Okay, so maybe a little blogging

In the city, it's easy to forget that season changes are about more than the temperature. Driving across Indiana and Ohio, spending the weekend at my parents' house in the country, I remembered that summer is about cornfields, tiger lilies, wheat fields, wild flowers. Summer is driving with the windows open and kind of loving the smell of manure, even though it takes your breath away, because it reminds you of being a kid and going to the fair. Trying to count how many shades of green are in view. Watching leaves turn upside down and silver just before it rains. Summer isn't just heat and humidity, box fans, searching for shade or A/C. It's about the real world--the natural world. I needed to remember that.

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My family, especially my mom, is going through a stressful time. I wish I could stay with her longer and take some of the burden off.









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I don't think I'm going to send out my manuscript today. Two (maybe three) reasons. 1) I don't want to send it out just because I told myself I would, when I know it's not quite ready, 2) I'm moving on Monday and packing seems a lot more important, and sort of 3) I'm procrastinating.

Yes, choosing to miss a self-imposed deadline to do other things is technically procrastinating. And maybe if I just sat down with it for a couple of hours, it would feel ready, but I don't want to force it. Still, I swear it will go out this summer. I just need to be more on top of it when the next set of deadlines comes up.

For the record

I'm proud to be a wicked alice contributor and a future dancing girl press author.

I've been away

but now I'm back.

I get my keys for the new place tomorrow. This week, I will be packing. Perhaps not blogging.

Tomorrow is my self-imposed manuscript submission deadline/goal, but I didn't get any work done over the weekend. Shall I stay up late and finish my edits tonight? We'll see.

Financial Freedom closer than it seems?

Could it be true?

"MFA programs are still the best way we have to make sure that people who want to become writers shut the fuck up, sit down, and spend a couple, three years writing a lot. That means something very important."

Amen.

Summer in the City

It's supposed to be 93 today, but it'll "feel like" 98. Joy.

P.S. By the time I was six, I knew all the words to this song. It was on a McDonalds Golden Oldies tape of "Summertime Hits." Oh, how I loved that tape and wished I had been born in the 50's instead of the 80's. I would have looked good in a poodle skirt. Oh, and I was invited to a theme party this weekend where I would have gotten to wear a poodle skirt, but alas, I'll be in Ohio.

mashup

It's almost too hot to drink my coffee this morning. It's not actually that hot outside, but my apartment is retaining all of yesterday's heat. Normally, I would just pack up my things and go to the nearest air conditioned coffee shop with free wifi, but I'm on a budget, and that budget does not include $4 coffees (which are the only kind I like, anyway). Nor does it include three glasses of wine at the bar around the corner where I go sometimes to work on Sunday afternoons. So I'm going to suffer through the heat as long as I can. And try to drink my coffee anyway.

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Speaking of being on a budget, Kelli had an interesting post (via Tatyana) about money yesterday. She/they ask "what does financial freedom look like?" For me:

1) Being out of debt. My car is mine, my education is mine, and my money is mine.
2) Living in a home I love--this could be an apartment I rent or a place I own, just as long as I love it. And have the cash to properly furnish it. No more hand-me-down couches and dumpster diving coffee tables.
3) Being able to buy gifts, nice ones, for the people I love. No budget.
4) Vacations. To places I've never been before.

The debt is, of course, the big one. The one that looms over the next 20 years like a UFO waiting to suck me up and do bad things to me. Could I have taken fewer student loans over the last four years? Can I take fewer or be more responsible with the loans I take over the next four? I guess some people make their stipends work for them, or work 2nd jobs all through grad school, but I a) can't live on 14K when I have rent and a car payment and b) can barely keep my shit together with just my responsibilities to school--working a second job would probably lead to a complete breakdown.

I thought about selling my car & eating the loss since I don't really need a car right now. But then I started thinking long term. Right around the same time I'm going to be needing a car (presumably I'm not going to find a job in Chicago or NYC after graduation), I'm going to be having to pay back my student loans. My car will be 9 years old by then, but it will probably get me through at least the first few months post phd if I'm good to it now.

