It's funny 'cuz it's true

Sometimes I feel good about my decision to go to grad school. And sometimes I feel, like Arrested Development's Gob, that I've made a terrible mistake. This clip from The Simpsons hits a little too close to home....

The Five People You Meet in Writing Grad School

Since I'm gearing up for Year Two in my MFA program, this post seemed apropos. I actually wrote this for a blogging contest sponsored by Writer's Digest-- I haven't heard anything from them, so I'm assuming I didn't win and can repurpose what I wrote. Admittedly, this is a little snarky and if you're in my MFA program and we're friends, don't worry, I'm sure you don't fall into any of these categories. Because if you did, we wouldn't be friends, right?

Mitch Albom may know about heaven, but let me tell you about some of the folks you’re likely to encounter in an M.F.A. writing program.

1. The Premature Memoirist

Color me old-fashioned, but I thought memoirs were generally supposed to be written at least halfway through one’s life. And yet, the popularity of creative nonfiction as a new track in writing programs around the country has resulted in tons of 24-year-olds working on their David Sedaris-style dysfunctional family memoirs.

2. Little Miss Defensive

In workshop, she rolls her eyes whenever anyone offers constructive criticism and ferociously defends every word. But if everything she writes is already perfect, isn’t graduate school a colossal waste of time and money?

3. I-Feel-Entitled-to-Discuss-the-Assigned-Reading-Even-Though-I-Haven’t-Done-It Guy

You probably encountered this guy in your undergraduate years. He makes seemingly profound, but vague comments, frequently using terms such as “deconstructionist,” “narrative distance,” and “meta-fictional.”

4. The Hunter Thompson Wannabe

He brings a flask to class, wears aviator sunglasses indoors, never shaves, and claims to do his best writing during cocaine-fueled all-nighters. He’s more bozo than gonzo, though.

5. The Pretentious L-A-N-G-U-A-G-E/Flarf Poet

His/her poems don’t make any sense, but that doesn’t make them deep. The titles of said poems are often longer than the poems themselves. Example:

Haiku Written on My Neighbor’s Toilet While Reflecting on Proust and My Mother’s Liposuction Scars

Ketchup packets burst
Like Partridge Family pancakes
Feline clitoris

Sometimes random is just….random.

*Note: You may also encounter these types at writing colonies, conferences, and book launch parties.

AWP Recap

Sorry for the hiatus in posting, but I just returned to Boston after a 4-day trip to Chicago for the Association of Writers & Writing Programs (AWP) conference. Students from Creative Writing MFA programs around the country attended, as well as authors, journalists, writing professors, and representatives from literary journals and publishing houses. There were panel discussions, readings, slams, book signings, and a lot of schmoozing/networking events with drink tickets. I'm exhausted, but overall enjoyed myself and met some interesting people in the industry.

Among my favorite panel titles:
Don't Stand so Close to Me: Controlling Narrative Distance
Jewish Poetry vs. Poetry by Jews
Gay Regionalism through the Eyes of Appalachia
Avoiding Sick Mothers, Absent Fathers, and Losing Your Virginity: The Tropes and Traps of Nonfiction
Quantum Narratology: Toward a Transactional Interpretation

I didn't actually attend any of those, but the titles tempted me. I did check out something called "Bad Poems by Great Poets," which was entertaining. It's refreshing to realize that even people like Wallace Stevens wrote a few stinkers. And to be able to discuss how much undeserved exposure Galway Kinnell's sex poem "Rapture" gets, especially around Valentine's Day. From a craft standpoint, it's just not his best.

The highlights of my AWP experience included hearing Paul Muldoon and Mary Jo Bang read and discuss their work, drinking with Emerson students at bars other than The Tam, and scoring literally dozens of free pens and notepads off tables at the Bookfair. I learned about applying for fellowships and getting published, and that unleashing a bunch of writers and academics at an open bar dance party results in utter chaos. You haven't lived until you've seen a bespectacled gray-haired professor doing the Worm.

I also found time during my stay to stop by The Wieners Circle, get dim sum in Chinatown, and enjoy a dirty martini at the very old school steakhouse Myron and Phil, as featured on the local Chicago TV show "Check, Please!" hosted by Alpana Singh.


My kind of town, Chicago is! And it just struck me how syntactically odd that song lyric is.

You know you're broke when...

....the discovery of a Borders gift card from Christmas fills you with joy because you realize you can use it at the Borders cafe and eat something other than Craisins and stale tortilla chips for lunch.

I understood when I decided to go to graduate school for poetry, as opposed to law or business, that I was committing to a life of financial struggle. Even published "successful" authors have to teach to support themselves (which is fine with me, I love teaching) and book advances are not as lucrative as they used to be. When I went to my five-year college reunion last June and told my fellow classmates that I was starting an MFA program in Creative Writing, most people responded in awe: "Wow, that's so brave!"

