A Check

Defying expectations, when I arrived to present my paper at the Phi Kappa Phi ceremony today, the man behind the prize contest for which I recieved second place changed his mind and decided to award me a little cash as well, which I think was pretty darn cool; I'll now have to remember to write him an official thank you for your generosity card/letter. Aside from that, I have to admit that the paper that won the whole shabang, and five hundred bucks was actually pretty well written, and as such, works an object lesson for me in that I need to remember not to wait until the last minute to write my papers. The first place award winner even indicated in her presentation that she practically spent half the previous term writing her paper, whereas I waited until the last week to even start. This blog was started as a partial attempt on my part to alleviate some of the stress that I felt during that week trying to write a good, prize winning, 12 page paper in a matter of days. Despite everything, I still think that second place is not that bad.

Still, all of this brings to mind the famous movie, A Christmas Story, because the father - a somewhat luckless and frustrated man who is known for his outbursts of cursing - recieves a "major award" from a radio contest, something that he obviously loves tremendously because of its association as a "major award," but which is so hideous to everyone else that his wife "accidentally" breaks it while cleaning. Of course, he returns to earth in his normal more distraught condition. But as for myself, I can't help thinking about the "major award" whenever I start to feel a little pride in my accomplishment, because on some level, I fear I may instead be acting foolish.

Work

Immersed in an ocean of lassitude, with gentle waves rocking me in the warm tides of nothingness, I've let the currents of time slip past me without doing anything worth while. I think that stress has built up for so long that - among the many, many things that demand my energy and attention - I got an illness that should resolved already, I overslept and missed work yesterday, I forgot to turn in form that I should have turned in days ago, and I haven't paid any bills; now I'm flooded with work, tasks, and chores, but thanks to the unforseen, and slightly unwelcome, shut down of my body and soul, I think I'm better prepared to finish everything I've left undone.

As for Tuesday night, the award ceremony was a world class snore-a-thon that wasn't worth the time I spent there. Many of the individual departments elected to recognize as many as ten students, with each student listening to a two to five minute summary of their accomplishments, as well as the general impressions their professors have of them and their work. Expanded to a hundred and fifty students, and you have a horrifying and infinitely boring preview of our upcoming graduation ceremony. Tomorrow morning, I'm going to have to read my 2nd place paper in front of my colleagues and professors, which consequently will require some work to summarize and outline. I'm not sure, but I think I'll get a certificate there too. Tonight, if the goblins of my deeply felt lassitude are kept at bay, I'll practice reading it.

Missing

I'm not too sure that anyone really much cares, but I haven't been posting in awhile, partially because I'm still trying to get over the sick thing and partially because it is getting close to the end of the term, so I have even more papers to write and assignments to finish combined with the regular and constant worrying about graduation. Tonight is the night for major work, as well as the night that I'm supposed to recieve an award for being the outstanding student in Literature. Fortunately, I'm finally finished with my E.M. Forster project, and even though, frankly, the paper is not among my best work, I'm hoping that I can slide through with at least a B- or something; now, I have to complete a rough draft for my linguistic project by tomorrow around 4:00 p.m. As for the award presentation, I suspect that tonight will consist solely of recieving a certificate from one of the professors after sitting around being completely bored for a couple of hours, but I'm not too sure. We'll see.

The Doctor

Thankfully, I managed to get through my E.M. Forster presentation last night without too much hassle, but I think I gained more points by talking with professor about Forster during the short 5 minute break we got afterward than I did during my in-class presentation. I tried to be super-nerd with my overhead, a mention of critical theory, and the citing of some relatively obscure biographical details about Forster, yet because I felt extremely bad, I don't think I did as well as I could have. And Instead of jumping right back into work when I got home later that night, I watched the PBS series about Vikings from underneath my blanket on the couch, eventually succumbing to the alluring siren calls of sleep.

And although I felt slightly better, I thought I should cover all of my bases and try getting a note from the physician at the student health center to explain to my boss that I'm not skipping work just because I can. Unfortunately, for some reason, the doctor at the clinic - a brusque and irritated man - was apparently frustrated by the large numbers of students who have been sick lately, and perceiving himself overworked, was taking it out on the nurses and the receptionist when I arrived. Doing a bad job of hiding his frustration from the other student-patients by loudly discussing his gripes in the hall, he told them not to schedule any more walk-ins. I, of course, was a walk-in. And, at first, I don't think he believed me. It was only until he heard my cough, listened to my lungs, and noted the blood in my nose (sorry for being graphic) that he decided that I just might - in fact - be sick. Consequently, he gradually softened his rude tone. But if I had a choice, I would never go to him again. Although I know that my privileges mean that I don't suffer the indignities of most, being uninsured stinks.