Anyway...I just thought Tatyana's question was interesting. I didn't plan on fretting about my loans.

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Rebecca Loudon is the nicest poet in blogland, I think. She did something very sweet and unexpected for me and I can't stop smiling when I think about it.

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I think, think, I have a plan for manuscript #2 (which I'm tentatively calling This is Not a Harvest [doh! I didn't realize: book 1 = weeds, book 2 = harvest. this might not work]) and manuscript #3 (which has no working title yet). I just have to decide which one to work on first (I have 5-10 drafts for each of them already). Joshua Corey is doing a visiting writer gig at UIC this fall, and I have to put together a portfolio and a little artist statement before I can work with him, so, decision time. The portfolio is due on July 15, so I have less than a month to figure it out.

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Still purging in preparation for next month's move. I've already gotten rid of 2 trash bags full of clothes, and I think there's at least one more to go. I went through my shelves but could only part with one small pile of books. And the papers...sheesh, I'm barely making a dent but I've worked on those files for hours and hours. That's probably what I'll spend most of today on.

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Geesh. This has got to be one of my most boring blog posts ever. If you read all the way to the end you should get a prize.

On another topic entirely

I'm very greedy with my time. That's why I don't want children. Or pets (I've decided, after cat sitting for two weeks, that I'm not ready--and perhaps never will be ready--to have another living being dependent on me).

I know this is counter productive, but I like to know that I have full days--from the moment I wake up to the moment I go to bed--where I won't have to talk to anyone or leave my apartment. On these days, I feel like I can accomplish anything. But it has to be the whole day. No interruptions.

Which is why I'm writing this. Because I sort of have one of those days, except I should really go for a walk before it gets to be 95 degrees again (okay, so it's really only supposed to get to 85), and since I'm part of the working world, Saturday is the day you're supposed to do laundry, and the peapod guy is coming today because I was going to go grocery shopping yesterday, but the weather was awful so I just went online instead (by the way, it doesn't matter how much canned/frozen food you have if you don't have time to cook).

So. I'm wearing this embarrassing hippie dress that is not at all flattering but is nice and breezy to wear in the summer when my apartment is an inferno/sauna and I don't want to have to change into real world clothes that are required for leaving my apartment. And I don't want to have to try to deal with my amazingly frizzy hair. I just want to be a hermit. Is that too much to ask?

Apparently so, or I wouldn't be here venting about it.

Names for things

I was listening to poems on From the Fishouse yesterday. There was a line from a Barbara Jane Reyes poem that keeps skittering through my head: "In my native tongue, breath is word is spirit. I can think of no single, adequate translation."

I don't know multiple languages--at least not well enough to be aware of the disconnects inherent in translation--but I have been thinking about the shortcomings of language. Today, I'm thinking about the word homesick.

All yesterday morning, I watched black clouds creeping south across the Chicago skyline. At noon, the sky opened up and for a couple of minutes, the air seemed to turn to water. The afternoon was hot, muggy, stiff. But last night the sky opened up again. The gates of all the fences flapped open, the dumpsters danced in the alleys, screens literally blew out of my windows, and I sat, rather stupidly, I admit, right in front of my patio and watched it all. And remembered the first night I spent here in this apartment. Remembered the weeks that followed, and how it hurt to be here.

Then, homesickness was physical--I was sick for weeks with this dry, hacking cough that finally made me decided to quit smoking (and okay, maybe I was just sick, too, but I think I would have gotten better quicker if I hadn't been homesick), exhausted, weak. But the mental/emotional side was hell, too. Being constantly nervous and uncomfortable because nothing was familiar, aching to see my family and friends (and okay, trying to make a long distance relationship work and ultimately not doing so didn't help either). During those first six weeks, the six weeks when I decided I had to immerse myself in my new life if I was ever going to adapt, I thought the homesickness might just kill me.

