Having it all

Last time I wrote, I was just beginning this journey of getting my Master's degree. I hadn't even begun the program yet. I was all anticipation and enthusiasm. "I feel like there's a bigger purpose to my life now, a future I can reach out and touch. I face each day with a new energy and excitement," I wrote. And then I disappeared off the grid, leaving the universe wondering what became of me.

I won't even pretend that I'm going to attempt to recap the last two years for you. Who would want to read all that anyhow? In short, going back to school and getting my Master's was everything I dreamed it would be and so so much more. I was successful. I was even brilliant at times. I was liked. I was admired. I presented my papers in front of strangers. I wrote 95 pages dedicated to one 30-page short story that hardly anyone in the world has read, and I triumphantly defended what I wrote before three professionals who have been in the game A LOT longer than I have.

I have honor cords. I have awards. I have connections. I have an amazing letter of recommendation.

I have nothing.

It is over now. I'm graduated. There are no more books to read, no more papers to write. And as far as the job market is concerned, I'm back to being nobody.

Part of me wants to grab a megaphone and stand in the middle of Rosa Parks Circle and shout to anyone who can hear me what a great asset I would be to their company, EVERY company! I saw on the Today Show that employers respond to shameless acts of desperation these days.

If it's anything I learned from my Master's program, it's that I AM a valuable asset to any establishment. And while I'm still not always super confident in my abilities, I at least do my best and try my hardest. One day, I was "working with" a professor's class, when really I was just sitting on the side and listening, when the professor said, "Okay, everyone, now Jenny's gonna lead a discussion and she's gonna pound you with questions about your topic for your final project. Go ahead, Jenny." And I looked at her like a deer in the headlights, my eyes bulging from my head in anxiousness. Then I stood up and pointed to someone, listened to their idea, and then pummeled them with interrogation. At the end of the class, when the students were rushing for the door, I still had the inclination to sheepishly ask, "Did I do okay?" to the professor, and apparently I did more than okay.

My Master's program taught me what I believe is the most valuable lesson I could possibly learn about whatever future career I may have--even if it's scary, I should still give it a try. And when I think about getting a job, whether it be teaching or editing or something completely and utterly new to me, I still get the nervous wrenching in my stomach, yet I know I could handle it. How hard could it possibly be? I've conquered worse and done so for free.

Unfortunately, even if I have luck finding a job (which granted, I haven't been looking super long and hard yet but I've already gotten plenty discouraged), I'm having a difficult time imagining a career path that I would find fulfilling. My thesis adviser is practically mourning the fact that I'm not going on for a PhD, or at least not going RIGHT NOW. I uncovered a literary gem with my thesis paper, we both realize it, and she thinks I could continue to do so for the academic universe if only I kept going with my education. She's not wrong. I know I have the capacity to bring a certain forgotten author back to the forefront because of my love and passion for her writing. And if a PhD program were ONLY about researching the authors that you love, then I wouldn't think twice. But I know it's also about teaching and reading and writing papers on tons of other topics that I might not find nearly as enchanting, and I've already neglected my husband, my house, and my life for two years--I don't think I can or should do it for another four.

Because of that nervous wrenching in my stomach, I'm not sure how well I would flourish in a corporate environment, either, always having to answer to someone, to please someone, to do what I do according to someone else's wishes. I've been there, I've done that. I see my husband continue to do that. It takes a toll on a body and takes years off of lives.

I have an excellent business idea that I've only recently realized is an excellent business idea because I started telling friends about it and they've reinforced it's an excellent idea. But it's also an expensive excellent business idea, and I really haven't made my household any decent money in (well, ever, but especially) the last two years, and I really should make an effort to contribute for a while, what with needing a new roof and a new deck and countless other expensive things. Also, there's the pesky hiccup of a problem in that I know nothing about starting a business.

There's been a lot of controversy recently about women in the workplace, whether they can "have it all" or whether they should "lean in" or whatever. I'll admit, I've been a bad feminist and I haven't paid it the attention I should for the same reason my husband doesn't listen to Glenn Beck anymore--it just makes me too angry, and you can't go through life being angry all the time. I actually addressed the idea of "having it all" in the conclusion of my thesis paper, which focused on Cold War American housewives. They were expected to have it all and do it all, expectations that no human being could live up to. And of course, we're really no better off today. Not only do women have to be successful in the home, but they have to be successful in the workplace. But all this "lean in" nonsense or whatever it is isn't addressing the correct question, and the correct question isn't really an issue of gender at all.

