The MFA Chronicles

Hi there! I'm back after a somewhat longish layoff, and will be resuming semi-regular posting on this blog. The reason for the delay? Oh... grad school stuff. Moving. Studying. Reading. Not writing. The weeks and months leading up to grad school have been incredibly busy for me, and unfortunately, I suspect that it'll only get busier once school actually starts. How's that for a kick in the pants? At any rate, I'm very happy to say that I will now be contributing to a blog called the The MFA Chronicles, brainchild of Jonterri Gadson. It's a blog with about a dozen or so first year MFA students talking about their various experiences through their first nerve-wracking school year and beyond. I imagine that it'll be a great resource for those of you looking towards applying or thinking of applying this fall, especially in the decision making process of what you will exactly want or not want in an MFA program. Plus, the community we have going for this blog looks to be an enthusiastic one, which is always great.

So what have I been doing these past few weeks? Well, as I mentioned above, a lot of stuff. I quit my job, which was in itself a great deal of work. You wouldn't think that something as freeing as ending your 9-5 job would require so much time and energy, but there was that curious sense of guilt and duty to my co-workers combined with my company's desire to get as much out of me as possible before I left for good that led to a very busy last few weeks. Shortly after that, me and my fiancee had to move out of our apartment and into a new one just around the block. And since I'll be moving down to Champaign separately a few weeks later (now a little over one week from today), I'll have the fine pleasure of essentially making two moves in a matter of one month. Fun, fun, fun. And then there's the stuff related to school. Of my craft class, I've managed to read four of eight books required for the semester, which is less than I'd like, but not bad considering everything, and of my teaching assistantship (which I am by and far most nervous for), I have read the teacher's handbook, the skeleton syllabus, and one textbook. And still I feel horribly, horribly unprepared.

The University of Illinois, I am incredibly happy to say, will provide a great support system for all their incoming TAs. In addition to a week-long orientation before classes start, I'll be taking classes in parallel to the one I'm teaching on, well, teaching, as well as participating in weekly meetings (support groups, really) with other TAs teaching the same class. What's not to like? Not much, as far as I'm concerned, except for the whole teaching bit. Getting up in front of 15-20 students and talking to them for an hour is not my idea of fun, even less so considering that I hate, hate, hate public speaking. Ah well. I'll get over it. Eventually.