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Linguistics of the MFA program:
- I am going to [eat, usually] the [shit/fuck/hell] out of this [foodstuff, usually].
- [This book, music, whathaveyou] is going to rock [or blow, I think I've heard that too] your face off. [yeeouch]

I am learning to not be that prim high school teacher I once was; sometimes, you can find me swearing, openly, in the classroom, hyped up in expressing how much I loved/hated a particular technique in a story/poem/etc. It's not often, but it might slip, if you watch closely enough.

I've been thinking a lot about how I censored myself as a high school teacher, especially after reading Michelle's very vocal post about gay rights and marriage. That part of me, the one who fell in love with a woman at the end of high school / beginning of college has been secreted away for so long. And I know this blog is completely google-able, that people from high school who might have suspected, or my former students who might now cringe at the thought of their former teacher being very comfortable with saying this, and I think I just have to recognize that it's a part of me that needs to exist, alongside my brazen announcements of deterioration of my body (oh, little breast mouse), and there it is. And I know that I also grapple with the fact of my life being easier since the past nine years have been spent loving a man. And this is just how it happened to be; I could have just as easily fallen in love with another woman once my year plus relationship with Jen came crashing down in a most melodramatic way. (Hey, we were nineteen; this is what happens in that angsty part of your life.) There is a certain privilege that I have been allowed because of the way Ryan and my organs happen to be, and I don't think there is fairness in that. And sometimes I try to avoid the topic altogether because I get so violently upset (and also hugely distanced due to my so-called unique position). Sometimes logic doesn't seem to win out in this country's decision making.

I must tell you other things, things that won't get me all tangled up inside, thinks that spark, but in a lovely way instead of the frustrated way.

- I am now The Carol Connolly Reading Series intern at Intermedia Arts, which means I attempt to juggle a great deal of information and put it into the correct slot. I got the position about two weeks ago, and I don't think I mentioned applying or the interview, but here I am, done with my first week, and it has been going well. It's nice to feel connected to the literary community in this way, and I think it fills a need of mine to be useful to other artists as opposed to selfishly pursuing my own. It's a great opportunity, and I'm really excited to be a part of Intermedia.

- I am now a part of the Line Machine blog. It's put together by Josh Wallaert, whose Webster's Daily blog (finding poetics in the dictionary) I have long admired, and Line Machine is doing something similar to what I had been doing in Collectanea, which I failed to keep up with. Anyway, I believe my first post is going up tomorrow, which is fun. A little Wanderlust. I love the idea of community reading--a choral reading, a sharing of what is on the page, a celebration of the art of language.

- My photo from last summer was put on the Shutter Sisters daily click a while back, and a few weeks ago the collective invited it to be a part of a book they are publishing. It's odd to think of a photograph of mine being in a book, but there you are. Granted, it's a blurb book, but nonetheless, the Shutter Sisters are a talented bunch with a solid following. I'm pretty pleased.

This weekend will be spent quietly: Kleenex, some potpourri boiling on the stove (I had forgotten how good cloves and cinnamon smell!), a good book propped in our laps. Cold season is descending; autumn is in full bloom here. Stout carrots are coming out of the garden and raspberries are awaiting transformation with instructional jam recipes.