The correct question is--can we be HAPPY in the home and the workplace at the same time? And I'm starting to doubt that anyone can. I worked a job for five years that I hated. I loathed it. I woke up every morning despising the fact that I was waking up to go to this job. And I always pacified myself with the fact that I had found true love and that I had a husband who I could commiserate with at the end of the day. Meanwhile, 40 hours a week or more, I was hating my life. That's a third of my life I was hating. That's a lot of hate.

Now that I know what that was like, I'm terrified that's where I'll end up again. Clearly, a job that I would love and be passionate about will be a hard find, as I expressed above. Sure, hopefully I'll be getting paid better now that I have a better degree, and depending on what I find, I might even be considered successful at it. But if I'm not HAPPY with it... then what?

Of course we all have to make compromises. That's part of being an adult. And with the economic climate still not making a big comeback, one can only ask for so much. Still, why don't we pursue careers like we pursue life partners? Why is passion not part of the equation in a lot of cases? Why do a lot of people settle for jobs because of pay or convenience, when they devote a third of their lives to them? Essentially, we devote the same amount of time to our jobs as we do to our partners if you consider you spend a third of your life sleeping. Why are we not expected to be in love with our jobs like we're in love with our spouses? There are definitely people who devoted their lives to their jobs instead of their spouses or in lieu of finding a spouse. But society doesn't always congratulate their success like it congratulates a newly married couple (even though the longevity of their success might be longer than the average marriage). It really seems like an either/or situation. Either you're in love with and devoted to your job or you're in love with and devoted to your spouse.

Is there a situation where you can have both? Or is a career like a mistress? If you devote too much time and passion to your job, you ultimately are sacrificing time and passion you would otherwise devote to your spouse?

I dream of having it all, of having a husband for whom I have passion (check) and a career for which I feel equally passionate (no check). I hope I'm not dreaming an impossible dream.

Guess who's coming to dinner?

Well, it's been four weeks, and I've written two people at the paper and even one at NPR, and haven't heard a thing, so if ever they published my shuttle launch story or read it on the air, they definitely didn't give me a heads-up. But I'm pretty sure it just got lost under the shuffle of everyday reject papers, and I'm okay with that. I didn't really have my hopes up.

Last night I was talking to my cousin and she wanted to hear all about our trip to Florida and what it was like to see an actual shuttle launch, so that inspired me to return to this blog and post my piece as promised. It's definitely not a perfect polished ready-for-publication piece (besides that of a local newspaper anyhow, or so I thought), but I'm proud of it and want to share it with the world.

In my newest "self-help" book on how to become a writer, Adair Lara, in "Naked, Drunk, and Writing" (sounds right up my alley, eh?), writes, "I realized that I'd been missing the necessary other half of the writing process: the pleased reader. It was as if I'd been trying to tell myself I was a good cook, but without ever asking anyone to dinner." So I'm inviting you all to my dinner party. I hope you are pleased with what I serve you. Here goes.

The Last Shuttle Launch:

“Ever seen one of these before?” asked the stout, middle-aged stranger standing next to me. I looked over at him and replied, “First time.”

His eyes gleamed behind his large glasses like he was about to let me in on a secret.

“You’ll never be more proud to be an American than right now.”

One night, my husband and I were sitting at our own respective computers, faces staring at our monitors, when out of the blue, he turned around in his chair and asked, “How do you feel about going to see a shuttle launch?” I felt like a giant palm had just whacked me across the forehead. Why had this never occurred to us before? Why had we waited until there were only four launches left? Knowing time was not on our side, we immediately began to put plans into action in order to see a shuttle launch as soon as possible.

When it comes to a launch, all the planning in the world can’t save you from surprises, or worst, scrubs. Scrubs can happen up to the last minute, the last second of a launch, so all that time spent organizing your travel plans, all that money spent on tickets and hotel and flights, all that waiting on buses, in long lines, on the miles-long causeway can disappear in a moment with the announcement of a scrub. And yet the possibility of a scrub can make the experience all that more exciting. Hearts thumping, pulses racing, butterflies stirring endlessly in your stomach as the countdown booms over the loudspeaker, “T-minus one minute and counting.” Please, God, let them keep counting.

We had beginners’ luck with our first launch, the shuttle Atlantis, STS-132 in May of 2010, the start of a year-long obsession with everything NASA. Everything went off without a hitch; the shuttle blasted from earth before our very eyes, a ball of flames pushing this massive craft up through the atmosphere and into outer space. Movies and television don’t begin to do it justice. It’s the world’s greatest adrenaline rush, and we were hooked, bound and determined to see whatever launches remain.