I guess it is brave...certainly, my life is more suspenseful than when I worked a regular job and received bi-weekly paychecks. Freelance writing is tough in terms of cash flow-- sometimes you get paid promptly. Ok, sometimes is a little generous. I just got paid last month for a story that ran in Time Out NY in September.

And you can't control when you'll be working -- for instance, I have a pretty sweet gig writing 700-word articles for an internal Smithsonian publication called The Torch. They pay well and it's the government, so the direct deposit does usually come in on time, but things can still go haywire. Like last month, when the person I was supposed to interview for a profile decided to leave the country for three weeks without telling me. I couldn't make my deadline and the story is now indefinitely postponed. Which means $500 less in my bank account, which means readjusting my lifestyle and becoming a Lady Who Lunches at Borders.

I am not implying that I deserve sympathy. I love what I do and I love being in school. Paying off my loans won't be a picnic, but I have a couple of years before I have to worry about that. And poverty does breed creativity -- this past weekend, when my brother (also a broke student) was in town, I found a number of free activities for us: Sam Adams brewery tour and tasting, the Freedom Trail, a friend of a friend's open bar birthday party. We did a lot of drinking and sightseeing and I sent him home on the Fung Wah bus properly hung over, like a good big sister.

I have friends and I have my health, so I guess in George Bailey terms, I'm the richest (wo)man in Bedford Falls. My birthday is coming up -- March 1 -- and I hate getting cash. But I do accept hugs, cards, home-cooked meals and cocktails. I mean, what kind of writer would I be if I didn't have a drinking problem?

p.s. I'll be at the Borders in Copley Square if you want to visit me.

I can has M.F.A. now pls?

I is good writer. Srsly.

Kthxbye

Under the influence

Since moving to Boston and starting graduate school has correlated with drinking copious amounts of beer (it's all anybody drinks in this town, seriously), I more than ever wish I could master the art of drunk writing. Not drunk texting or e-mailing; people who know me are well aware of my demonstrated mastery in those fields. In college, I actually had to put Post-Its all over my laptop before going out to remind myself not to send e-mails when I came home drunk. I've matured a little bit since those days.

I'm always envious when I talk to people who say they do some of their best work when drunk and/or high. Coleridge and Poe had their opium; Bukowski, whiskey; Aaron Sorkin, cocaine. A med student once told me that if Sorkin were her patient, she'd feel torn between her responsibility as a doctor to tell him about the myriad medical risks of cocaine abuse and her impulse as a West Wing fan to tell him to stick with the blow.

The truth is, my writing is terrible when I'm not sober. The other night, after some enjoying a few beers with some fellow students at the Tam, I came home tipsy and decided to write a poem. The best thing about this poem is the title: "Wherein I contemplate the possibilty [sic] that I have a drinking problem." The poem itself is completely incoherent, though I did devote an entire stanza to the glories of brunch cocktails. (I have yet to find a solid Bloody Mary in Beantown.)

I often come home from a night of drinking with the best intentions to write and be productive, but I inevitably end up sprawled on my bed watching, for the 1,000,000th time, that episode of Law and Order:SVU where Det. Stabler goes undercover as a pedophile ex-con.

Mmmm, yes.

I have only tried to write stoned once, in college. The poem was about spiders. Correction: "arachnids." I remember thinking that was an amazing word when I was writing the poem.

I keep thinking I might be able to tap into a secret reservoir of creativity if I could just compose sentences while not fully in control of my faculties. I certainly become an amazing dancer when I'm drunk. Check out my hot moves:


Fierce, no?

"Knowledge is good."

After Day 1 of Emerson orientation, which consisted of campus tours, ice-breaker games and welcome addresses given by faculty, administrators, and grad student ambassadors, this is what I learned:

1. Lewis Black is an alum!

2. There is a Will and Grace set permanently on display in the library (since the creator of W & G attended Emerson)

3. Pabst Blue Ribbon bottles are only $2.75 at The Tam

Academia, how I've missed you!

I knew I was ready to go back to school, but I didn't realize just how ready I was until I read this in my grad school course catalog:

Students do a significant amount of primary and secondary reading. Classes are conducted in a seminar format where students do at least one presentation.

Students do a minimum of 25 pages of critical writing that includes at least one 10 – 20 page analytical research essay.

In this class that will mean either two 10-pg research papers; or one 20-pg paper. “Analytical research essay” means a scholarly paper, requiring significant research, not an op-ed essay. The balance of the 25pg min. will be made up by weekly reading responses.

...and got a grad school hard-on. You know you're ready to leave the workforce when the idea of writing reading responses (weekly!) and the promise of "significant amounts of primary and secondary reading" gets you all hot and bothered.