For the Write Reason

This is perhaps my favorite day of the year: the first day of school. It feels much more like New Year’s Day than January 1. It feels fresh and exciting. No matter what the weather is like, it is perfect weather for the first day of school. For twenty years now, I have fought the urge to wear one of my new sweaters on the first day of school, when it is invariably too hot for a sweater.

On Talk of the Nation last Thursday, part of the program was devoted to the cost of higher education. The guests were Tom Joyce, who works for Sallie Mae, and Scott Jaschik, the editor of a magazine called Inside Higher Ed. The conversation inevitably weaved through the convoluted maze of scholarships, financial aid, loans, and the FAFSA, but Jaschik managed to find time to mention that students don’t always even apply to the right colleges. I began to think about when I was eighteen and trying to figure out where to go to college. DePauw University sent me some literature, as did many other private colleges, but I ended up only applying to IU in Bloomington and IPFW here in the Fort.

The sea of colleges was overwhelming. I couldn’t base my decision on program quality because I didn’t know what I wanted to study, although I was purporting to want to study Latin, because it was the only thing that I was good at in high school. (Of course, I was good at English, but I didn’t want to be a high school English teacher. Having fallen victim to the “English degrees are for teaching” fallacy, I avoided English and thus wasted my first year of college.) So off I went to IU in Bloomington to become a high school Latin teacher. (Yeah, I know that is teaching. My eighteen-year-old self was constantly hypocritical in this way.)

I can see now that I do not have the temperament for a major public university like IU. I am not naturally social; I don’t naturally want to be with people. It is remarkably easy to be alone on a campus as huge as IU’s, and I spent a good deal of time alone in my dorm room. I can remember telling Mary Ann this story and she asked me if I wrote when I was alone in my room. Did I ever. I wrote notebooks full of the most melodramatic shit you have ever read. I spent a few months considering dropping out of college altogether and moving to L.A. to become a soap opera writer so I wrote countless storylines, scenes, and snipits of dialogue sometimes for General Hospital and sometimes for my own made-up show. I have tried to think of my three semesters at IU as valuable, but the truth is that I wasted my parents’ money, my time, and my intellectual energy.

My sister goes to a small, private college that is significantly more expensive than my IU education or especially my subsequent IPFW education. I can see, though, that the cost may worth the experience. Last summer, I met a friend of a friend who went to a similarly small, private, liberal arts college in Minnesota. We were at a champagne party, and as you all know, I love me some champagne. I suppose this friend of a friend got to know me better and more quickly that she would have ordinarily because of the champagne and soon she was telling me that I should have gone to her college. (I have since forgotten the name.) I do wish I had gone to her college or to one like it. I wish I had had the kind of close-knit collegiate experience that my sister is having.

College isn’t only about academics. Education doesn’t just happen in the classroom. I met some really excellent intellectual powers at IPFW. These are people whom I consider thinkers (Hi, Andy! Hi, Katie! Hi, Dave! Hi, Chad!), but I didn’t meet them in classes. I met them at the student newspaper. I imagine that my entire collegiate life could have been lived like my time at the newspaper. IPFW is hardly a huge university, but I’m not sure it is small in the right way.

I am far more comfortable as a graduate student than I was as an undergrad at IPFW. The English MA program is the small, close-knit community I was looking for, and last spring, I took a theory class that finally made me feel like an academic. I wrote a paper about using writing memoirs (by people like Joan Didion, Joyce Carol Oates, and even Stephen King) to teach first year composition students, and since I currently teach such students, I am able to put into practice the theory I advanced in that paper.

I will admit that I definitely yearn for the name-dropping privilege that comes from attending a prestigious university. I have always been a nerd, and so academia has always been the backdrop of my pipe dream and the way I measure worth. I equate a person’s level of education with his/her value. I know it’s wrong, but it is ingrained in me. I don’t care what kind of car you drive. I don’t care where you live. I don’t care what kind of job you have (unless you’re a professor). And I don’t care how nice you are. I want to know how many college degrees you have and where they came from, and then I want you to be able to talk to me as if you have read more than one book.