However, we apparently had used up all our luck the first time, because both Discovery and Endeavour, the next two in line, scrubbed shortly before the scheduled launch, but only after our own flight had landed on the tarmac in Florida. And we were devastated each time, not just because we had taken the time off from work or because we had spent all that money on the trip (these were the risks of space travel spectating that we assumed from the beginning), but because there was a very real chance that we would never get to see a launch again.

Our last chance to ever see a shuttle launch came July 8, 2011, the Final Flight of the Space Shuttle. It was our old friend Atlantis again, our good-luck charm, I was hoping. It would be a grueling experience that kept us awake for 39 hours and left us sitting on a bus for 8 of those (all for a 45-second-long show), meanwhile our stomachs churning from the dense storm clouds and constant rain that threatened any chance of a liftoff. Please, God, not another scrub.

It seems we had paid our dues to Lady Luck, because shortly before scheduled launch time, the clouds began to clear and favorable weather conditions looked like a possibility. As we intently listened to my husband’s ham radio, the countdown miraculously continued and unknown voices urged, “Go for launch.”

We readied our cameras, trying to keep them steady despite the thumping of our hearts. “T-minus one minute and counting.” The crowd roared. Until…

“We have a hold at T-minus 31 seconds.” The man on speaker broke every one of our hearts simultaneously. A sea of groans emerged. My husband was desperately trying to hear what was being said on his ham radio while I incessantly hassled him: “What’s happening? Are they scrubbing?”

The problem was quickly addressed and the countdown resumed. We all breathed such heavy sighs of relief before taking up our cameras again, and we all shouted out the remaining seconds.

We can’t even hear Mission Control announce, “Liftoff!” We are all cheering as loud as we can, cheering for that ship and for the astronauts on it, even though they can’t hear us. And a fire ignites under the shuttle and smoke billows out and completely engulfs it until you see it rise like a phoenix, humungous flames shooting out from underneath it as it ascends into the sky. And it’s as if time slows down for a few seconds, just long enough for us to appreciate what is happening in front of our eyes. And I feel as if a part of me is on that shuttle, because I am an American and that is my family on that ship. I am filled with such an enormous amount of pride that tears are streaming down my cheeks freely and I am giggling like a schoolgirl. I take a deep breath and try to relish every second, knowing that I am witnessing history, knowing that I will never again in my life get to see this exact scene ever again. And in the blink of an eye, it has disappeared into the sky, behind the clouds, into the vastness above. Only then does the rumbling sound of takeoff finally catch up with time, and all our bodies vibrate with the boom that is left behind by Atlantis.

That stranger on the causeway, he was right, of course. He was right the whole time. I have never been more proud to be an American in my life. I have never been so proud, period.

This territory goes uncharted.

It's true, I missed my deadline. I can hardly believe my grandfather has been gone a whole year. It feels like maybe a month. And then sometimes it feels so much longer than that.

I have no regrets about what has transpired this year. Well, maybe I regret spending so many hours after work watching "Boston Legal" reruns instead of writing. I suppose often the task was too daunting or I was too lazy to choose the book over relaxing on the couch. But even if I had not wasted some of those hours, I probably would still not have produced a completed novel by this month. I have learned so much this past year, the most important of which was learning that I still have so much to learn.

My life has completely changed since last July. I've figured out what it is I want out of life and I'm actively pursuing it every day. It all started with getting accepted into the MA program. That was the spark that set everything into motion. I took that research project, too, that was offered about Walter Scott. And then, after a while, I tried to give it up because I felt I was in too far over my head. But with some encouragement (and a little begging) from the project chairperson, I agreed to stick with it. Two weeks before the deadline, while my husband was attending a training session in Cleveland, I holed myself up in our hotel room (where the biggest distraction was "Saved by the Bell"reruns on TBS) and, in my old college habits, cranked out a paper in two and a half days, and, to my surprise, ended up with a pretty respectable paper. I had hoped to spend that hotel time writing about my grandfather, not Walter Scott, but desperate times call for desperate measures. I'm still volleying the piece back and forth with my editor, who keeps finding revisions that need to be made, so it's not on its way to the printer yet, but just finishing a first draft was a huge accomplishment for me and a huge reassurance that I can, in fact, go back to school and succeed (or at least finish). And I know it will be all worth it when I'm handed that book and my name is printed inside of it.

