than planned) to resurrect this class. Presumably so I can teach it. It is, after all, the class they originally hired me to teach in the first place.
That was Tuesday night at supper. Thursday morning, I was sitting on the front porch drinking an enormous mug of tea when the phone rang again. Again, it was College B. I tensed, thinking they were going to take ENG101 away from me, even though there are 20 students enrolled and no full-time professor in his right mind wants to teach ENG101. That's why there are adjuncts in the first place. Well, that and the lack of office space on campus.
But no. The department chair was calling to see if I could teach ENG210, something I have not only never taught, but haven't particularly studied since I left my undergraduate institution lo these fifteen years ago (see paragraph 1). I allowed has how I really couldn't answer this right away, because I was leaving to take the GRE in thirty minutes, and I can't freak out about two things at the same time, so I was tabling this discussion until later that evening when I could freak out about it properly. In the meantime, could she send me the syllabus and other useful information (like when does this class even meet?) so I could make a more informed, or at least slightly less hare-brained, decision.
By the way, did I mention that ENG210 apparently has no syllabus, just a basic outline of how to teach the entire history of theatre (which is only about as long as the entire history of man walking upright) in fifteen weeks? And that the textbook that was ordered by the professor to take this class in between its original creator and me does not actually match the textbook followed by the syllabus? And that class starts in 72 hours? Yeah. Not kidding.
Still, being a sucker (we are, after all, a service-learning based institution) and intrigued by the glitter and glamour of getting to teach a 200-level class, and also possibly still riding high on the fact that I had totally rocked the GRE, computer algorithm or no, I caved. Said I would teach it. Even though it now doubles the number of days per week I have to drive to College B, and trebles the number of times I have to commute directly from teaching at College B to College A, which involves driving on an toll road that ends in the word "Turnpike" through a notorious Eastern city in midafternoon.
Now where did I leave those amphetamines?
Let's just point out that it's been twenty years since I've taken a math class, and the last time I took the GRE, I actually had to use a pencil. Needless to say, "ramping up" roughly translates into "experiencing recurring bouts of unmitigated panic".
First I got a mysterious message from College A, from the new department secretary, saying that the new Dean had given her my resume and wanted to know if I was interested in an adjunct position at College A. This mysterious message was quite troubling mostly because last time I checked, I have an adjunct position at College A. In fact, a syllabus from no fewer than three classes was likely in the new secretary's inbox as she dialed. One of them turned out to be utterly useless because COM101-M4 has a late start date, but that's another post altogether, and not worth getting into.
Two days later, one of the part-time assistants from College A also called, wanting to know when I was going to email a copy of my current syllabus to the department. After pointing out that the answer was, indeed, "two weeks ago" I asked to be transfered to the new full-time department secretary. The one who had tried to give me my own job, as if I should be grateful for it.
Eventually, we got things straightened out at College A, blaming most of the kerfluffle on the new Dean.
Then College B called.
College B is notoriously wonderful. It's a small, Catholic college; it engages in service learning on a regular basis in which even the College President participates alongside freshmen and volleyball coaches, bends over backwards to accommodate my particular insanities, and just generally has its shit together on a pretty consistent basis. In short, I often want to kiss College B on the mouth. Sadly, College B was calling to cancel ENG104, my favourite class of all time, for the second consecutive semester due to underenrollment. The department chair and I spoke at length about our desire to see this course fly, and plans are underway to revamp some other things in the department requirements (including a core course that is much less effective than planned) to resurrect this class. Presumably so I can teach it. It is, after all, the class they originally hired me to teach in the first place.
That was Tuesday night at supper. Thursday morning, I was sitting on the front porch drinking an enormous mug of tea when the phone rang again. Again, it was College B. I tensed, thinking they were going to take ENG101 away from me, even though there are 20 students enrolled and no full-time professor in his right mind wants to teach ENG101. That's why there are adjuncts in the first place. Well, that and the lack of office space on campus.