Another point made on Talk of the Nation was that these so-called cheaper state universities are increasingly more and more impossible to get through in four years whereas the private, more expensive colleges offer better advising and more course availability (sections don’t fill up as quickly because there aren’t a bagazillion students trying to get into each class) in order to make sure students get done in the traditional four years. I am hardly an advocate for tradition for the sake of tradition, and the fact that it took me six years to get my two BAs didn’t really bother me. The exposed truth, though, seemed worth mentioning.

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I am in the midst of a full-on infatuation with Gilmore Girls.

Prior to this summer, I had been a low-key watcher of this show. Something—perhaps my women’s studies background—moves me toward TV shows about women, even if it is just to check it out and then check it off my imaginary list. This is what made me watch Kate & Allie, for example. My experience with Gilmore Girls has been less instant enthusiasm and more trepidation. The first time I watched Gilmore Girls was at the very end of season five, when Rory was first starting to misbehave with Logan. Quite frankly, the show made my head hurt. I noticed right away that Lauren Graham was cute…

but I was then distracted by a growing suspicion that the actors on this show weren’t so much acting as reading. It was like watching a really elaborate read-through of the script. Individually, the lines are clever and the actors are capable, but together, something goes wrong. The result is stilted and awkward.

For whatever reason (masochism?), I watched season six fairly faithfully and I got angry along with the rest of the show’s fanbase in season seven. When it was all over, I was relieved. I stopped wondering why I liked the show; I didn’t need to question my standards because the show was in the past and didn’t matter anymore.

Then, this summer, I started kind of casually watching reruns of Gilmore Girls on ABCFamily. Before I knew what was happening, I was hooked. I had to watch it. I tried to fight it, but the show was getting to me. I no longer find the dialogue weirdly presented, and I very much want to go to Stars Hollow and stay at Lorelei’s inn. I’ve been brain-washed. So charmed am I by the show and by Rory and Lorelei in particular that I don’t even fastforward through the opening montage, even when I’m watching two or three episodes in a row. I just sit back, hug one of my couch pillows, and sing along.

Now I’m convinced that the show is important, which is a word I throw around to justify my TV habit. If I say a particular program is “important,” then I become a cultural critic instead of a coach potato. Gilmore Girls is, as I already noted, a show about women. There are fleshed-out male characters but the stars of the hollow (hehe) are definitely Rory and Lorelei. Admittedly, their relationship is symbiotic, but this problematic fact is fully acknowledged on the show. Their needing of each other gets in the way, and they are forced to grow when it is sometimes uncomfortable. The characters on Gilmore Girls all have to face the consequences of their actions, which is one of my favorite things about it. (This is also, incidentally, my favorite thing about Grey’s Anatomy and definitely what keeps me watching, now that Kate Walsh is gone.) Sure, sometimes the consequences are silly, but they are consequences nonetheless.

There is something human lurking beneath the unrealistic dialogue and the TV-ready people (even the bed head is cute) on Gilmore Girls. Rory and Lorelei love each other fiercely. In many ways, they grew up together (like in the B.J. Thomas song), and Lorelei never pretends it wasn’t hard. She is honest with Rory about nearly everything, and Rory reciprocates. Although they are usually happy and free of the tragedy that befalls primetime TV characters (people rarely die and are never horrifically murdered on Gilmore Girls), Rory and Lorelei remain interesting. The show even made it work when they were living in separate towns the last four seasons because things happened organically and naturally—well, except for that strange way they talk.

Because of all the time I wasted pretending that I wasn’t in love with Gilmore Girls, I’m not as far into the series as I could be. I have just started on season four. The good news is that I have no desire to watch episodes I have already seen so my obsession appears to be finite. With any luck, in a month or two, I’ll be free of the Gilmore spell and on to new infatuations.