Here's where the problem with language/naming comes in: today, I'm homesick. But it's nothing like what I just described. It's a restlessness. I want to get in the car and drive. I want to put this stuffy little apartment behind me. But god, how I miss my parents and my sisters. I was talking to my mom about the upcoming visit and she said she would be so happy when Carla and I both got home because then she would feel whole again. And yes, that's how I'll feel, too, when I'm sitting at the kitchen table and the people who make me who I am are there with me. I'll feel whole.

So, today I'm homesick, but not homesick like I was here, and so, to bring it back to where I started--shouldn't there be words distinguishing the degrees of things--you know, besides "very" and "really" and all the other words we teach our freshmen to avoid?

Anyway, a week from now, I'll be hanging out in scenic Chatham, Ohio, and everything will be right in the world.

duh!

Why didn't anyone tell me I was being a moron? Cadaver Dogs was not available through the library because it just came out. Why did I think it had been out for a while?

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I found a spider on me while I was on the el today. Ever since, I've been having that creepy-itchy feeling like I'm covered in bugs. Ew.

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What if I stopped blogging? Would I miss it? Maybe I'd write more letters. Maybe I'd write more poems.

I'm not going to stop blogging, but this is something I think about from time to time.

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Plowing through my reading list. Love Denise Levertov even more than I thought. Love Charles Wright less. Feeling somewhat "eh" about Karen Whalley. Having trouble spending time with my library books. They're just so heavy and unbendy. Mary Oliver and Mary Kinzie are both pissing me off a little bit. (In related news, why do how-to-write-fiction books seem so much less preachy and finger pointing than how-to-write-poetry books?)

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Since moving happens in less than a month, I'm trying to eat all my frozen and canned food instead of going grocery shopping. I may be a bit of an apocalyps shopper, bc I definitely have a lot of non-perishable food around. But June is really not the time to be eating non-perishable food. I want watermelon and zucchini and sweet corn (fresh, not canned!) and plums and artichokes... You get my drift. Canned pineapple and frozen brussel sprouts will have to do. I'm being practical.

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I get to see my momma and my pops and my seesters in less than two weeks!! I wanna go now! (Don't tell, but I'm looking forward to driving with the windows down and the radio up almost as much as I am looking forward to seeing my peeps.) I'm going home for one of my nephew's graduation parties. I just looked at the graduation announcement which reminded me I graduated 10 years ago. How and when did I get this old?

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I've spent the last 2 hours (minus the time I just spent here) trying to decide what I was going to try to accomplish tonight. Talk about Epic Fail.

New Work...

at Anti-!

Many thanks to Steve for giving my poem a home!

It was only a matter of time...

before I talked myself into taking a weekday off. But it was/is much needed. I'm already on my second load of laundry, I cleaned the litter box and swept the kitchen floor, and there's lots more to do: grocery shopping, bill paying, apartment cleaning, etc. And hopefully some poetry work too.

I really admire/am confounded by "working" poets--and by that, I mean poets whose day jobs have nothing to do with poetry. I find that, sadly, I don't have the will to write (or read, or put together submissions) when I get home from work at 6 after a day of staring at a computer screen unthinkingly. I can't switch gears fast enough to accomplish anything in the short time between getting home and going to bed. And, since I'm one of those unfortunate people who requires 7-8 hours of sleep to be fully functional, I can't just stay up late.

So here I am, sacrificing a day's pay in order to feel in control of my life. Perhaps not the smartest, most forward thinking choice, but the one that's best for my current state of mind.

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While we're talking about work... cornshake has some pretty wonderful things to say about being a poet in academia. What she says makes me feel really great about my career decisions so far.

I am one sleepy puppy tonight. But I did go to work today, and I think I found an apartment, too. Plus, I had coffee with Laura, one of my very favorite Chicagoans, and talked to my mama on the phone for almost an hour. All in all, I'd call today a success.