Another big confidence boost is the fact that I roped myself a grad assistant for this coming school year. While it was an emotionally grueling process, I somehow accidentally fooled them into thinking I was perfect for the job, and now I've secured my tuition for all of next year's schooling. Hopefully this means I can sneak in some writing classes as well and perhaps even earn my BA in writing while earning my MA in literature. Look at me be all scholarly!

I'm still on the fence about writing classes, though. I worry that they will end up being a waste of a time, a collection of skills I already have learned. I mean, sometimes I can sit down and crank out something in one sitting that is, I feel, the best thing I've ever written, and then I don't feel like I need to take writing classes at all. And then sometimes I sit down and feel like everything I type is disjointed, unoriginal, and all-around crap, and that I should take every single writing class available in the world because I desperately need it. However, I sense that most writers, no matter how much schooling they've had, probably go through this same cycle, so I very much doubt writing classes are gonna help clear up that problem.

And yet, I feel like I can't pursue writing seriously until I've got some professional lessons under my belt... which sounds silly. I've got a BA in English. I've written things people have commended me on before. But I'm old-fashioned. I don't want to be a famous blogger (it's painfully obviously I'm not anywhere close to being famous with this blog) or an internet sensation. I don't want to make millions publishing bathroom literature on Amazon (well, I mean everyone wants to make millions, but any serious writer will tell you they aren't into writing for the money, and good thing, because there rarely is any). I want to do this the hard way. I want to work for it. I want it to take time so I can appreciate it, so I take my lessons to heart, so I can cherish the personal connections I make along the way, and I can be grateful for and proud of everything I create.

Monday night I sat down and wrote something that I am immensely proud of--a reflection on my experience attending the last shuttle launch. And I emailed it to the local newspaper in hopes that they would print it. I'm not sure anything will come of it. I haven't heard a peep yet, so of course, I've declared defeat already, even though it's only been two days. I'm not even sure if it's something a newspaper would normally publish (although my supportive husband assures me it is). And even if they do publish it, it's not as if it were The New York Times, although perhaps I should send it there, too. But still, to see my name in print along with thousands of others (absolutely a larger number than those who will see my Walter Scott piece)... now that would be something.

I figure if they print it, they'll probably print it by the end of the week, because next week the launch will be old news. And if they don't print it, I'll probably post it on my blog, because not only do I feel it paints a good picture for those of you who have never been lucky enough to witness a launch firsthand, but I also happen to be quite proud of it.

The biggest downfall to this adventure of mine is definitely the waiting. It's gut-wrenching waiting to hear whether or not my piece is good enough, whether or not I am good enough. I suppose I best get used to it, though, because once I start submitting pieces to literary journals, there will be a lot of impatient nights and probably all for naught, because I hear rejection letters are abundant even among the most talented. Like with this newspaper piece, I can't rationalize what would take them so long to get back to me. How many op-eds could the department head possibly have to read? Why would they not get back to me right away? Did they even receive my piece? Maybe I should call them just to make sure? And then I see an article someone else wrote in a paper or online or on the news, and I think, hurry up, you damn paper. Every new article I see about the launch makes my piece even less important and effective.

When I had my interview for the GA position, I walked out of the interview feeling like I had nailed it. The Dean of the department even told me I had nailed it and that I would hear from him the next day or the following Monday. And of course he made me wait all weekend, my stomach in a perpetual knot while I replayed the entire interview over again in my head, second-guessing every word that came out of my mouth. Did I tell too many jokes? Did I come off too cocky? If I nailed it, why did they have to wait to decide? Why couldn't they just tell me now? Maybe I had it all wrong and they didn't like me at all. To my immense relief, that was not the case. Yes, indeed, the waiting is the worst. I pray it gets easier down the road, but I don't have high hopes that will be the case.

At any rate, I feel like there's a bigger purpose to my life now, a future I can reach out and touch. I face each day with a new energy and excitement. It's a pretty frickin' awesome feeling.

I often think to myself, I only wish I had done all this sooner, that I hadn't wasted five years at a job I hated, spent all that time being depressed and hopeless about the future. And part of me does regret waiting so long, because now I have to decide between starting a family or getting a PhD, putting my career goals perhaps before my domestic ones, and worrying about my biological clock and two wannabe grandmothers breathing down my neck for babies (and my increasing desire to oblige). But if this had all happened sooner, maybe I wouldn't have been able to appreciate it as much, wouldn't be so motivated to work hard for it. No, I think now is a good time. And the rest of it will fall into place, I'm sure... I hope.

With all of these new experiences in my life, still not a day goes by that I don't think about that book. Ideas or sentences pop into my head at the strangest of times. I am always planning outlines in my mind and taking notes about my memories as they float up from my subconscious. I have no intention of stopping my work on it, and I have no doubt the book will exist some day. And when it does, it will be perfect.

