i will

Entry part the second: day of self loathing. We'll call it mild.

So this is going to be a small part pep talk and a large part beat-self-over-head-kick-ass-into-motion.

I need to write. Not just anything. Aerlun's story. Daemien's story. I've been getting this vague feeling lately that I'm getting closer to pushing through the barrier that's keeping me from just getting up and going on this story. Well, I need to force my hand and push it now.

I'm not in an awesome place right now. I'm not in a bad place... I mean I'm really lucky in general. I'm in college, I've got Danny (and I couldn't ask for more than him), and I don't have to worry about money... not really, anyway. But I haven't been doing any substantial writing in ages. For my workshop submission, I did a quick edit of "For a Soul" and submitted it... which is a good piece for the workshop, I think, but disappointing when I intended to write something new. I'm also not doing as well in school as I'd like. Now we must remember that "not doing as well as I'd like" for me is different than for a lot of other kids. I'm not afraid of failing, I'm just afraid of not making all or mostly As. Still, it's stressful for me.

Moving on to the writing itself.

So I've had several problems. Largest: I'm having horrible trouble getting started. Reminder to self: it has to start somewhere. The important thing is to get going. The beginning can be rewritten, replaced, whatever later on. Another concern: first-person vs third, present tense vs past. Reminder to self: I'll have just as much trouble getting started writing in one as in another. I just have to go, and later I can decide if it needs to be revised for another tense/POV. Another concern... and while this hasn't consciously bothered me as much, it's probably the most daunting: I have trouble with the setting, trying to make it realistic and unique. I feel like I need to study up on building materials, what materials/foods/etc are available in what sorts of climates, etc. etc. This is harder to solve. I want to tell myself that it's my world, so things don't have to relate exactly to real world climate zones or anything like that, but I do want the science in my world to be sound where magic doesn't actually interfere. But I do suppose that these are also edits that can be made later. Better to write it and have to edit some details that don't make strict sense than to have nothing to edit, right?

So. Yes. I need to get on it. I have my opening line. Just gotta go from there.

Lyss' stare burned between his shoulder blades.

So I drew three things for Danny. One straight pencil done of a picture I took using my iphone, just zoomed in on my hand up around my necklace, as if I'm reaching to grab it. Another is the idea I described in my last post, with the lowcut Vegas shirt and video game controller. The other is a close up of Supergirl, just face and boobs. =) Yes, boobs would be the recurring theme here, especially considering the Hooters cards I got him. I asked him if he guessed any of his presents yet and he said no, which makes me glad. I was worried it would be obvious (since I told him they don't cost money and I asked his favorite female comic character) but I want him to be surprised. Especially since I haven't drawn anything for him since February.

Had Writers Here and Now today. Was long, and slightly dull for large portions, though that was probably due in large part to my mindset. I didn't really want to be there at the time. The second reader, though -- Phillips -- made me tear up just a little with the second passage he read. It was about a soldier seriously injured in Iraq's family finding out by phone that he was injured, but not really knowing the extent of his injuries or anything. They called his girlfriend and made sure she wasn't alone before they told her because they wanted to make sure she had someone there for her. That was the point that got to me, because it's something I could definitely see Danny's parents doing in the same situation.

But Danny will be home by this time tomorrow night so cheerful thoughts!

So I'm learning to drive stick finally. Danny's tried to teach me a little before but my heart wasn't really in it... I wasn't comfortable enough driving automatic yet to really commit to it. It's a lot to think about and adjust to. Danny keeps telling me to feel where the clutch hits the point you need to start hitting the gas, but I'm still better at seeing it when the RPMs drop. I'm told that his car is a weird manual, and if I can learn to drive it I can drive any manual... we'll see. Our driveway is a steep hill (speaking of which, I looked up at the mad security system for our house a minute ago and saw a white horse walk past the bottom of the driveway -- weird), and yesterday after I almost drove his car into a ditch because I was fighting between slowing down enough to turn and stalling, he had me sit on the driveway and go from stopped to first gear. It took a few tries, but I started doing pretty well at that. In the beginning it was very frustrating and I was close to tears, but at the end he told me I stalled way less than he expected...

