Sunday, September 20, 2009

She said, He said

Synchronous, Synchronicity- sometimes my many streams of self-help converge and I notice a theme. Lately, i keep getting a certain message: i need to develop myself, my goals, my talents...

And just writing that down, typing it out to you, is opening a door in my mind.
So in an effort to "develop myself" I will be writing here more intentionally.
But it will not all be real, not autobiographical like everything else has been.
And i thought that I should let you know that, because it could have been confusing, right?

I decided on writing because writing comes easily and naturally to me, like speaking. I don't know that i love writing as much as i love language and words-- more for the symbols that they are than for the letter following letter-ness of them. I love words. i play with words in my head... like the beginning of this post, i will start with a word and speak its connections...or just turn them over in my mind. synchronous, synchronicity, fate, time, serendipity.

i don't really have any discipline in this or any other matter.
but it seems like i'm being sent the message that now is a good time to start having some, getting some, developing Some discipline.

once when i was in grad school, the professor i went to grad school for gave me an A on a paper I prayed for a C on. i had written the paper overnight, in twelve hours, when it was supposed to reflect two months' worth of work. my classmates talked about their research efforts for a whole month while i did nothing. i got as good a grade as they did on their papers.

It was, actually, a really good paper. And she said so, right before she said, "and your writing is okay, too." Trying to own that it could be better, and also trying to acknowledge the fact that I could be better as a person, i said, "So do you think i need to enroll in a writing class?"
to which she replied,

"No. It is my opinion that you either can or cannot write and there isn't much you can do about it either way. you're writing is fine, passable."

ahem.

There was another professor, a man with a lot of facial hair and an awkward fashion sense, a man who could formally bless us with his hand lifted in the air, right after delivering a three hour long wit-filled diatribe on the History of Christianity, and this man came to mean something to me, too.

And i wrote the hell out of several papers for him; oh! i wrote, friends. And he gave me a B a lot of times, but almost ALL of the time he wrote things like:

your writing sparkles. or your paper haunts me.

and, i am not joking when i say, i would love to write the book that would satisfy them both.

and i am thinking about doing exactly that over the next two years.

3 comments:

Sandra said...

You know that saying they have about singers "she could sing the newspaper"? I feel that way about your writing.

I'm looking forward to whatever it is you write here.

maryh said...

isn't it funny how even the littlest comments stick with us? the first professor sounds like a snob. passable? please. she must have been jealous.

Kristen said...

Wow. Yes. This whole post made me smile. Looking forward to more writing. :)

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