I haven't updated this blog in a while because I figured no one really cared about this adventure I was on. And I could be very right about that. I could post this entry on my facebook and it's quite possible no one will even click on it. So I figured for a long time, what's the point? And I'm not sure I have a point, even now as I'm writing. However, I guess I owe it to those people who do care, if any, to let them know where I stand after my year deadline. I'm not worried about letting anyone down about not completing the book. I haven't let myself down, and that's what matters most.

I can't say I'm gonna continue writing on this blog. I guess it just depends what kind of adventures keep coming my way and if people genuinely want to hear about them. In the meantime, keep an eye out for my launch piece, either on this site or maybe even in the paper.

Diligence is the mother of good luck.

Boy, has this year got off to quite a mixed bag of tricks. Here we are now, end of February already, and while I must confess, I'm no farther in writing my book than I was four months ago, I'm so much farther in so many things that will hopefully aid in my process to finish this novel. Truth be told, of course I haven't updated this blog since Christmas because I haven't accomplished anything I said I would accomplish. But I've actually accomplished quite a lot that I didn't say I would accomplish. And therein lies some of life's greatest surprises.

Firstly, I sat down and read my mom's memoir one night, I think it was a weekend night, while Chris was busying himself with either building a workbench or setting up his own photo studio in the basement (being the resourceful husband he is). The "book" was a fast and easy read, and though it is in need of much literary love, my mom has some really great stories wrapped up in that package, and I'm really eager to talk with her more about them and write out the scenes with more description and depth. I have mixed feelings on what I read. It helped me see my grandmother more as a human being, where I've regarded her as a saint my entire life. But it only tapped the tip of the iceberg that was her personality, and I'm now I'm filled with many questions and many holes that need to be filled.

The main issue with what Mom wrote, though, and revising it for the masses, which is still an idea that I don't think she's sold on, is the same main issue I've been having with my story and thus the main reason I haven't sat down to write any more of it lately. That problem is that there is no major conflict in our stories. Sure, someone is dying, and you would think that would be conflict enough, but the conflict has to reside in the protagonist. There has to be something for the heroines to overcome, to come to terms with, to learn, to grow from. And in the case of both my mother's story and mine, we are but simple loved ones who live through the experience, changing in the end, sure, but in small ways, nothing quite resembling a denouement. Mostly, we are just telling events as they happen and sometimes volunteering our emotions as we feel them, but that does not make a story... not a good one anyhow.

I thought that perhaps we could combine our stories together... tell how the mother dealt with her first experience with death and losing one close to her, and then I'd chime in with my story. But that would make a better eighth grade essay than it would a memoir, with its compare and contrast elements. There would still not be any real conflict, no mountain for us to climb.

And my writing club has been no assistance either, which I started frequenting again. It's funny how things haven't changed in the four months I've been absent. There's still the same old man writing magazine propositions, but who never brings the actual articles for us to critique. There's the same petite woman with a deep voice writing the most rudimentary remakes of children's fairy tales. There's the lovely slender housewife who totes copies of her already written (though still in much need of polishing) novel. And there's the fantastical lyricist who hypnotizes everyone with his smooth narrating voice and dancing words, but has no actual comments to hand out to anyone else. And of course, there's me, who receives the same critique every time: I have a great style and a unique voice, but my pieces lack any kind of conflict.

I'm starting to feel some conflict with my lack of conflict.

Then the other day, I had some conflict with the huge pile of snow in my driveway, which is nothing new. Shoveling out my driveway usually involves a lot of cursing, throwing of hats, and general huffing and puffing. But in all that anguish, the answer appeared to me.

I've posed the question more than once on this blog about whether this story that I'm writing is really about my grandfather or if it is about me. I always assumed it was about me, because I obviously couldn't put words in my grandpa's mouth (even less so now that he's dead). But it's not just about me. It's about my relationship with the man, or, more importantly, the lack of relationship that I had with him. I always felt close to my grandpa, though I had no good reason to. We never had any heart-to-heart conversations, I never asked him for advice. In the six months I lived in his house, I don't think I even learned how to cook a single thing, though he made us dinner every single night. We really never shared anything together, and yet this world darkened for me the day he left it. It was only at his funeral, when I had nothing left to lose, that I could actually tell him how I felt about him. Now if that doesn't sound like plot resolution, then I don't know what does.