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I watched Loving Annabelle twice last Monday and I am thinking about watching it again right now. Save your sympathy for my sad, sad life. I wanted to watch it twice. I planned out my day so that I would have time to watch it twice. And keep in mind that the film is 77 minutes long so watching it twice didn’t even take three hours. I watched it first with commentary by the director Katherine Brooks and the star Erin Kelly and then once the regular way, and Sachen and Madeline slept through both screenings.

This week I got the DVD for my birthday so now I can watch it whenever I want—which is often.

When this movie first came out, I was infatuated with it. It is the reason we have Netflix. I knew it would be impossible to rent it and when I discovered that it was available through Netflix, I signed us up.

The thing about Loving Annabelle is that it is visually pleasing. I’m not just talking about Erin Kelly. The shots are artistic, and the scenery is gorgeous. The place where they filmed the exterior boarding school shots has all kinds of grand stone buildings and fancy archways and such, and the interiors, like the chapel and the cafeteria (for lack of a better word for where they eat, for it is hardly cafeteria-like), are grand as well with high ceilings and stained glass.

Loving Annabelle is also quiet, which I like. Several years ago, I went through a phase in which I watched only quiet movies, like Kramer v. Kramer and Interiors, and I never lost my affection for them. I like the attention that quiet movies demand, like it’s happening whether or not you notice so you better notice or you’ll miss it. However, since I have seen Loving Annabelle more than thirty times once, I can put it on while I’m cleaning, and then turn my full attention to it when it reaches a favorite part, like when Annabelle sends Simone flowers and that nun delivers them to her room and says “They’re not from me” in her dry way. (P.S. There is a hilarious rendition of that scene on the bonus features on the DVD.)

The primary reason I love this movie, though, is all about its inevitability. From the very beginning (even from the DVD cover), you know where it is going. You see them drawn to each other, and you feel the realism the director is infusing into the story so you know there is no sunset here. I like how clear and concise the story is, and I am coming to terms with the fact that it perhaps only needs 77 minutes. I know exactly why Simone makes every decision she makes, and I know exactly why Annabelle takes every step she takes. I even know why Cat blows everything apart at the end. Although the story is simple, the telling is layered, and it took me more than one viewing to figure out Cat completely.

Now that I have watched the movie with Erin and Katherine’s comments, I feel like I’m in on a joke. For instance, the photos of Simone’s dead girlfriend are actually of Katherine herself, the director. I find this tidbit adorably low budget. Every time I watch the movie, I will look at those photos and smile to myself. This is just another reason for me to watch it. A lot.

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Actually, it’s only been four years, but the sentiment expressed in the Family Ties theme song fits us because it feels as if Sachen and I have been together since forever.

I got Sachen four years ago today, the day after I turned twenty-three. He was already old and cranky and I was already weird. We were two distinct personalities already formed and fortunately compatible since my particular personality was and remains subservient to Cat.

Sachen isn’t the cat I would pick if I were picking. Previous to my association with him, I didn’t want a long-haired cat because of all the fur. Also, when I was a kid, we had a black and white cat who was very special to me and I wasn’t looking to replace or replicate. Add those issues to the fact that Sachen’s attitude (bad) and breath (worse) aren’t exactly endearing. Now I can see that the long hair is adorable. Go ahead and click on that paw and examine the tufts of fur between the toes.

And this fluffy tail…

How am I supposed to live without that?

Some friends of mine recently lost their dog and the loss is hitting them very hard so I’ve been thinking lately about how much Sachen means to me. Andy and I often talk about getting a nice cat, but the truth is that we will be destroyed when Sachen dies. I’ll be lucky if I can get out of bed in the morning, let alone even look at another cat. People like me and Andy (and our poor dog-less friends) throw our whole selves into loving our pets, and the idea of losing Sachen tightens my chest and shortens my breath.

