07 May 2005
postsript-cum-inquiry -
almost certainly this is a completely unneeded, almost self-self-referential thing to do, but. for some reason i am compelled to make note of my blog-absence of late. it is due in part to an un-new and unsurprising lack of focus; but even more it stems from a re-direct of said focus. (am very quickly falling very much in love; am also in the middle of mental wanderings regarding my future schooling/career-type paths. [i strongly dislike that recent days have heard me use the word path quite so much; path, together with direction, course and endpoint, have conspired to make me feel a grade-school copernicus -- too naiive to object but intuitively certain that it makes no sense to conceive of your every ambition as leading straight away from you in a line.]) so, i've just decided to ask all of my closests, namely you, a question: let's say that i'm back in school in the fall of ‘06. studying writing, but with the primary aim of equipping me to teach writing. also let's say that a good chunk of energy in the coming months is to be spent locking down a bunch of pages of my shit for application purposes, but that, after that is done, i’ll have a chunk of time to work as i please with no concerns of it leading anywhere, other than keeping my pantry stocked with a variety of ramens. this is a rapid-fire, thin-slicing sort of question -- answers are encouraged to be honest and wide-ranging, from “you would make the best rock star ever” to “you would be the movie star ever.” (it is worth noting seriously that, while there is no such thing as a stupid question, a stupid suggestion is not so hard to come by. as such, please refrain from demanding that i do something like sign up for a seminar series in balloon art; ie, when considering what mark should do with himself, bear in mind that fitting and useful are not always interchangeable.) the actual question is twofold: a) what do you think i should do for work during that time and, more importantly, b) if you were in my (most probable) shoes what would you do. extra credit for describing the shoes – should they be sensible walking shoes? kangaroos perhaps? loafers? please, god, don’t let them be loafers.
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6 comments:
So, it's come to WWM(or insert any initial here)D? Well, frankly, I'm confused at your goal--you want a masters in English just so you can teach? Granted, I'm still young enough to both still think I'm invincible and not know what a biological clock even is, but nonetheless see a certain amount of validity in living in the present.
So they say, "Those who cannot do, teach; and those aho cannot teach, teach gym" and you, Hunts, are neither of those things. So why not just do? None of this eventual-goal-process-path crap--just do. Write. Love. Move. Whatever. Make your endpoint death, and everyday until then fill with music and sex and books and words and whathaveyou. Don't be like me and freak out because of a birthday.
That being said, you're definitely too tall to make coffee (my chosen 'day job' as of late), but Rockstar may not be too far off. Have you ever thought about lion taming (I think you would need cleats)?
well, see, mm -- it's complicated. by which i mean that it is not that, at all, but i am still figuring the shit out. writing is on the docket; is not going anywhere. but i'm coming to realize that my core gifts/talents/predilections extend beyond faux-mopey prose, and, you know, teaching is something my mind can really wrap around. it generates energy in my head. and, oh! hey! did you get to sleep with your Free to Be You and Me teacher 'fore you left? that story was so awesome.
No, didn't even have time to try. The friday before my departure became crazy-get-everything-done-that-you've-procrastinated-on day instead. Now I look at my belongings that I so carefully packed that day and wonder how badly I really need them. Such is life.
So teaching is something is something you could truly enjoy. Yes, I get that; and I can see you being both very successful and gifted at it--if you can't be swayed, then good luck.
Of course it's complicated--I don't doubt that, but what I see more than your desire to actually figure out some sort of 'path' for yourself is you freaking out and settling for some rash, but more simply(not easily, mind you)achievable goal. But then again, I'm not your mom or your shrink--so who am I to say? Don't let me make you rationalize your decisions, it'll only make you grow even more stagnant in every(any)direction.
This deserves far more detailed discussion than a brief comment here... but speaking as someone who recently received her MA in English and is married to someone with an MA in English, too, with combined seven years of experience teaching writing in our household: the part they leave out of the glossy MFA and MA brochures is all the really really dull, discouraging, shitty, either pretenious or plagirized writing you have to read and think about all day as ProfessionalWritingInstructor... that is to say: your students' work. All that energy spent on that rather than reading and thinking and dreaming toward/for *your own* writing.
This is not at all to say it's a bad idea... but in the heat of the fabulous, fabulous excitement-slash-panic-slash-love-inspired enthusiasm for life and real work and real art, just know what you're getting into. We need to conference call with Sully or something... or, preferably asap, sit down over a guinness in your town or ours and hash out all the pros and the cons.
So, believe it or not, this is actually intended to be an encouraging, cheerleading comment... keep daydreaming and brain storming. Good, good stuff. Even with its disadvantages (and did I mention the CRAZY people that go to grad school?) an MA or MFA is relatively fast, cheap, and fun -- can't really hurt. I just feel like, 9 months after finishing, I am just now able to read again. Perhaps I'll feel detoxed enough to write by the end of the summer. Not exactly what I signed up for, that's all.
xoxo, Mon
PS: Good alternative: low-residency MFA programs? check out Poets & Writers for ads
hunts, some fine thoughts have been put down here, in the comment quadrant of your Pile. i am just now sitting in my cube (comfy, well-appointed, yes, but still a cube) and feeling sorry for the supes and for your white ass and for the state of humanity in general. what have i to add to this postscript cum inquiry? well. i am of two minds. life is toil, after all, and anyone who says otherwise is either lying or heavily, heavily medicated. that is to say: like the adolescent marmots frolicking in the shadow of the big mountain, we all must eventually cross the rubicon and from thence forward be wary of predators. we must find food, cha cha cha. and so there is the matter of, as william baldwin put it, finding that thing in life that you least hate (i am paraphrasing). hell: i am sitting in a cube, after eight years of freelance freedom. so the teaching route, though perhaps less than it is billed to be (as anonymous pointed out so well), might be the least odious means of securing the aforementioned marmot necessities. on the other hand, and i am definitely rambling now, there is the pursuit of art. but think on this: toni morrisson wrote "beloved" while raising three kids solo and holding down as many jobs (again, i am paraphrasing). that fact always makes me feel slothful and full of shit, as you know how i am prone to bitching about my inability to find a balance between family (second son due any minute), work, self, others, and life. but that is the rub, in'it? every day we recalibrate our spindly scales. every day it's a new challenge to find delight in the very fact of our being.
helpful? probably not. but there it is.
Do you know that a very prestigious institution where I am now employed, if you give a whole lot of money, you may be invited to Kennebunkport for a weekend of shopping and institutional education culminating in dinner with a certain former president and his wife? And if you give a little less than a lot of money you will be invited to some prestigous person's private gardens and you will be granted access to world class physicians without having to wait in line and if you ever get sick while flying on your corporate or personal jet you can call this place and speak with a doctor and they will advise you and if necessary, arrange to have you come to this place of care? And yet, and yet ... so many people come here and they are so sick, and sad, and scared and they cry when they talk about their 92 year-old mother who loved to dance whose doctor twirled her around the hospital room or who held their hand while they cried when being diagnosed with cancer. And they wheel around their bald, anemic children in cartoon wheelchairs with bright balloons and I want to throw up. And sometimes they get better and they're soooo happy, or their person doesn't get better and they're so sad ... and they give money. Loads and loads and loads of money. So many people with so much money. And "the needs of the patient come first" they say and you know what, i actually believe they mean it. I was so prepared to be cynical and i'm actually feeling kind of positive and proud and ... it's weird and confusing. Of course, every once in a while an errant radiologist will accidentally send them to surgery, but no place is perfect after all.
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