Spin Dizzy

I've been sick for the last few days - really, really sick. Although I've tried to spend as much time as possible in bed recuperating as best I can, it hasn't been easy, especially since I still have a ton of homework to do. Fortunately, after class tonight, I will no longer have to worry about my E.M. Forster presentation - but I will have to write a paper about it for the week after, and I have an exam tomorrow morning. It's somewhat amazing how quickly and completely a little physical illness can de-rail you. Largely because of illness, I did not post yesterday, and unfortunately, I can't predict if I be able to post regularly in the next few days; it'll depend on how well I feel. Let me just say: I hate being sick.

Buddhism in the Library

Each year, the English honor society - Sigma Tau Delta - puts on a softball game between the students and the professors, something I have played in the past two years, but, unfortunately, it looks as if excessive rain will cancel this year, even though there is a rumor that the softball event will turn into a basketball event so it can be held in doors and out of the rain. As a result, I'm postponing my trip to the big city, until I know what's happening for sure.

Consequently, I've been doing homework and was just recently slogging away at my British Lit. novel in the library (I'm almost done!), but at 2:00 p.m. Buddhist monks, dressed in red and orange robes, performed a small ceremony, including blowing large horns, chanting, and clashing cymbals, in the lobby. Apparently, they had made a colored sand mandala yesterday and were in the process of sweeping it up into small mylar bags which they handed out to anyone who wanted one; one of them said that the sand from the mandala could be a blessing for those who decided to take it. I decided not to take one, not because I'm opposed to Buddhism - nothing could be further from the truth - but because I figured that my real desire for it actually came from a partial desire to have tangible proof that I saw Buddhist monks in the library - a purely materialist reason. Because it is my belief that sincere spirituality is central to our existence, I correspondingly feel that what I should take from the ceremony is the memory my being there and seeing it and the recognition that the real gifts are the ones created from consciously developing virtues.

The evening

Not wanting to spend the entire night in my apartment - normally just a "crash pad", but currently a miserable mess - I drove about fifteen miles out of town to a wildlife refuge where I could read the assigned novel for my British Lit. class without having to look at dirty laundry or papers strewn about my floor; I hiked a steep grassy trail up a broad hill, surprised a herd of deer grazing about twenty feet away from me, and sat in a meadow at thel top where I read my book, listening to the faint summer honking of Canadian Geese swimming in a slough at the bottom. Although I had been to this place several times before, once for a required science class, I was not quite prepared for the awesome display of rain clouds woven into the setting of a soft orange sun. It was somewhat cold, about 50 degrees, and my hands were getting a little numb; Nevertheless, I spent about an hour reading and listening to the brush sparrows flit and chirp overhead. I still haven't completed many of my school projects or papers, but I think that this excursion was refreshing enough to lend new impetus to renewed attempt.

Words

Not too long ago, while walking home from school in the early evening, just when the several clouds in the sky begin to color, I noticed a handful of birds sporting about underneath some dusty green bushes by the local senior center. At the time, something like the phrase "a sprinkling of birds, like handfuls of sugar tossed carelessly from..." jumped into my mind as a potential beginning for a poem; but while I thought about the words, the birds, and that particular metaphor for a couple of days, I didn't commit anything to paper (or screen). Shortly afterwards, I realized that I was equally affected by the words (their sounds and images) and the feeling of satisfaction that they gave me - like having just completed a delicious meal - as I was with the actual sight of the little guys peeping around and popping up and down in bark dust. Maybe I've gone off the deep end, but I think that my relationship with words and language is going through some minor transformation, to the point where I sometimes turn on the close captioning to my television, so I can continue to read even as I watch television. Of course writing all of this just now has made me realize something else - I must be the biggest nerd on the planet earth.

The Prize

I just found out that I did not win the writing prize for my Herman Melville paper that I had submitted last term at the request of one of my professors, but I was "competitive" and was among the top two or three papers. Although I nearly killed myself writing the silly thing, I knew it had some problems, and therefore, I did not have my hopes up; however, I'm intensely curious about which paper did win and who wrote it - what do the professors consider to be very good writing. I think I'm going to find out when I go to the Outstanding Student Award ceremony on the tuesday after next; my professor mentioned that the winner will read part of her paper before all of the attendees.

As for everything else, work continues to pile up. Besides all of the forms I have to fill out for grad. school, I need to finish my papers and my projects, which admittedly need more of my undivided attention. I am also going to get a cell phone tonight if everything goes according to plans, which, although I probably need a phone as much as the proverbial fish needs a bicycle, is sure to be another - albeit rather cool - distraction from my getting anything actually done.

