catching up.

It's been a while since I last blogged, partly because I got really sick with a cold that morphed into a stomach virus and still is lingering a little bit, and then Spring Break happened, and now things are just super busy with school. We have about 4 weeks left in the semester, which is just unfathomable to me. The first year cannot be over yet. It just can't. And we are definitely all feeling the crunch. This semester in general has been a real ass-kicker, but lately most of my cohort is in a caffeine-fueled state of disarray, myself included. So much writing and reading, so little time.

I have loved my Narrative Medicine class, though. Even the people in it are just so great. I sent an article out from the NYT on talk therapy waning and writing workshops on the rise, and multiple people emailed me to thank me and share their own thoughts on it - some of whom are counselors who are feeling burnt out themselves and needed the boost. I had one woman who told me I could stay at her house, in her daughter's room since she's away at college, when I shared that I had a mouse in my apt (yes, I had a mouse...haven't seen him since last week, thank goodness). Whenever I've come to class perturbed by a meeting about workshop submissions, they always say the right things. It's a great group of like-minded individuals. We see the therapeutic value of writing, and acknowledge that the simply act itself can be therapeutic. We appreciate the emotional texture of the writing while noting the craft. It's hard to explain, it's just a good group of people. It's usually the bright spot of my week.

I can't believe next semester I have my Thesis Workshop. Most people don't turn in their thesis at the end of second year; they take at least one year of Research Arts, which just gives you time to write and allots you a certain number of meetings with an advisor (I think).

I'm probably going to NC for the summer, hoping I still have my job at the bookstore....I need to get out of the city. In today's workshop, someone had written an essay on suburbia, etc, and we talked about those communities where there are communal spaces, and I shared about my neighborhood in Chapel Hill, Southern Village...and they started laughing when I explained that the houses had porches to facilitate communication with neighbors, and there's a Village Green and communal meeting areas. They said it sounded horrible. I loved it. I still do. Give me that over the cold, impersonal, high-strung city life any day. Southern Village DOES sound like Stepford when you describe it to people, or like some idyllic fantasy suburb - but that's why I loved it so much. It was (is) idyllic but real. I've really been missing North Carolina. My stomach is all messed up, I think from nerves/stress, and I know that when I go down South, it will get better. I just know this. But then it will be really, really hard to come back to NY.

I'm excited, because for the first time since he turned one, I will be able to go to my sweet nephew's birthday party! When he said to me, "JJ? Are you coming to my birthday?" I was able to tell him YES! Of course, I will also be writing my customary annual birthday letter to him. I am so thankful for this - he is growing up so fast, and needs all the support he can get. I cannot believe he will be five. It is hard to remember life without him. It seems very empty.

Listening: Birdy, "Fire and Rain," "Skinny Love"

Snacking: Twizzlers, Airheads, Tootsie Rolls

Reading (aside from schoolwork): "Wild," by Cheryl Strayed; "This Lullaby," by Sarah Dessen, the new issue of The Paris Review