But no. The department chair was calling to see if I could teach ENG210, something I have not only never taught, but haven't particularly studied since I left my undergraduate institution lo these fifteen years ago (see paragraph 1). I allowed has how I really couldn't answer this right away, because I was leaving to take the GRE in thirty minutes, and I can't freak out about two things at the same time, so I was tabling this discussion until later that evening when I could freak out about it properly. In the meantime, could she send me the syllabus and other useful information (like when does this class even meet?) so I could make a more informed, or at least slightly less hare-brained, decision.
By the way, did I mention that ENG210 apparently has no syllabus, just a basic outline of how to teach the entire history of theatre (which is only about as long as the entire history of man walking upright) in fifteen weeks? And that the textbook that was ordered by the professor to take this class in between its original creator and me does not actually match the textbook followed by the syllabus? And that class starts in 72 hours? Yeah. Not kidding.
Still, being a sucker (we are, after all, a service-learning based institution) and intrigued by the glitter and glamour of getting to teach a 200-level class, and also possibly still riding high on the fact that I had totally rocked the GRE, computer algorithm or no, I caved. Said I would teach it. Even though it now doubles the number of days per week I have to drive to College B, and trebles the number of times I have to commute directly from teaching at College B to College A, which involves driving on an toll road that ends in the word "Turnpike" through a notorious Eastern city in midafternoon.
Now where did I leave those amphetamines?
08 August 2008
Pop Quiz
Today's pop quiz will be in architecture. There will be one problem. You will have an unlimited amount of time to solve this problem.
1. What's wrong with this picture? (Hint: it's not the location of the back door.)
1. What's wrong with this picture? (Hint: it's not the location of the back door.)
Yes, I seriously saw this whilst perusing Craigslist.
07 August 2008
FireCat Takes One in the Ass.
(No, not up the ass, in the.....oh, never mind, just click the link.)
Behold, denizens of Derfwad Manor. The mighty Mrs. G. has spoken.
And the puny, approval-craving FireCat has responded.
Yes, the short news is that I've been cleared to run again, in slow, teeny little prescribed increments. For the past two weeks it's been fifteen minutes every three days, or about as often as I spend on personal hygiene. Beginning Monday, though, it's bumped up to a whopping fifteen minutes every two days.
Can't ya just hardly stand it?
The good news: even this little bit keeps me from going entirely mazurkoid over research for a critical paper I need to have done by December. There's only so much Thoreau a girl can read before she has to go pound some serious pavement. Or, in my case, packed dirt and gravel, as roads are off-limits except during races.
The bad news: fifteen minutes is about all the aerobic activity I can handle now, just twelve short months after a splendid 110+ mile August log.
Behold, denizens of Derfwad Manor. The mighty Mrs. G. has spoken.
And the puny, approval-craving FireCat has responded.
Yes, the short news is that I've been cleared to run again, in slow, teeny little prescribed increments. For the past two weeks it's been fifteen minutes every three days, or about as often as I spend on personal hygiene. Beginning Monday, though, it's bumped up to a whopping fifteen minutes every two days.
Can't ya just hardly stand it?
The good news: even this little bit keeps me from going entirely mazurkoid over research for a critical paper I need to have done by December. There's only so much Thoreau a girl can read before she has to go pound some serious pavement. Or, in my case, packed dirt and gravel, as roads are off-limits except during races.
The bad news: fifteen minutes is about all the aerobic activity I can handle now, just twelve short months after a splendid 110+ mile August log.
07 July 2008
17 June 2008
The Lip Bone's Connected to the Trombone
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14 June 2008
Captain Jack Russell and His Crew
Drink up, me hearties, yo ho.
Ever since the premature heat wave this time last week, I have been suffering from that special brand of restless insomnia that can only strike PMSing women whose homes have no air-conditioning. The past two nights, dawn has broken before I was able to sleep, and even then I was up again every two hours to untwist the sheets, find a dry spot in the puddles of sweat, growl something surly to the cat at the foot of the bed demanding breakfast (which was already downstairs if she'd just get off her furry ass and go look), and try to return to unconsciousness. It hasn't been great for morale here in Three Feathers. Fortunately I'm the only one here these days, so I don't feel guilty when I finally slouch downstairs at the crack of noon.