Although, now this opens up a whole can of worms where my personal life is concerned. Intimate issues I have with forming relationships, being scared to be honest with my feelings, the regrets I face for not taking a more active part in the lives of my family members... I can already visualize the therapy sessions that are inevitable in my future.

It's not what I wanted originally. I wanted this memoir to be a tribute to my grandpa, to tell his story. I didn't want my life to be in the forefront. But what is a memoir if it's not about the person behind the pen? I'm really hoping that, in the end, it will still be all those things I wanted when I started, and maybe now it'll actually be a good story, too. Fingers crossed.

Another important bit of news has occurred in my life. I've been accepted into the Masters Program at my old alma mater. I always assumed I would get in, because I was such a good student during my Bachelors semesters, no matter if my GRE score was lousy or if I submitted a writing sample I wrote five years ago and didn't bother revising. I assumed I would get in, but I wasn't certain, and I did have a few episodes where my brain flashed forward to show me my floundering future as an utter failure (yay, alliterism!). But alas, I made it, and I feel the winds of change a-brewing in the Furner household. I've already been propositioned to write a biography on Sir Walter Scott and his relation to Orientalism, two subjects I know absolutely nothing about, which my dear cousin in Kentucky assures me is entirely normal for graduate school. It's a little strange being thrown back into the deep end so abruptly, and truth be told, I'm thoroughly terrified of this project, but I'm also excited and relieved and I feel like I'm back in the place where I belong. However, now this project takes away precious time from my own writing, and the deadline for it is, of course, July. I think one project will help fuel the other, though. The critical thinking and word juggling of one will only facilitate productivity of the other, or at least, so I'm hoping. Again, fingers crossed.

I think "fingers crossed" is the epitome of my emotions at this moment in time. I have a lot going for me, and I'm hoping to keep the motivation alive, to keep all the balls in the air, and I'm holding my breath that perhaps this is the start of something bigger and better for my life.

Fingers crossed.

A novel holiday contribution...

Well, seeing as you haven't heard from me for over a month, you can bet it's safe to say that NaNoWriMo was a complete and utter failure. I got nowhere near the designated 50,000 words and got too wrapped up in other things to allow myself to care much. Am I disappointed in myself? Perhaps a little. I mean, when you think about it, it's not THAT hard to write that much in 30 days. One of my friends who participated surpassed the goal with a whopping 60,000-plus words. It's not like a marathon where you can only do it if you've trained for it. Anyone can sit down and write that much at any time they want to. So to not even get close to accomplishing such an achievable goal did do a bit of a number on my self-respect and confidence.

Although I know it wasn't because I COULDN'T write that much. It was because I chose not to. I chose to believe other things were more important. And if faced with that same decision today, I'd make it again. Some things are more important than NaNoWriMo. Another month, another year would have been better for me, would have had less life-altering changes to combat with. But that goes back to the whole premise of NaNoWriMo and the reason people do it in the first place. I learned that this year and I will try to keep that in perspective next year.

And in that respect, NaNoWriMo wasn't a failure at all. I am so glad I at least attempted it and stuck with it for two weeks. I learned so much about myself and my writing. I learned to pay attention to the tiniest details and to always keep the reader in mind. It got me really excited for the memoir, actually, though my actions may suggest otherwise. And though I rarely designated my writing as more important than other chores, I always deemed it significant enough to include in the schedule. I never thought to myself, "I shouldn't be writing" or "I shouldn't bother writing." In fact, I often thought, "I should be writing," or, "I WISH I was writing. " The fact that I want to write and want to make time for writing gives me hope that I will see this project through to the end.

Therefore, I have decided that January is going to be my makeup NaNoWriMo. I'm gonna get out the tens of thousands of words I didn't write in November and achieve enough words to be able to call myself a novelist. I feel like I can't begin to work on the editing and the fine-tuning of the novel until I get it all out on the page, and really, this being a memoir, I should get it all down before I find myself forgetting anything. So I'm excited to get that finished and follow through with what I should have completed a month ago.

However, I do have another distraction tempting me away from my own memoir. This holiday, when we were all gathered at my mother's, she handed me a finished copy of HER memoir about her mother's death. I've been dying to read it since I even knew such a thing existed, but I didn't want to bug her to finish it or to show me because that's something she had to figure out on her own and something I didn't want to feel rushed. But as part of our Christmas gift, she gave each my brother and me a copy. You should have seen the beaming smiles on our faces. I was so proud of her, and I think she was really proud of herself.

