Song: Oops I Did It Again x Britney Spears
I think I did it again...
No, I don't think, I did. Sorry for abandoning you all once my summer got crazy. And by "you all," I'm still unaware of who I'm even speaking to. Do I have an audience? Is anyone out there? *echoes back to me*
Anyways, summer 2017 is almost to a close, with Labor Day and the beginning of the semester on the horizon. I may not have classes, but I sure have a lot going on. I have two major projects, thesis, and of course submissions and applications to literary magazines and jobs for when I am appropriately booted out of the educational system.
It's time to learn how to adult. I've been wearing wedges at work for about a month, and the things that a small heel can change (namely my height)!
I told you, I'd talk about the projects eventually, so I'll let y'all in on project #1 because again, I don't know how y'all is, but you might be interested. You might not. I don't really care. Anyways, project #1 was birthed in my non-narrative thought class, in which I struggled to write non-narratively because narrative just makes sense and non-narrative is difficult to read, but even more difficult to write. Each student had to bring in a narrative essay, which we would spend the semester (magically) turning into non-narrative. I chose the first essay I wrote during my program, which was about my Hair Journey and that entire transitioning process.
After switching my non-narrative plans up a billion times, and eventually realizing that I had so much on my plate, I was no longer committing to the project with the same original energy...my professor allowed me an out. They said, bring in a project you're working on and use it in class. But me, being all academic integrity and perfectionist and overachieving, I said no. So what I ended up doing was creating a whole-ass website for my final project (for which, we didn't need to have a completed project, we could have just had an idea). The website was a lexicon about hair and beauty and blackness.
I took that website and pitched it to a nonfiction literary magazine, Fourth Genre, who was having a digital essay submission call. My website was digital. And it was certainly an essay. So I pitched it, on the eve of the last day of class and my vacation, burnt out AF, I somehow scrounged up the energy to write a legitimate proposal for this project and submitted it.
A month later, I had been accepted.
What I wanted of this lexicon was for it to become a platform for black women to talk about hair and beauty and pop culture, and to create a forum of sorts. These sorts of places exist on the internet already, but I wanted my platform to explore the differences and similarities in the ways that black women approach beauty and hair, through personal stories, essays, rants, odes, etc. I reached out to my friends and asked them to contribute to the site, if they wanted to, which several did.
I've been editing and putting together this site/digital essay for about 2 months now, and it's ready to be submitted as a draft for editing. I'm not as terrified as I thought I would be, but I'm stressed. I have a lot of deadlines coming up this weekend/next week and this website draft is one of them.
What else?
Need to finish my syllabus. Need to submit 3 submissions/applications by Friday. School starts after Labor Day and for the second year in a row, I have the privilege of being the face and representation of Columbia College Chicago at 9 a.m. on the first day of school. WELCOME. I made an instagram page for my writing, readings and projects...I also repost horoscopes and artist things and my bitmoji (@kaudonegesti). I moved, but you don't care about that. Excited to start this new adventure of my life, this 2017-2018 academic year, aka my last year of school after 20 years (unless I get my PhD, which I doubt).
ohlesdoit.
Tuesday, August 29, 2017
Monday, June 26, 2017
SubmittIng, Rejection, Publication and All That Jazz
Song: Work (feat. Drake) x Rihanna
Somehow this morning I was able to walk down the street on my way to work without rolling my hips to Rihanna's "Work," a feat that I'm quite proud of.
Anyways, I'm writing this in the AM (8:48 a.m.), but I probably will put it on hold for publishing until after work this evening. But I got into work and while gearing up for the day, I checked my Submittable account. This is something I do pretty obsessively, even though when it comes to being accepted or rejected, the publication will usually send an email (unless they do "completed" but we'll get to that later). This morning, one of my three submissions went from "received" to "in-progress" and yes, I'm pretty geeked.
