06/13/00 -- Feeling Inadequate?

Oooooh, yeah!

Okay, so I was feeling inadequate last night, too.  But even moreso today.  First round of crits happened this morning.  All I'm going to say is everyone is brilliant.  And I feel like a slug.  Story isn't done (wanted to get it done by today) and, in spite of encouragement from David and some other folks, I'm still not certain it's going to be worth the effort it took to get it to the point it's at, let alone the additional work to get it to the end.

Up too late last night, up early today.  I wrote the assignment writing a fictionalized monologue by a person we saw in real life and the monologue for a character in a story we'd already written.  My biggest fear is that Suzy would want us to write something with them interacting.  She did.  Aieeee!  How can I make Oria interact with this "too perfect to be a hippy and to spaced out to be a preppie" chick?  They're from totally different worlds!  I want something believable.  I can't come up with anything.  *wry smile*

Lunch saw David, Susannah, Kelly and I on our way to Bennigan's.  Food wasn't bad.  Dessert was delicious (and I fell victim to display my super power, again, because it came with two maraschino cherries with stems).

Back to campus.  Back to my room.  Back to my computer.  Nick Cave back on the CD player.  I wrote.  I think.  Yeah, I must have, because there were more words in my story than there were when Jen and I left to go work out.

The Nautilus machines in the gym are scary.  I miss the Y.  I miss the Cybex machines.  I miss the elliptical machines.  I want my normal workout back!  (Though I'd love it if the Y had a few more chest machines, but I suppose I can use free weights to the same effect.)

After a nice (painful -- I can tell I haven't worked out in a week!) workout (lifting and some cardio), Jen and I came back and wound up snagging Stuart, as well, into a dinner expedition.  The plan had involved El Azteco.  Things went awry.  We couldnt' find a place to park (may as well have walked!) and I couldn't find the place, either.  It was on Ann Street.  Which doesn't actually seem to be a real street unless it is like the Pearl Street Mall or something.  So we wound up going to Bennigan's  (take two, for me).

Back to campus.  Back to my room.  Back to my computer.  Nick Cave back on the CD player.  I wrote.  I finished the story.  Wow.  I finished it.  My first Clarion story!!  Wahooo.

I wandered the halls to celebrate.

An hour later (did I mention how late it is?  It's almost 11:30pm now) I get back to my room and pick up the stories to crit for tomorrow.  Four of them.  One really long one.  Am I going to make it?  Am I going to get my assignment done?  Am I going to get a chance to print a copy of my story to look through and correct a bit before it goes into the box tomorrow morning?

It turns out, yes, no, no.  I was up until almost 3am reading and critiquing.  I hope that I didn't miss anything major in any of the stories because I was so brain-dead.  I saved the assignment for first thing in the morning. Ditto with printing out the story and reading through it.

Where does all of the time go?  I thought, I have all afternoon, all evening to do stuff: to write, to read, to critique, to keep up my journal, etc.  And I had all night, too, almost.  I wanted to sleep.  I was exhausted.  But I had to do everything I somehow missed getting done during the day.

I really do need those 32-hour days I mentioned.  Wow, do I need them.