Letters

Today must be the day for letters; When I arrived for my evening British Lit. class, the professor handed me the following:

Dear (Zhaf)

Congratulations. You have been chosen by the English department to receive the outstanding student award in English for Literature. This award will be presented to you at Student Recognition Night on Tuesday May 27 . . . Refreshments will be served after the presentation. I look forward to seeing you there.

If you have ever read Pynchon's short comic novel The Crying of Lot 49, then you'll understand why I'm beginning to suspect the Tristero.

Mailbox

This morning, when I finally managed to crawl out of bed and check the mail, I found that I had recieved yet another in a series of letters and packets from my chosen grad. school detailing both the enrollment procedures and the forms I'll need to fill out over the next few months. Later, as I walked to school, I read through the letters and course descriptions of some of the upcoming classes. To excerpt from the letters:

Dear (Zhaf),

Welcome to the University of (Grad School). I am very pleased that you will be joining us as a scholar, and, soon, as a teacher. You will be recieving more information pertaining to your graduate work when you arrive this fall, but I want to let you know about a few important things now . . . We will send you a draft of the conference schedule as soon as it is ready, but please check your department mailbox in (BLDG), the English department office, as soon as you arrive on campus, so you'll have up-to-date information about the conference and other required meetings during conference week . . . I am asking that you read one text, Terry Eagleton's Literary Theory: An Introduction (second edition), before you come to the first class. Depending on your experience, it will serve as an introduction to or review of current theoretical approaches to literature, albeit from Eagleton's bias of Marxist criticism.

All of this sounds exciting, including the more mundane elements like the fact that I'll have my own mailbox within the English department. (My own department mailbox! I never had one of those before.) It is also a little surreal to realize that, yes, I will be a scholar and, hopefully, a teacher in just a few short years. Life takes some interesting turns - and while this is all part of the goals I want in life, I don't think I could ever have imagined it happening in just this way.

The Money

All of my days of restless, preoccupied, stomach gnawing worry are over because, after my weekly early morning drive from the big city, I checked my dew covered mailbox and finally discovered the financial aid package that I had been waiting for all along, mercifully sent from one of the colleges that accepted me to English graduate school; although I suppose that my days of worry have only been effectively deferred until I eventually transition from my academic career into the real world of work. At this point, it will look as if I will have about 40k debt when all is said and done; I'm not rich, but I am determined to pursue the career I want - even if it means that, Titanic-like, I will break myself over the cold, cold iceberg of financial pain, strain, and misery.

Everything seems to be drawing to a close far too quickly. One of the things that I must remember to do is to personally thank each of my professors with a handwritten note letting them know how much their help and instruction has meant to me. Is this nerdly kissing up? Maybe, but the other, more sinister, purpose to the note will be to solidly establish an e-mail connection that I believe will help me as I crawl through graduate school over the next year.

Scratch Tickets

After another night of fitful, but oddly not stress inducing sleep, I found that I was late for my first class - again; So instead of walking into class late - which, for this particular professor, is act comparable to throwing your desk out the school window, or setting fire to the overhead projector - I walked though our small town and bought yet another in a series of greasy hamburgers (ugh - fast food again.) On some level, I'm sure that I could write biography of my entire life as told through the many hamburgers I have ever eaten. My plan is to plead for forgiveness for my abject transgressions during his office hours, but only so I can get the homework and see how well I did on Monday's exam.

Yet, before my ill-considered lunch, before my somewhat pleasant walk through town, I got the mail and discovered that I was not accepted for the Teaching Assistantship (T.A.) for the college I was waiting to hear from. Their phrasing, "we are not able to offer you a position at this time," based as it was on an explanation of tight budgets and "worthy applicants," was not terribly surprising. As I told a friend later, I figured that applying for a T.A. was like buying a dollar scratch ticket from the grocery store: you're not likely to win the lottery, but what the hell - you'll never know unless you try. (By the way, this is an odd metaphor because I never buy scratch tickets, play for the lottery, or gamble.) The way that they write these letters always depresses me, because the unavoidable implication is always that the college has many "worthy applicants," but obviously I am not one of them; it's a platitude I'd rather do without.

Nowhere Dude

About the only thing that really worked for me today was the fact that I finally received my new pair of free glasses; the old ones had broken while they were still on the warranty. I have to tell you that with the perfunctory tape that I had around the eyepiece of my glasses for the last several days really completed the nerd ensemble - I mean nerd warp factor 10. But like I told someone at work yesterday, once you've put tape on your glasses for about the fifteenth time in your life, you get over the nerd thing - mostly. The office where I bought my glasses was packed with people looking to buy sunglasses for the summer, which I believe in our extremely wet and cloudy corner of the country are incredibly unnecessary. Nevertheless, I feel slightly more human and slightly less goofy.