I don't know who reads this blog, so I've decided I'm just going to talk about my experience with submitting from when do I know a piece is ready and/or done to what do I do now that I've been rejected. As a writer and MFA candidate, trying to get published is a top 5 priority for me and it's something that I discuss with my peers, professors and friends a lot. Fortunately, I've been rejected and published on more than one occasion, so I feel like I'm a good person to talk about these things.
First thing to know is: I'm a pessimist. This is something I've mentioned in some of my work and a thing that I let people know about me early on, I just think it's much easier to not have any expectations. That way, when something goes my way for once (say getting published) then I can be very excited about it, instead of rolling my eyes like "Of course, they accepted it...I wrote it."
The second thing to know is: my first publication was in January 2015 for Nailed Magazine (an online magazine) in their response column. I wrote 1000 words on "Masturbation" on the last day submissions were accepted. I submitted it via email and got a response two hours later, accepting my piece. Very exciting, but I didn't tell many people because...masturbation.
I only started publishing things because I completed all of the classes for my Creative Writing degree in Fall 2015, so I still had an entire semester of Neuroscience, Psychology and Literature courses to take, but I wouldn't be producing new creative work unless it was on my own time. I was finally getting a long awaited and much deserved break from writing. Publication wasn't really pushed in my college classes, at the end of each semester we'd have to submit a piece or two as part of our portfolio, but I didn't really know what I was doing, how to submit, how to choose publications, etc. My first submission was to Susquehanna Review and I still don't know anything about that publication--where it's from, who publishes it, what they want to read, who their audience is--nothing. But I had spent three and a half of my college years writing, workshopping and revising new work. I had poems, short stories, essays, articles, half-written pieces, prose poems, long-form narratives, disjunctive essays, lyric essays, on and on and on. (Maybe I should write a post about how I decided on the essay as my form? 😏) Anyways, I had over 30 works that I'd written for those classes just sitting on my computer, untouched, unpublished. So, I thought, it's time to do the thing that eventually every writer has to do and that's submit.
I submitted three long-form essays from my senior seminar and contemporary writing class as my manuscript for the Ohioana Library Award (which I later had the amazing and humbling privilege of winning). I was submitting manuscripts for graduate schools (thus, why I'm currently at Columbia, gearing up for my final thesis year). I was trying to participate in the monthly response column as often as I could between school, applying to graduate school, being rejected by graduate schools, working/tutoring and doing all of those senior year celebration events. I was able to participate in four before the column was no longer continued.
It's taken me days to write this and all of those submissions are still "in-progress" gleaming in bright azure. So, I guess I'll talk about rejection. If you're going to be real about writing and publishing, then you need to understand that the cold shoulder (sometimes not) of rejection will become very familiar. You'll get rejected at least once. I've been rejected many a time and my pessimism makes me just assume I'm going to be rejected anyways, so most of the time I'm not surprised, but other times, it's like being stabbed in the chest. Grad school rejections were like that. When I send out a piece I'm very proud of and have spent hundreds of hours reading and workshopping and revising, only to get an email or notification that it wasn't accepted--that hurts a lot. Sometimes, publications never get back to you. Sometimes, they lose your piece via email. Sometimes, they just ignore responding to you. I spent months waiting to hear back on an essay I specifically wrote for a publication's submission prompt and I never heard back. Eventually (with the advice of a professor), I emailed them, asking about my piece and explaining that I'd prefer not being in limbo. They still haven't responded. So I did what was best for me as a writer and submitted it elsewhere. It will be published in print later this month.
So how do I find publications to submit to?
Somehow this morning I was able to walk down the street on my way to work without rolling my hips to Rihanna's "Work," a feat that I'm quite proud of.
Anyways, I'm writing this in the AM (8:48 a.m.), but I probably will put it on hold for publishing until after work this evening. But I got into work and while gearing up for the day, I checked my Submittable account. This is something I do pretty obsessively, even though when it comes to being accepted or rejected, the publication will usually send an email (unless they do "completed" but we'll get to that later). This morning, one of my three submissions went from "received" to "in-progress" and yes, I'm pretty geeked.