We had always talked about (perhaps only joked) about how I could edit it for her when she finally did finish it. But she didn't seem too keen on the idea now that it was written. "Oh, Jen, I think you'll be disappointed when you read it," she said.
"But let's just say I want to change some things..."
"I didn't write this for publishing," she said.

But I could barely help myself. Only reading the first page, completely oblivious to the conversation in the living room, I found myself making all kind of mental notes on how to make it better. Not saying that it was bad. Goodness, no, that's not the case. I haven't read it yet, but I know before looking that, between her and me, we could make that into something really fantastic. She's got the story and I've got the creative flair. And really, what more do you need to write a smashing book? Hell, some people on the Best Sellers list don't have either of those things.

Really, though, I'm excited to read it, to know more about my grandmother, my family, and heritage, myself. And maybe I'll find some answers to questions I'm having about my own book.

Can you ever just be whelmed? I think you can in Europe.

Overwhelmed is a state I often find myself in. There is a phrase that goes, "when it rains, it pours." With me, it never seems to stop pouring. That's just how it's always been. The week my last semester of college started, I turned 22, my then-boyfriend broke up with me, and my paternal grandmother died... for instance. And now I'm trying to write a novel in the same month that I'm trying to renovate a house, or more correctly, finish renovating a house, a house I must move into the same month, oh, and of course there's a little holiday called Thanksgiving in there, too, which means driving back and forth across the state repeatedly. And I'm still considering taking a weekly hot yoga class, just to make things a little more interesting.

Usually when so many things like this happen simultaneously, my brain goes into overload, and I can get kind of depressed recounting everything that has to get done and realizing the improbability of any of it getting done. It makes me not want to do any of it. And the worst part is, I feel like I have a justified reason to quit. So I usually quit.

But then the most amazing thing happens. Everything ends up getting done. And the world doesn't explode. I still don't know how.

Up until this morning, I had justified to myself how ridiculous it was for me to agree to all these commitments and how foolish I was to believe I could accomplish any of them. I had given it the old college try, I told myself. I had learned some new things. I should be proud of what I've done up to now. Everyone will understand if I stop now.

Then I realized I should be used to being overwhelmed by now. And if I were to quit, I would just take all that time that I had devoted to projects and use it as an excuse to sit on the couch and feel sorry for myself. There are 200,000 other people out there right now who probably have just as busy of lives as I do, and I don't hear any of them complaining. In fact, I get emails from some of them (just randomly--I have no idea who they are) empathizing with the way I feel and then offering encouraging words to keep me going on. I always feel like my life is so much more outrageous than everyone else's, but really, I just like making excuses and letting myself off the hook. Being busy is just the American way. We like to bite off more than we can chew, even if we choke a few times getting it down our throat.

So last night I had decided to give up on NaNoWriMo, focus on finishing the house and getting moved and maybe get my grad school app done since December's lookin' crazy, too. And then this morning I changed my mind.

I'm 10,000 words behind. I think you are not surprised to hear that. I'm still not promising I'm going to be able to hit that 50,000-word mark. But I am promising to continue to try.

Because I'm desperate for every word I can get, I decided that when I'm writing, I just have to be as honest as possible. I'm writing everything I think and feel about whatever or whomever I'm writing about. It's been quite eye-opening. If I were reading my book as a complete stranger to my family and myself, I would think that I was a jerk and a brat. I've written some pretty terrible things about almost everyone, but it's not that I think terrible things about everyone. It's just, taken out of perspective, my opinions about things and people sound negative. I'll write a whole paragraph about my brother's perpetual tardiness and finish it with, "Well, this paragraph will never make it in the book," because I know it's coming off hurtful instead of intended funny (because it is comical--love ya, bro!). So that will be definitely a hurdle in the editing process.

Another major problem I'm finding is who this book is about. It's clearly about my grandfather, right? Wrong. So far, it's about me. And that's what memoirs are supposed to be about. But I don't know if I'm happy with that. Do I want my viewpoint only, even though it's so limited? Or do I want to include my extended family members, get their opinions, their stories, their memories? Or would that be opening a can of worms? I'm just not sure what would make the best story yet. Hopefully the answers to these questions will start revealing themselves the more I type.

I'm nearly 14,000 words, which sounds like an astronomical amount, but it's really only a quarter of the way and an entire week behind where I should be. But I'm feeling good. I'm not running out of steam yet. I have plenty still to talk about. In fact, probably too much.

Being okay with crap...

Well, we're five days into NaNoWriMo, and I only have 4,000 words written so far, 8,000 words away from what my goal is for Sunday. In my defense, it's been a rough week.