This morning was particularly rough. The humidity is starting to build again, and after finally relaxing at 5:30, I was awake again just after 6:00 and 7:00 to reassess the ORSP situation, not to mention wander down the hall to check on the peeing situation.
Then, at about 8:30, my neighbour walked his dog. The aptly named Jack is (of all things) a Jack Russell mix who suffers from the twin behavioural issues of being part Jack Russell and spending his life with Paul as his full-time companion. They're a good match for each other. They're both wholesomely cute, though in a way that would never encourage me personally to take them home with me; they're well-meaning, enthusiastic, and friendly, sometimes to the point of exhaustion; and both a little bit clueless about social norms. Fortunately neither of them has ever tried to sniff my crotch. In short, I like them both all right, but in short doses and not first thing in the morning. I'm antisocial that way. I think of it as my contribution to world peace.
One of Paul's biggest difficulties with the world is that he grew up across the road on a horse farm of about 40 acres. This has left him with a certain perception of the world and his place in it. Not that he feels a righteous ownership, or that the world owes him anything--he's far too disarming for that. No, the difficulty is that Paul just honestly sometimes flat-out forgets that other people occupy space too, having had so much of it to himself growing up. It's an honest mistake, one we are taking great pains to subtly correct now that Paul and his family occupy land on three sides of us on this side of the road. (The fourth side is railroad tracks.)
Enter Jack. Like all dogs, Jack likes to be walked first thing in the morning. Like all owners of large tracts of land, Paul eschews the conventions of leashdom whenever possible. Like all grouchy neighbours, I am of mixed opinion about this. My problem is not that Jack frequently gets a bug in his puppy little terrier brain and shoots like a rocket in search of a groundhog or a bee or a tennis ball or whatever else might catch his canine fancy at any given moment. Jack is a dog. Dogs are wired that way. Lord knows I've fielded enough phone calls from the next county over because Juno wanted a bobcat for lunch. My problem is that in the summer, the family's alarm clock sounds like this: "Jack! Jack!! Jack, where's your ball? Jack, come! Jack!!!! Who's the good boy, Jack? Jack?? Jack!" This occurs not only because of the aforementioned off-leash tendencies, but because it hasn't yet occurred to Jack's owner that he does not own forty acres of land with no neighbours, and that--get this--sound does not bend to follow property lines.
This has been particularly hard on my father because his name is John. His family nickname? Is, of course, Jack. Early on, he tried to break Paul of this habit by throwing open the nearest window and yelling, "What?" in his sourest Brooklyn accent. Sadly, rather than taking the hint, Paul was amused by this.
One good thing that's happened in the two years we've all been owned by Jack is that this phenomenon has started occurring between 8:00 and 9:00 AM, instead of the less-than-godly 6:30 at which it often used to take place. I don't know whether this is a concession to Paul's schedule, the sleeping habits of his neighbours, or simply the crate-training of a dog with an infinitesimal bladder. As someone who often needs to pee at the crack of dawn myself, I can sympathize with poor Jack. It's his owner who drives me to early morning uncharitableness, especially when I've only just gotten into some semblance of sleep. I do not need to hear a running monologue about what is happening outside my window, in (I may point out) the strip of driveway that he's actually technically trespassing on. Frankly, when I am asleep, I don't care where Jack's ball is, though I do have an idea of where I'd like to put it.
But this morning? Jack did not have a tennis ball. Oh, no no no. No, this morning Jack had a squeaky toy.
Later this afternoon I may post a request for bail money.