I don't know who reads this blog, so I've decided I'm just going to talk about my experience with submitting from when do I know a piece is ready and/or done to what do I do now that I've been rejected. As a writer and MFA candidate, trying to get published is a top 5 priority for me and it's something that I discuss with my peers, professors and friends a lot. Fortunately, I've been rejected and published on more than one occasion, so I feel like I'm a good person to talk about these things.
First thing to know is: I'm a pessimist. This is something I've mentioned in some of my work and a thing that I let people know about me early on, I just think it's much easier to not have any expectations. That way, when something goes my way for once (say getting published) then I can be very excited about it, instead of rolling my eyes like "Of course, they accepted it...I wrote it."
The second thing to know is: my first publication was in January 2015 for Nailed Magazine (an online magazine) in their response column. I wrote 1000 words on "Masturbation" on the last day submissions were accepted. I submitted it via email and got a response two hours later, accepting my piece. Very exciting, but I didn't tell many people because...masturbation.
I only started publishing things because I completed all of the classes for my Creative Writing degree in Fall 2015, so I still had an entire semester of Neuroscience, Psychology and Literature courses to take, but I wouldn't be producing new creative work unless it was on my own time. I was finally getting a long awaited and much deserved break from writing. Publication wasn't really pushed in my college classes, at the end of each semester we'd have to submit a piece or two as part of our portfolio, but I didn't really know what I was doing, how to submit, how to choose publications, etc. My first submission was to Susquehanna Review and I still don't know anything about that publication--where it's from, who publishes it, what they want to read, who their audience is--nothing. But I had spent three and a half of my college years writing, workshopping and revising new work. I had poems, short stories, essays, articles, half-written pieces, prose poems, long-form narratives, disjunctive essays, lyric essays, on and on and on. (Maybe I should write a post about how I decided on the essay as my form? 😏) Anyways, I had over 30 works that I'd written for those classes just sitting on my computer, untouched, unpublished. So, I thought, it's time to do the thing that eventually every writer has to do and that's submit.
I submitted three long-form essays from my senior seminar and contemporary writing class as my manuscript for the Ohioana Library Award (which I later had the amazing and humbling privilege of winning). I was submitting manuscripts for graduate schools (thus, why I'm currently at Columbia, gearing up for my final thesis year). I was trying to participate in the monthly response column as often as I could between school, applying to graduate school, being rejected by graduate schools, working/tutoring and doing all of those senior year celebration events. I was able to participate in four before the column was no longer continued.
It's taken me days to write this and all of those submissions are still "in-progress" gleaming in bright azure. So, I guess I'll talk about rejection. If you're going to be real about writing and publishing, then you need to understand that the cold shoulder (sometimes not) of rejection will become very familiar. You'll get rejected at least once. I've been rejected many a time and my pessimism makes me just assume I'm going to be rejected anyways, so most of the time I'm not surprised, but other times, it's like being stabbed in the chest. Grad school rejections were like that. When I send out a piece I'm very proud of and have spent hundreds of hours reading and workshopping and revising, only to get an email or notification that it wasn't accepted--that hurts a lot. Sometimes, publications never get back to you. Sometimes, they lose your piece via email. Sometimes, they just ignore responding to you. I spent months waiting to hear back on an essay I specifically wrote for a publication's submission prompt and I never heard back. Eventually (with the advice of a professor), I emailed them, asking about my piece and explaining that I'd prefer not being in limbo. They still haven't responded. So I did what was best for me as a writer and submitted it elsewhere. It will be published in print later this month.
So how do I find publications to submit to?
www.pw.org (contests + list of most publications)
www.submittable.com (need an account)
www.essaydaily.org (list of publications)
ww.thereviewreview.net (call for submissions)
Twitter
Books by authors I like (usually list previously published works)
But how do I choose?