We started it in Florida where we were hoping to see the shuttle "Discovery" blast off into space. Discovery was having a lot of trouble the week before, little mishaps that kept popping up, but NASA engineers were working day and night to get her all patched up for her big ride. Well, the day before we were supposed to leave, NASA announced the launch would be delayed a day. We hurriedly changed our flights, added another night onto our hotel stay, and rearranged all our vacation plans. A friend who was supposed to come with us, though, backed out because he couldn't afford a new flight and an extra day off of work. Such is the businesses of space travel spectating. It's a risk you have to be willing to take, and he wasn't.

So he got a refund on his Saturday plane ticket while Chris and I cashed ours in, but just after landing on the tarmac in sunny Orlando and turning on our cell phones the minute the pilot said it was okay, Chris discovered Discovery was pushed back another day, another day we ourselves could not afford to stay. In other words, we had a black cloud following us around the whole four days we were down there. Don't get me wrong, it was a great trip. It was 85 degrees, 35 degrees warmed than we were accustomed to in chilly Michigan, and we still got to see plenty of awesome things, like the shuttle actually sitting on the launch pad. However, since we did things that were related to NASA and the shuttle launch, our emotions were confused. We would see something really interesting and astounding, and we were elated, and then it would remind us of the shuttle launch, and we were depressed. There was so much sorrow in our smiles. It was the epitome of bittersweet.

I had planned on having a lot of time to write on day one and day two, because shuttle launches are all about hurrying up and then having to wait, so with all the down time we would have on the causeway waiting for the countdown on Monday and of course the airplane ride home on Tuesday, I figured I'd have plenty of opportunity to spit out a couple thousand words at least. But then our plans changed, I didn't have quite so much free time, and the little bit I did attempt to write I thought was terrible, and the trip had already been depressing enough.

But I still had my original battle plan of writing for two hours every day after work before Chris got home. Only when I returned to work on Wednesday, all hell had broken loose while I was gone, and my boss was practically begging me to do overtime. Now everyone loves a little cash in their pocket, but when's a girl supposed to find time to write? And of course every evening is spent renovating our house, so I was starting to feel up a crick without a paddle.

One of these nights, after a minor nervous breakdown, I told Chris I couldn't spend much time at the house because I needed to write if I was gonna take this pledge to NaNoWriMo seriously. (Haha it's hard to talk seriously about something called NaNoWriMo, but I digress) So I got myself a cup of tea and a slice of cake and I sat down at my computer and got serious.

Only everything I wrote was crap. Crap, crap, crap. I felt like I was in third grade again, writing pages of run-on sentences and boring plot lines strung together with "and thens."

In fact, overall, it hasn't been finding the time that's been the problem this week. You can always find the time if you look hard enough. It's getting motivated to face my monitor when I know all that's coming out is crap.

I argued with myself a lot this week, asking myself if it was worth it to spend so much time if I would have to rewrite my entire end product, and if I should bother wasting so many bad words when I could be writing better (though fewer) words. But I keep trying to remind myself that it's about words in general, good and bad, and just getting some on the page, which is a task that seemed to be eluding me before this month started. And yes, I'm writing a lot of stuff that will end up getting crossed out with the most brilliant red pen I own, but there's also little gems here and there, ideas I hadn't thought to include before, metaphors I hadn't pondered before, poetry I didn't know I was capable of before. That alone, I think, is the reason so many people believe in NoNaWriMo and want to be a part of it. I just have to keep reminding myself.

Luckily, I've got help. At least two friends on my facebook are "suffering" (though self-imposed) with me, both veteran writers who love to root this rookie on. They reassured me that writing crap is okay and even they, with their more advanced writing level, are still writing their share of crap and then some. One friend doesn't even bother looking back at anything he's written. In fact, he's got a writing program that only lets him see the last hundred words he's typed, which I think is friggin' genius. I find myself writing for a good fifteen minutes, hitting a wall for a moment, and then checking my word totals, only to find they've increased by a mere hundred or so. The other encourages me to not stop writing for anything, and to switch gears to a different plot line or character if I feel myself slowing down. Great advice from both and great encouragement!

But to be honest, the most helpful thing they told me was that they were writing crap, too. It reminds me I'm not alone.

So I will trudge on. Hopefully I can find some time this weekend between laying hardwood floors in our house to catch up on those 8,000 words. If it's one thing I've learned so far, it's that getting behind by even a day can really hurt your numbers, and after all, this really is all about the numbers (since it's certainly not about good writing). I guess I need to take Tod up on his offer and have a POWER WEEKEND!