Ever since the premature heat wave this time last week, I have been suffering from that special brand of restless insomnia that can only strike PMSing women whose homes have no air-conditioning. The past two nights, dawn has broken before I was able to sleep, and even then I was up again every two hours to untwist the sheets, find a dry spot in the puddles of sweat, growl something surly to the cat at the foot of the bed demanding breakfast (which was already downstairs if she'd just get off her furry ass and go look), and try to return to unconsciousness. It hasn't been great for morale here in Three Feathers. Fortunately I'm the only one here these days, so I don't feel guilty when I finally slouch downstairs at the crack of noon.
This morning was particularly rough. The humidity is starting to build again, and after finally relaxing at 5:30, I was awake again just after 6:00 and 7:00 to reassess the ORSP situation, not to mention wander down the hall to check on the peeing situation.
Then, at about 8:30, my neighbour walked his dog. The aptly named Jack is (of all things) a Jack Russell mix who suffers from the twin behavioural issues of being part Jack Russell and spending his life with Paul as his full-time companion. They're a good match for each other. They're both wholesomely cute, though in a way that would never encourage me personally to take them home with me; they're well-meaning, enthusiastic, and friendly, sometimes to the point of exhaustion; and both a little bit clueless about social norms. Fortunately neither of them has ever tried to sniff my crotch. In short, I like them both all right, but in short doses and not first thing in the morning. I'm antisocial that way. I think of it as my contribution to world peace.
One of Paul's biggest difficulties with the world is that he grew up across the road on a horse farm of about 40 acres. This has left him with a certain perception of the world and his place in it. Not that he feels a righteous ownership, or that the world owes him anything--he's far too disarming for that. No, the difficulty is that Paul just honestly sometimes flat-out forgets that other people occupy space too, having had so much of it to himself growing up. It's an honest mistake, one we are taking great pains to subtly correct now that Paul and his family occupy land on three sides of us on this side of the road. (The fourth side is railroad tracks.)
Enter Jack. Like all dogs, Jack likes to be walked first thing in the morning. Like all owners of large tracts of land, Paul eschews the conventions of leashdom whenever possible. Like all grouchy neighbours, I am of mixed opinion about this. My problem is not that Jack frequently gets a bug in his puppy little terrier brain and shoots like a rocket in search of a groundhog or a bee or a tennis ball or whatever else might catch his canine fancy at any given moment. Jack is a dog. Dogs are wired that way. Lord knows I've fielded enough phone calls from the next county over because Juno wanted a bobcat for lunch. My problem is that in the summer, the family's alarm clock sounds like this: "Jack! Jack!! Jack, where's your ball? Jack, come! Jack!!!! Who's the good boy, Jack? Jack?? Jack!" This occurs not only because of the aforementioned off-leash tendencies, but because it hasn't yet occurred to Jack's owner that he does not own forty acres of land with no neighbours, and that--get this--sound does not bend to follow property lines.
This has been particularly hard on my father because his name is John. His family nickname? Is, of course, Jack. Early on, he tried to break Paul of this habit by throwing open the nearest window and yelling, "What?" in his sourest Brooklyn accent. Sadly, rather than taking the hint, Paul was amused by this.
One good thing that's happened in the two years we've all been owned by Jack is that this phenomenon has started occurring between 8:00 and 9:00 AM, instead of the less-than-godly 6:30 at which it often used to take place. I don't know whether this is a concession to Paul's schedule, the sleeping habits of his neighbours, or simply the crate-training of a dog with an infinitesimal bladder. As someone who often needs to pee at the crack of dawn myself, I can sympathize with poor Jack. It's his owner who drives me to early morning uncharitableness, especially when I've only just gotten into some semblance of sleep. I do not need to hear a running monologue about what is happening outside my window, in (I may point out) the strip of driveway that he's actually technically trespassing on. Frankly, when I am asleep, I don't care where Jack's ball is, though I do have an idea of where I'd like to put it.
But this morning? Jack did not have a tennis ball. Oh, no no no. No, this morning Jack had a squeaky toy.
Later this afternoon I may post a request for bail money.
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