I should be a good person now and tell you to read every single literary journal you find interesting and see what they publish. If that seems like a lot though (because it can be), look at publications that published works by authors you've previously read and enjoyed. Look at publications that include authors who write in a similar style to yours. I look at word limits (I write pretty lengthy, so I need to know what I can submit), mastheads (who will be publishing my work is important to me) and mission statement (what is this publication about, who are they, what do they want to see/read). I've found that I like publications that encourage some sort of pop-culture based or critical writing mixed in with the personal; also those that are interested in underrepresented/marginalized voices; and pubs that want both beauty and grit in a piece. Once I find interest in a publication, I look at its submission guidelines to get a better idea of what they want and then I peruse the publication to see what's been previously published. Sometimes, you'll find a publication you love that will love you back. Other times, you'll find a publication you love that doesn't care about you. Sometimes, a publication will publish you and then later will reject you. Or the opposite. Publishing is weird.
I follow a lot of publications on Twitter, so I can see when they're open for submissions and work that they are digging at the moment. By following publications I like, I find that I constantly see publications that they (the publications) like and RT, which I find myself also becoming interested in and it becomes a whole cycle. I also follow writers I love on Twitter and they introduce me to more publications and opportunities, etc.
This is a lot. And I feel like I could keep going on forever about publishing and submitting, so I'll stop. There is always going to be someone who loves your work and wants to help you share it, you just have to find them.
I had a professor tell me once that publications should be grateful to publish your work; as in they should also be thanking us for submitting, instead of us thanking them for accepting. The things you write are important, so where you end up placing them speaks to that. It's an arduous process, but in the end it will be very rewarding. Good luck. And may the odds be ever in your favor.
Thursday, June 22, 2017
The Handmaid's Tale (& Updates)
Song: You Don't Own Me x Lesley Gore
(no spoilers because I'm on episode 3, so...)
So a few months ago, I finally gave in a upgraded my Hulu subscription. Game changer. So, first I binged Queen Sugar (brilliant, spectacular, heartbreaking), then I started working on Cupcake Wars (which is a great show if you like to critique professionals at their own craft for funsies), and a coworker suggested The Handmaid's Tale to me, which is a Hulu original.
I'm usually hesitant to 1) suggestions/recommendations of media because what if I hate it? Then you'll be mad that you shared your new favorite obsession with me and I was not impressed. 2) "originals" from things like Amazon, Hulu, Netflix...because it's like, why are you making your own things instead of providing me with things that I really want to watch and don't have access to? But sometimes those originals are great: Luke Cage, I Am Not Your Negro, I Love Dick, Dear White People, Making A Murderer, Black Mirror, Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life, Beasts of No Nation...the list could continue and you can now tell that I am an avid binge-watcher of on-my-own-time television and movies.
But anyways, The Handmaid's Tale. This is a show based on a book by Margaret Atwood that I, admittedly, haven't read and maybe once I'm done watching the series will read. This is a show that everyone has been gushing about online and everywhere in life because of the election and political climate, etc, etc, etc. And the way it was described to me was "women are basically forced to have sex with men in prominent positions to repopulate the world after a serious infertility/birth rate problem" and "everything is based in traditional values" and "it's dystopian, but it takes place during the now" and "it's terrifying" and "dark."
And I said, "Seems pretty plausible to me." Because...well, um...that's what happened during slavery. Sure, women weren't named "Handmaids" and "Marthas" but black women were certainly being raped on a consistent basis by their masters and constantly under the scrutiny of their masters/master's wives and their "bastard" children could end up in any sort of situation depending on the master/master's wife and families were being split up and they were property and seen as objects, not humans and this was a thing that was happening during the *cough* two-hundred plus years of slavery.
So I don't understand why everyone is so shocked about a plot where women have no rights, when *inhale* that was a thing until the 20th century if we're going to be real about it.
Seems like a lifetime ago (literally), but in the grand scheme of things, it's pretty damn recent.
