I wish I were more surprised

Almost finished with the paper.  I would jump up and down with glee and delight, but I am so damn tired. All I can see is letters. Both kinds.

I have been making a list of books I want to read when this madness is finally over. Most of the books (over 60 percent, and I only know that because I have to take a final in whatever that math for basic idiots class that I should be embarrassed to take, except I don’t much care anymore, and we did a thing on percentages) are about young women coping with the impending specter of their own insanity.

(I think I will call it Phil. )

I am not surprised.

My best friend Mac is finishing her paper on Sylvia Plath.  We know the tragic result of that topic.

My best friend Helena is wrapping up her paper on motivational speaking and goal setting and she is graduating at the top of our our class.

I have been reading letters and books about letters, books in the form of letters, books that contain letters and actually had an argument with St. Paul. That was a result of a very long night and some of my grandmother’s helpful suggestions.

So I wish I could say my attraction to a ringside seat at open mic night at the loony bin was  a surprise.

 

Try to look productive

I left the house today.  The idea was much better in theory than it really was.  Traffic was, in a word, awful. I was taking it slow. Today’s adventure was research related so I didn’t want to karoom around the world higgledy-piggeldy.  That is a direct quote from my mother.  (She’s a very well-educated, high-functioning adult, I swear.)

I am making every attempt to keep up with the workload that will soon be thrust upon me when I get  back to school in a few days.

Ick.

Helena suggested that I take my research topic; Epistolary Literature, and start from the very beginning. Not as far back as who created the pen and paper method of writing, as per the wisecrack that Mac helpfully tossed forth.  I’m glad that she’s able to crack wise whilst researching the Plathster.

What is the beginning, you may ask? The beginning is the letter itself.

I am amazed at the number of style guides, templates and idea books there are about writing letters.  It boggled my formerly fever addled mind.

I sat down to jot a few things down and some incredibly pregnant lady gave me the fish-eye.

Observation- While the very pregnant may have questions for me, they don’t care enough to stop and ask me.  Not a bad deal, but I can’t hang out on the floor avoiding everyone but the pregnant.

I found a book called

“The Pocket Muse” which is small and alleges to contain ideas to help spark your ideas and possibly rid you of writer’s block.

I opened it hoping a tiny little hammer would pop out and whonk you in the nose.  That would get me to writing.   I think the makers of pop-up books are missing out on a whole new audience.

I’m not going to tell my mom, but she’s right.  I shouldn’t try and do too much. I’m not woozy but feeling less than lifelike.

what.now?

After my bizarre yet enlightening experience with Madam and her tea, I thought that it might be a good idea to slow down a little before I have full blown gonzo existential crisis.  Helena and I are also worried that Mac might get too bogged down in her Sylvia Plath research.

I call it getting Plathtered.

So Helena bullied us softly into a no homework night at her house last night.

The best part was about halfway through the movie (Helena was actually sitting on her hands to keep from writing or otherwise multi-tasking.) one of the fish leaped out of the fish tank. I don’t know if he was trying to make a break for it, or perhaps wanted a sip of soda.  It was just alarming.  Mac leaped up, stepped in the bowl of popcorn and jumped around in a circle screaming, “fish, fish, fish!” The fish flopped around for a second while chaos reigned.  I scooped him up, he was slimy and covered in carpet lint, and I returned to his comrades.  I swear they high-finned each other. We laughed until we cried.

I think we’re going to be ok if we can take a few fish chasing breaks once in a while.

Call me Diego, if you must

My senior theme (I hate it that they still call it that, it makes it sound like this is the one thing that will set the whole tone for the rest of our lives,like some bad high school dance in the gym of the world.), is on Epistolary Literature.  You would be amazed at how many people at my school, a few of them teachers, thought this meant I was going to write a paper on handguns or maybe hair removal products.

I wish I was kidding.

Although a handgun that removed hair might be interesting.

No one wants to be dead and hairy.

For those of you who really want to know

“There are two theories on the genesis of the epistolary novel. The first claims that the genre originated from novels with inserted letters, in which the portion containing the third person narrative in between the letters was gradually reduced.^[1] The other theory claims that the epistolary novel arose from miscellanies of letters and poetry: some of the letters were tied together into a (mostly amorous) plot.^[2] Both claims have some validity. The first truly epistolary novel, the Spanish “Prison of Love” (Cárcel de amor) (c.1485) by Diego de San Pedro”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epistolary_novel

But I don’t plan on limiting myself to the novel.   I was at the college library, a surprisingly humorless place, browsing while Mac furrowed her brow at a Sylvia Plath biography. I pulled out a book at random.  Maybe to find a fact to stave off the information vampires that feed on me, and a letter floated out.  I didn’t read the whole thing; I just saw what was on the bottom.

Sometimes you just know

I don’t think they really want to.

There are some days that I desperately want someone to ask me a question.

Today would be a good day. Mac and Helena and I all have college essays looming  ahead of us with all the cheese and horror of a 1970’s movie about a spree killer.

I’m feeling a lot unfocused and I  think there’s a lot of empty going on in my head.  I’m a little woozy, too.  I think that’s because we three went to lunch off campus and wound up drinking a lot of coffee and bandying about possible essay topics. I saw a brochure from the coffee place that said, “We want to hear your thoughts.”

No.  No, they certainly do not.

For instance, I wonder why certain objects catch my eye and then I can’t uncatch it.  (today’s picture, undoctored and unstaged will show you what I mean.)

Mac is considering doing her essay on Sylvia Plath.

Really. Sylvia Plath.

If Mac wasn’t so goofily chipper, I would be worried about her going over to the Goth side.

I browsed through her book which was the unabridged diaries of Her Glumness, Ms. Plath.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution is convinced that Plath is the diarist of our time.

I think that’s a broad overstatement to make about that particular broad.

There is also a publisher’s note from the good people at Random House explaining that the reader should take in consideration the colloquial meanings of her words,and by the way, the publisher is not responsible for said/read words, but that Plath used the word “queer” to denote an eccentric or suspicious person.

What kind of cretin do they think is reading the unabridged diaries of of Sylvia Plath?

The coupon just confuses me