I like Sachen more than I like most people. Chances are that I prefer his company, such as it is, to yours, whoever you are. Just kidding. Sort of. It’s just that Sachen and I have a special connection. He resists and I push and it just works.

Happy anniversary, sweetheart.

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I have always been fond of the date of my birth, with all the eights and ones and the sharing it with Robert Redford. I have not, you will surely recall, always been fond of getting old. That is why last year I instituted a moratorium on the getting older. Thus my annual 26th birthday parties began.

Check out the cake Andy got me this year.

Gaudy much? (I think you can click on the image to enlarge it so that you can read the “2nd Annual” part in green at the top of the cake.)

It’s not as if I don’t think of myself as twenty-seven now. I can’t hide from chronology. Even I am not that removed from reality. Let’s say that I am officially twenty-seven, but colloquially twenty-six. I assume that later, when I have figured out what I want to do and who I want to be, I will let my official age and my colloquial age merge. I wouldn’t hold my breath for twenty-eight, though. You might as well mark your calendars for Katie’s 3rd Annual 26th Birthday Extravaganza.

I mean, does this look like a person who knows anything, let alone what she wants to do with her life?

I think we are dancing.

Yes, that is definitely dancing.

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Yesterday I realized one of my longer-lasting dreams. This kind of dream fits into a category of dreams that are actually attainable, like wanting a breakfast nook in the kitchen, a Subaru, and a nice cat if Sachen turns out not to be too mean to die after all.

You see, internet, I’ve always wanted to watch Olympic badminton, and yesterday, on my very own MSNBC, there it was: men’s singles badminton.

Some dude from the U.S. of A. was playing some dude from Finland and the match was surprisingly entertaining, even though the American was perhaps only slightly better than I am. (Finland won.)

I’m not sure when my love affair with badminton started, but it rivals basketball as my favorite sport. However, whereas I have no desire to play basketball, I actually enjoy playing badminton. This is weird because I am in no stretch of the imagination what anyone would call athletic. I don’t even like to be outside, so imagine my glee when I learned yesterday that there are badminton clubs, whole buildings that house indoor badminton courts. Of course, badminton is much bigger in India and parts of Asia than it is in the United States so badminton clubs are few and far between here. I doubt I could find one in Fort Wayne, even if I wanted to play in the organized sweat of strangers.

Perhaps I am destined to be an observer. Good thing I have MSNBC.

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The Garrison Keillor column that appeared in this Saturday’s Journal Gazette was funny, as usual, but made a claim of superiority that made me uncomfortable. In his mocking of John McCain, Keillor pointed out that McCain doesn’t write his own books and that Barack Obama does.

The Chicagoan, who grew up without a father, wrote a book on his own, using a computer. The Arizonan hired people to write his for him.

I haven’t read any of Obama’s books, but I have read two of McCain’s books—Faith of My Fathers and Worth the Fighting For. You see, way back when McCain ran for president in 2000, I was kind of a fan. Now that he has had an apparent personality transplant, I am embarrassed to admit that I read and enjoyed his books, but back then, McCain was different. He stood out from his fellow Republicans (didn’t he even start out as an independent?) and that is what attracted me to his story. I like people who stick to their convictions, especially when those convictions don’t exactly follow the party line. Now I’m not sure McCain has convictions at all, let alone ones that stand out from his party. In 2000, I was going to vote for Al Gore regardless of what happened with the Republican nomination, but I respected McCain.

Both Faith of My Fathers and Worth the Fighting For were co-written (i.e. written) by Mark Salter, a fact that is plainly acknowledged on their respective covers. I didn’t read these books because I wanted to find out what kind of a writer John McCain is. Keillor makes a lot of English major jokes, and most of the time, they fit me. I am a stereotypical English major, and I generally equate writing ability with intellect.

Well, I used to, at least.

