Off Again

I'll be going back to Oregon on Tuesday for my third residency. As usual, I am both looking forward to it and vaguely dreading it. I really don't like the traveling part of it, trying to make sure I have everything I need, managing my luggage, flying, being away from Marc and my cats. But I love seeing my friends, going to classes, being immersed in the creative atmosphere, getting to talk to other writers.

Usually, just before I go, I wish I could cancel it, get out of it somehow. Then after I get there, I almost immediately stop thinking about it and have a great time. Fortunately.

I'll be rooming with my usual roommates in the same dorm as last time. That should make it easier for me to settle in. It'll at least be familiar.

I'll be blogging the trip, as usual. Hopefully there won't be so many typos this time. I have a couple of new goals. We always have to do reviews of the classes we attended while at the residency. They're due within a week of the end of the residency, or we can turn them in before we leave. I've never had mine done in time to turn them in at the res, but I'm going to try to write about each thing I attend on the day I attend it. Maybe I'll do that here. I'm also going to try to make my reviews more formal and meaningful than I have in the past. I'm usually so tired by the time I write them that they are just a kind of fill in the blanks report of what the lecturer said. But I'm hoping that if I do them immediately after, and if I find some way to take better notes (and if I can actually read my handwriting--heh), hopefully I can write a good summary.

Every semester, a few well-written reviews make it onto the MFA website, a sort of advertisement for the program, and an endorsement of the student writer's work. Two of my roommates have had pieces up over the past two semesters. When I've seen theirs I've felt like a moron, because I can't imagine how they were able to focus enough to write such strong essays. So this time, I'm going to do it. I don't know how yet, but I'm going to.

The residency starts on the 19th, so I'll begin blogging after that. I'm co-teaching the reading for writers class again with Julie Rember. We're doing two sessions, but each one is only an hour this time. I'll write about those, but I expect it will go like it did last time.

More during the week.