So I've driven up and down Warrenton (street leading to our driveway, little to no traffic ever) once or twice, and today he had me drive through the parking lot from Target to Chipotle. I'm determined to actually learn this time, but I do want to start small, and I'm not ready to stall in traffic yet.

I'm also sick. I woke up with a worse sore throat than what I had yesterday and a mad headache, so I didn't go to class. I did go by school to drop off the last of my tuition status paperwork though. The woman wasn't there, but another lady found my file for me and let me sign my tax returns and leave the other stuff with my file. I stopped at the Diner and got a milkshake too. I've got laundry in the washer now, and I folded the clean clothes that have been sitting in a basket for almost a week.

( Stuff to do for next week )

Lots to do... where to start?

ETA: Also, I went to room selection yesterday and met my roommate for next semester. She seems pretty chill, we'll probably have a relationship in the middle of the Joy-Laura spectrum... Laura being someone I chat with a lot when I see her, Joy being someone I really only say hi to. Her name's Deborah, she's 21 and a junior (we can have beer in our room o_O), and she's in Writer's House more for poetry than anything else. Which means I'll have to go outside my room for community about my specific type of writing, but that's cool. I need to do that anyway.

So maybe it hasn't been that long, but a lot of stuff has happened since last I posted. I applied to Writers' House and found out today that I'm accepted, which is great. There will be a couple prep things I'll have to attend, and I have to make sure I don't work those days -- or at least that I work early enough that I can still go. They're both Wednesdays, I think.

Starbucks also had some big to-do thing about closing down all its stores at 5:30 the Tuesday before last for a training session for its employees -- sort of going back to basics, making sure baristas are following Starbucks-quality procedures. I couldn't go because I have a late class on Tuesdays, so I had to make it up Monday. Debra, the district manager, was supposed to come, but she didn't show up, which was a huge shame since I really wanted to ask her a few things... I've never even met her. So George gave me the 'training' -- which wasn't much.

Ah. Danny's birthday was great. We had a fight in the hotel room, and I felt really bad about it because I didn't want anything to dampen his birthday... but the next day we woke up great and went skiing. It was raining lightly and a lot of the snow was just covered in ice when it hadn't been groomed recently enough, and we ended up basically skiing in a cloud that just crept lower and lower all day... but we still had a good time. I was definitely more scared this time that last time because of the conditions, though. I started to get the hang of it again toward the end, but I had a few kind of painful falls early on -- a couple from trying not to run into little kids who weren't paying attention.

I also bought him a butterfly knife online Saturday night when we were slightly drunk. We'd intended to do it earlier but forgotten. It should arrive at his parents' house any day now.

I've had three midterms; one last Tuesday, one last Thursday, and one the Tuesday immediately past. I feel pretty decent about them. The only one I think I'm slightly worried about is Psych, and just because I want an A, but I could see myself getting a B.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do this summer. I think I might try to get a campus job and leave Starbucks. Working with George is just a pain most of the time. Danny's friend and old neighbor who just left Starbucks herself told him that she's heard of George, and that if she was me she'd get out of his store and out of Debra's district, too. Go talk to Rick again and see if I can transfer back to his district. I could do that, but I'm also looking into other stuff. In my email I got this thing from the school saying they're looking for three students to basically tour some Japanese exchange students around the area and help acquaint them with American culture for two weeks during the summer, and it would pay $1000. There are other campus-related jobs, too. I think one of them is manning the desks during orientation sessions and assigning keys and such. Pay is listed as competitive, but no actual price... but it can also be full-time, so... and I could always apply to drive a campus bus. They pay you to train for your commercial driver's license (I think that's the one) and it's a $10 an hour job, 12 to 20 hours a week. Except I'm probably not a confident enough driver. And of course there's the gym, where I'd love to work. It'd be really convenient. They're having open interviews at the end of April, so I have to make sure to go.

That's about it.