A List of Things That Have Been Making Everything a Little Better.
1. I have finally stopped waking up at 6 am in a panic. In fact I've been sleeping really well the past few nights. My bed and I are new friends again.
2. Salinger.
"Granted I’m off today. I keep a good neurotics calendar, and it’s three years, to the day, since Seymour killed himself. Did I ever tell you what happened when I went to down to Florida to bring back the body?
I wept like a slob on the plane for five solid hours. Carefully adjusting my vail from time to time so that no one across the aisle could see me - I had a seat to myself, thank God. About five minutes before the plane landed, I became aware of people talking in the seat behind me. A woman was saying, with all of Back Bay Boston and most of Harvard Square in her voice, ". . . and the next morning, mind you, they took a pint of pus out of that lovely young body of hers." That's all I remember hearing, but when I got off the plane a few minutes later and the Bereaved Widow came toward me all in Bergdorf Goodman black, I had the Wrong Expression on my face. I was grinning.
Which is exactly the way I feel today, for no really good reason. Against my better judgment, I feel certain that somewhere very near here--the first house down the road, maybe--there's a good poet dying, but also somewhere very near here somebody's having a hilarious pint of pus taken from her lovely young body, and I can't be running back and forth forever between grief and high delight."
- Salinger, From 'Zooey'.
3. I am taking a class with the Head of the Writing Department! at my school. I hold this guy in exceedingly high regard. He pretty much called me, immediately, on all of my shit in a really awesome and succint way. This forced me to finally learn to write well 'within an institution'. I'm proud of myself. If you have no idea what I'm talking about,
Emily: this is a good, though slim and rather hurried, start on what promises to be a good paper. It feels rushed, and a big careless, and clearly is very shirt for the assignment: barely 4 pages. Nonetheless, the insights are good and the writing often very strong. In addition to the comments I made on the page - which grew repetitive for me, so I stopped making them - which request that you go more slowly, add proper quotes, and disentangle some of the prose, what this needs is three things. 1: you need properly to stage your intro to each story with an enticing introduction. 2: you need to make your argumentation smoother and more interesting. 3: you need to show me why I should care about these stories by communicating to me, dramatically and effectively, why you care.
This last one is the one, of course, that concerns me the most. This reads to me like a paper by a very smart, original, insightful writer and thinker who is really not working even close to their potential. That, of course, is your business, but for me that's never going to be a response to either art or education that I can feel too good about.
Draft Grade: C
Well Emily this is very good indeed. The only element lacking is a bit more contextual introduction to each story. Otherwise, your thinking is clear and you writing very, very fine. In fact, with writing skills like this, there is nowhere you can't go during your time with us, and if you are lucky enough to encounter and find liberating some of the conceptual and interpretive frameworks in literary studies, philosophy, psychology, history, etc. that you'll be exposed to here -- assuming they aren't ruined by a teacher -- you could find your time here very exciting indeed. Anyway, failing that, I hope that you'll have good experiences in writing classes. You clearly have a great deal of talent.
Final Grade: A -
Maybe I'm being crazy but it feels really nice to have the respect of someone who isn't A) a blood relative B) a person who doesn't know me in an academic context or C) someone to whom I give head.
4. I'm writing a kind of eulogy for George and have had a lot of contact with that side of my family. Which is pretty helpful and loving and hard and important.
5. Making new friends at school and AHH! THE ZOO WITH MOLLY AND THE BABY BRIAN! BEST!
2. Salinger.
"Granted I’m off today. I keep a good neurotics calendar, and it’s three years, to the day, since Seymour killed himself. Did I ever tell you what happened when I went to down to Florida to bring back the body?
I wept like a slob on the plane for five solid hours. Carefully adjusting my vail from time to time so that no one across the aisle could see me - I had a seat to myself, thank God. About five minutes before the plane landed, I became aware of people talking in the seat behind me. A woman was saying, with all of Back Bay Boston and most of Harvard Square in her voice, ". . . and the next morning, mind you, they took a pint of pus out of that lovely young body of hers." That's all I remember hearing, but when I got off the plane a few minutes later and the Bereaved Widow came toward me all in Bergdorf Goodman black, I had the Wrong Expression on my face. I was grinning.
Which is exactly the way I feel today, for no really good reason. Against my better judgment, I feel certain that somewhere very near here--the first house down the road, maybe--there's a good poet dying, but also somewhere very near here somebody's having a hilarious pint of pus taken from her lovely young body, and I can't be running back and forth forever between grief and high delight."
- Salinger, From 'Zooey'.
3. I am taking a class with the Head of the Writing Department! at my school. I hold this guy in exceedingly high regard. He pretty much called me, immediately, on all of my shit in a really awesome and succint way. This forced me to finally learn to write well 'within an institution'. I'm proud of myself. If you have no idea what I'm talking about,
Emily: this is a good, though slim and rather hurried, start on what promises to be a good paper. It feels rushed, and a big careless, and clearly is very shirt for the assignment: barely 4 pages. Nonetheless, the insights are good and the writing often very strong. In addition to the comments I made on the page - which grew repetitive for me, so I stopped making them - which request that you go more slowly, add proper quotes, and disentangle some of the prose, what this needs is three things. 1: you need properly to stage your intro to each story with an enticing introduction. 2: you need to make your argumentation smoother and more interesting. 3: you need to show me why I should care about these stories by communicating to me, dramatically and effectively, why you care.
This last one is the one, of course, that concerns me the most. This reads to me like a paper by a very smart, original, insightful writer and thinker who is really not working even close to their potential. That, of course, is your business, but for me that's never going to be a response to either art or education that I can feel too good about.
Draft Grade: C
Well Emily this is very good indeed. The only element lacking is a bit more contextual introduction to each story. Otherwise, your thinking is clear and you writing very, very fine. In fact, with writing skills like this, there is nowhere you can't go during your time with us, and if you are lucky enough to encounter and find liberating some of the conceptual and interpretive frameworks in literary studies, philosophy, psychology, history, etc. that you'll be exposed to here -- assuming they aren't ruined by a teacher -- you could find your time here very exciting indeed. Anyway, failing that, I hope that you'll have good experiences in writing classes. You clearly have a great deal of talent.
Final Grade: A -
Maybe I'm being crazy but it feels really nice to have the respect of someone who isn't A) a blood relative B) a person who doesn't know me in an academic context or C) someone to whom I give head.
4. I'm writing a kind of eulogy for George and have had a lot of contact with that side of my family. Which is pretty helpful and loving and hard and important.
5. Making new friends at school and AHH! THE ZOO WITH MOLLY AND THE BABY BRIAN! BEST!