Cross your fingers for me that I get the apartment. It's very cute, very close to the blue line, and very affordable. And then, after I get the apartment, cross your fingers that I get it together and stop moving every flippin' year. This is exhausting.

My work ethic is broken

My summer job has flexible hours. Really flexible. I decide how many hours to work, when to come in, etc. The only restriction is that I have to work sometime between 9-5 and a minimum of 4 hours at a time (max 40 per week, obviously. I usually aim for 30).

I woke up today not feeling like working. And now, since it's 10 minutes to 8, and it takes me an hour to get there, I definitely won't be starting at 9. It would be a stretch to get there by ten, actually, because I haven't showered yet either.

The truth is, I'm thinking about not going at all today.

If my mother's reading this, she's shaking her head at me and saying, "But I thought you were broke."

Money is tight, but so is time! One of the things I've come to love about the academic schedule is being able to run errands when everyone else is at work. Same with appointments--haircuts, doctors, apartment viewings, etc. And I really need to start finding an apartment.

Okay, let's face it. I'm just listing excuses why I shouldn't have to go to work today. But responsible me is saying, "Get it together." I can be there by 10:30 and work a solid 6.5 hour day.

Writer me is saying, "Write a new draft, then go to work."

Starving artist/bohemian grad student me is saying, "You'll figure out a way to live without that money. Stay home and get some real work done."

Aaaaah! Is this what it's like to have multiple personalities? Because I am definitely feeling a little insane right now.

progress

I've read five of the fifty books on my list so far, and started 2 more. I also ordered all the ones I don't own from the library (except for Midnight Voices and Cadaver Dogs, which neither the Chicago public library nor I-Share has (a tragedy, btw, that Illinois has such lousy poetry collections. I expect this sort of thing from Ohio...). Anyway, I'm going to have to hold off on buying either book until I get my finances in order, so my summer reading list might be down to 48).

I'm reading all the small books first, because those are the easiest to read on the train on the way to and from work. I don't know what I'm going to do when I'm down to all the books that weigh three pounds each.

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It's time to purge. Clothes, files, books, everything. I'm moving again soon, and, let's face it, I'm a pack rat. If I have this much junk that I never touch at 28, I don't want to think about what I'll be like at 48.

The trouble is, I don't know what to get rid of in terms of my writing. When do you toss old drafts?

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I can't begin to explain why this is, but I've decided I want to be able to do the splits by the time I'm 30. When I was 15 and on my high school gymnastics team, I couldn't do the splits, so I don't know what kind of crazy pills I'm taking... but still, I'm going to try. Let the stretching commence.

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I'm going to be house/dog sitting at the farm in July and am super-psyched. It will be more like a mini-residency than a house sitting gig because I'll be all alone out in the woods with nothing but time to write and read. The farm is a little too far from civilization (read: my friends and family) to see them regularly, so I really will have lots of time to work. Can't wait!

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I guess that's all. Time to read before bed. Maybe a little Whitman. Nah...I'm feeling kinda prosey. Maybe The Noonday Demon.

and because my sister repressed all her childhood memories

because sometimes, you just want to feel like a kid again

Houseguest

This is Mia. She's living with me while her real family is in Europe. It's quite an adjustment sharing my home (and my bed--oy!) with my new feline friend. I'm still on the fence as to whether or not I'll get a cat of my own some day, but I have to say I'm pretty okay with the litter box. The biggest problem so far is that I seem to have an ant problem when her bowl is on the kitchen floor, so I'm keeping it on the kitchen table, which really wouldn't work as a long term solution. Anyway...

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I started my summer job on Monday, which is good, bc I need cash, but bad because I got really used to bumming around all day. I'm so spoiled. It's low-key though. I set my own hours, wear jeans, don't have to talk on the phone or go to meetings, and I like the people I work with. I really shouldn't complain.

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Everyone has been complaining about how cold it is, but I love this sort of weather. It can stay this way until November for all I care!