Bittersweet Chocolate

I take it all back. For the past week, I've been complaining about our homework in Fiction Tutorial. Our professor assigned us one of those eavesdropping dialogue exercises, and I HATE those. I don't like eavesdropping, and I never hear anything good (dialogue-wise, not good as in juicy.) Consequently, I've been putting it off. So today (the day before it's due), I had to buckle down and get it done. I treated myself to lunch at Monsoon Noodle House and set to eavesdropping. Once again, I didn't hear much, but I did hear one or two phrases that triggered something in my mind. I threw in a few phrases/sentences I heard people say over the weekend, and then I got to work on the scene we were assigned to write using the at least 4 of the collected phrases. I can't believe it, but I actually got a useful scene to go in my linked sequence of stories! I'm so excited. What's really great is that the scene is not from one of the four stories I'm working on for Senior Seminar. It's actually from later in the sequence...stuff I'll need in order to continue working on this sequence once I graduate.


Speaking of graduation, it's getting to be that time...time to think about life after I graduate. On the surface, I'm too excited for words. I'm doing all the graduation things that all the "traditional" graduates do. I got my Senior pictures taken. I even got a class ring. Senior trappings aside, however, there is a lot to take in. First, there is graduate school to think about...where to apply, hoping I'll get in, hoping I'll be able to produce high quality work once I get in...will I be uncovered as a fraud who actually shouldn't be allowed to write an email, let alone a work of fiction? Then there's life after Converse. I've gotten really spoiled by my time there. Every day, I get to go to a place where all the professors are there to help and support you, and I am surrounded by other women with the same interests and drives as mine. We can talk about one short story for three times longer than it took to read it, and rip apart each other's work and still be friends. Most of the other creative writing majors are traditional aged students, and they don't seem to realize what they have there. I've been out in the work world, the real world, for lack of a better term, and it's nothing like the cozy, cocoon that is college. There may not be much time left in my final year, but I'm going to soak up every last minute of it.


Tomorrow night is our final Fiction Tutorial class, and I am so sad. Leslie Pietrzyk has been wonderful, and I have learned so much in one short month. I know I have some awesome classes waiting for me in Spring Term, but I really hate to see this month end. (Okay, it probably has a little to do with the fact that I only have class once a week right now, but it's the quality of the class, too.) I'm just hoping that Senior Seminar will be a kind of continuation of this past month - great discussions, amazing one-on-one time with my professor, and crazy progress on my stories. In the meantime, we'll celebrate tomorrow night with fiction and brownie bars.