Now I teach writing to college freshmen, many of whom are bright, articulate, skilled, and terrible writers. These students are often better at speaking their ideas than I am at speaking mine, but something gets lost when the ideas go from the mouth to the paper. Sometimes the problem is nothing more than nervousness and can be helped with simple practice, but writing doesn’t come easily or well to everyone. It is a talent, and like any other talent it can be cultivated and nurtured but never created out of thin air. Last night, we watched Wonder Boys (for the millionth time), and despite its often limited and sometimes problematic representation of what Andy calls my people, I love this movie. Near the end, Michael Douglas’s Grady Tripp tells Robert Downey, Jr.’s Terry Crabtree that writing can’t be taught. This is, of course, the central dilemma of writing studies. I tend to believe Grady, even if he, as a creative writing professor, is having a crisis of faith that can’t wholly be taken seriously.

But if writing can’t be taught, then what are we doing?

It’s important, then, to think of writing as a skill here. As an instructor, I don’t expect to create writers. My main goal is for my students not to hate or fear writing because it is an integral part of college and a tool of basic communication. I can show my students how to make their ideas clearer, what kinds of words to use, how to organize their sentences, and—most significant to them—what professors will be expecting from their papers, but I can’t teach them the instinct for what words to use or the feeling for originality. Even after I have instilled confidence into my young writers, I know that they will avoid the task whenever possible. I think writing is important and even fun, but I don’t pretend this is a universal opinion. Many of my students simply excel in other areas and regard writing as a challenge best avoided. Isn’t it possible that McCain is just such a writing student?

My point here is that Barack Obama’s greater ability to write doesn’t automatically make him a better candidate for president than John McCain. I’m all for making fun of McCain’s shortcomings, but I don’t count recognizing his limitations in regard to writing and choosing to use a ghost-writer to be among them.

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I may be overwhelmed. I woke up this morning with all ten tracks of Didn’t It Feel Kinder stuck in my head. I always wake up with a song in my head, but usually it is just one. Today, it was ten playing at the same time. It reminded me of that episode of BtVS where Buffy can hear everyone’s thoughts and at first, it seems kind of cool but we soon realize that it is a nightmare.

Also, I am facing a philosophical issue of sorts. Do I like Didn’t It Feel Kinder because I unquestioningly like Amy Ray or do I like it because it is good? In other words, which came first: my love for Amy or my love for Amy’s music? Of course, as is the case with most philosophical questions, the answer doesn’t matter and the question is indeed intended not for answering but for debate.

If I didn’t like it, I wouldn’t listen to it. I am not here to prove my loyalty. I will be the first to acknowledge that Billy Joel’s newest single—”All My Life,” released in early 2007—is pretty crappy, and no one loves Billy Joel more than I do.

The great thing about music is that it doesn’t matter why you like it and it is really difficult for it to be bad for you. As long as Amy Ray keeps making me happy, I’ll keep giving her my money.

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My copy of Didn’t It Feel Kinder came in the mail today. The album doesn’t come out officially until tomorrow so, yeah, I feel pretty special.

I have listened to the album all the way through twice now, and I’ve listened to “Cold Shoulder” and “Stand and Deliver” a few extra times. Before I got the CD, I was really into “Cold Shoulder” after hearing it on Amy Ray TV last week. I am still digging it, especially that “she may be straight tonight but last night she let me hold her” part.

I’m clearly not ready to “review” the album, but my initial reactions are all positive. “She’s Got to Be” is really interesting. Amy took a pretty big risk there with her voice, and I think it paid off. I definitely support and appreciate all her experimenting. “Rabbit Foot” is quiet and intense. It’s one of those songs that feel so personal that I almost feel uncomfortable listening to it. I’ll get over it, of course.

Prom is a really special album, and I may be unfairly comparing Didn’t It Feel Kinder to its predecessor. Prom’s tracks fit so well together that it’s as if they are all different parts of the same song. The songs on Didn’t It Feel Kinder are more distinct from each other, and I like that each of them seems to stand on its own.

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