Generally, I spent most of the day developing good intentions to study, but miraculously avoided doing anything. Call it a gift. Although I must have said it several times before, I really am going to begin focusing on my class projects: papers about Laura Esquivel, E.M. Forster, and writing instruction in the classroom. All of the other times I mentioned doing so, I was in fact trying to mentally prepare myself for the tasks ahead and the corresponding commitment to the research and writing work. If I believe that good writing cannot occur the night before an assignment is due, then I have to start walking the walk, instead of talking the talk.

Linguisticas

My linguistics class, although very fun, like the proverbial "herding cats" metaphor, has an inchoate and dispersed feel about it. I never figured that I would say this about any of the classes that I'm taking, but I have to admit that I think the class might be a little too fun; there should be a bit more lecture. (Ugh - my nerdly propensities are getting the better of me - must . . . resist. Sigh.) Some of the students careen too easily from the topic at hand - imitation as a writing skill for example - to a discussion about the instructor's personal life or hobbies, just one example being her upcoming surgery. Our instructor - very popular - has made friends with most of the students. Partially, my desire to discuss actual linguistics more comes from the fact that I'm personally becoming excited about writing and writing instruction. Okay, it may be boasting to say so, but I think that through our book, the handouts, and the discussion we are having in class, I just might improve my writing ability to become a much better writer.

I've decided not to worry about paying for graduate school for the time being, although I am going to call one of the schools to make sure I have all of the right forms necessary to apply for their financial aid; which reminds me, I also need to visit the financial aid office at my current college to finalize leaving and make sure that everything continues to be copasetic. Nevertheless, I've over-invested in worry, and am going to concentrate more on smoothly finishing the staid academic requirements of regular school for now.

Crazy Victorians

I've just spent the last few hours - okay only three and a half - at my Gender in Victorian Literature class, and although by the end of class I'm aching to escape my cramped desk and let my legs once again taste the freedom of actually standing up and walking around freely, I was more struck this time by the eccentric love lives of some of the more famous literary Victorians. Let's just say that they understood that there was more happening above their ankles than our current popular culture would let on; however, most of the unfortunate people were absolutely terrified on the first night of their honeymoon because they either did not know what to do or what to expect. My own thoughts tended to how our culture - drastically different from the victorians in that regard - is not just comprised by a given group of people, but by a group of people at a specific period of time.

Setting Bill and Ted aside for the moment, I've occasionally wondered about how someone on the past would react in the present. For example, during the 1850's, and even as far back as the middle ages, there were a few women who wrote and published books that offered other women practical advice or described proper etiquette in varying situations. Would a Victorian recognize the same type of thing in Dear Abby or Emily Post (aka Miss Manners)? Would the average American be shocked that they might? I always used to assume that in our advanced age, we've left much of history behind - and maybe that is still true, but apparently, their influence lives on.

Early Birds

On my early Monday morning drive from the big city, a drive that usually takes at least couple of hours, I made a quick stop at a fast food restaurant (a nasty habit that one day I'll quit) and was completely charmed by two little birds flitting in the barkdust underneath the bushes and the sun. Although some environmental purists would rightly decry my throwing a bit of bread out window for them to nibble on as yet another egregious offense against the ecosystem, I spent about ten minutes watching them delightedly bob around my car, the curb, and the short grass eating their fortunate breakfast. One of my favorite Bob Marley songs is Three Little Birds, so I think that I'm discovering some internal reservoir of avian wonder I've been unconsciously hiding.

On a different tack, the school saga continues; I really let way too much time pass by when I applied for financial aid. So while the both of my proposed schools are increasing the amount of forms that they want to fill out, pressuring me for more commitment, I am becoming increasingly worried about where I am going to receive the money to go. At this point, which ever school says that will offer some money, I'm there.

Togas

The first time I ever saw anyone in a toga was when I watched the classic movie Animal House, which of course - besides introducing my fifteen year old brain to a variety of ideas that a fifteen year old would find intriguing - immediately fixed within my mind the connection between togas and wild drunken college parties of infinitely creative debauchery. Subsequently, I have realized that the mythology of the toga party is much more a creation of Hollywood than anything else. After all, since Animal House portrayed the ultimate and idealized party so well, what's the point of continuing on with it.

I only mention togas because our English Honor society here at the college had something they called a togafest, which - rather than being the realization of the mythological party on earth - was actually an event for students and professors to read greek poetry. Although two students did actually wear togas and laurels, everything was very tame - to the point of being a little dull. And to ensure my enduring status as a word nerd, I actually read two of my own poems about Achilles. I will not inflict them on you here, suffice it to say that Achilles really interests me because, when thinking about everything I've read about him (admittedly very little), I am struck with the imagery of fury and violence; they are pratically valorized. For me, the themes between violence and men, especially in our own era, are very interesting things to explore. Anyway, that's it for the cellar this week; I'll be back on Monday.