Anyways, this show is good. It's terrifyingly good, it's like: man what if the ****p administration really does fuck us all over and strip women of their rights and most men of their rights creating an even worse class system and we all basically end up in servitude of old white men who are trying to convert and control us all based on biased twisted and misinterpreted values of the new testament like how do we fight something like that do we just go with it or nah we have to resist or can we like all the other "developed" countries are shaking their heads at us now because our government is ass backwards but if you're hearing what I'm saying then you can totally see this happening too right and I guess I get why everyone who is watching is so upset because like when privileged people imagine themselves without privilege it must really spark some sort of panic or personal crisis but I'm just chilling and watching the show like the meme below and being like wow this could really be us in like ten years I should probably work out so I'm prepared to escape or fight or something but let me just eat one more cookie and get in one more episode before I start.
But I'm just saying.
*Updates*
Trying to get together a website so everyone can be happy and have access to my work, but if you feel like you don't want to know some things about me then you probably shouldn't read those things, tbh.
Also trying to get back into the groove of writing, but as you can see...I've been watching hella television because it's summer.
It's Gemini season and Beyonce Knowles-Carter had her twins (a boy and a girl) and I am anxiously awaiting any and all photos of the two once they appear. But gemini twins can you imagine? 😟🙏
SZA dropped an immaculate album, so basically no one bother me all summer and for the rest of the year because I don't have time for foolishness when I need to grind grind grind
(no spoilers because I'm on episode 3, so...)
So a few months ago, I finally gave in a upgraded my Hulu subscription. Game changer. So, first I binged Queen Sugar (brilliant, spectacular, heartbreaking), then I started working on Cupcake Wars (which is a great show if you like to critique professionals at their own craft for funsies), and a coworker suggested The Handmaid's Tale to me, which is a Hulu original.
I'm usually hesitant to 1) suggestions/recommendations of media because what if I hate it? Then you'll be mad that you shared your new favorite obsession with me and I was not impressed. 2) "originals" from things like Amazon, Hulu, Netflix...because it's like, why are you making your own things instead of providing me with things that I really want to watch and don't have access to? But sometimes those originals are great: Luke Cage, I Am Not Your Negro, I Love Dick, Dear White People, Making A Murderer, Black Mirror, Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life, Beasts of No Nation...the list could continue and you can now tell that I am an avid binge-watcher of on-my-own-time television and movies.
But anyways, The Handmaid's Tale. This is a show based on a book by Margaret Atwood that I, admittedly, haven't read and maybe once I'm done watching the series will read. This is a show that everyone has been gushing about online and everywhere in life because of the election and political climate, etc, etc, etc. And the way it was described to me was "women are basically forced to have sex with men in prominent positions to repopulate the world after a serious infertility/birth rate problem" and "everything is based in traditional values" and "it's dystopian, but it takes place during the now" and "it's terrifying" and "dark."
And I said, "Seems pretty plausible to me." Because...well, um...that's what happened during slavery. Sure, women weren't named "Handmaids" and "Marthas" but black women were certainly being raped on a consistent basis by their masters and constantly under the scrutiny of their masters/master's wives and their "bastard" children could end up in any sort of situation depending on the master/master's wife and families were being split up and they were property and seen as objects, not humans and this was a thing that was happening during the *cough* two-hundred plus years of slavery.
So I don't understand why everyone is so shocked about a plot where women have no rights, when *inhale* that was a thing until the 20th century if we're going to be real about it.
Seems like a lifetime ago (literally), but in the grand scheme of things, it's pretty damn recent.
Anyways, this show is good. It's terrifyingly good, it's like: man what if the ****p administration really does fuck us all over and strip women of their rights and most men of their rights creating an even worse class system and we all basically end up in servitude of old white men who are trying to convert and control us all based on biased twisted and misinterpreted values of the new testament like how do we fight something like that do we just go with it or nah we have to resist or can we like all the other "developed" countries are shaking their heads at us now because our government is ass backwards but if you're hearing what I'm saying then you can totally see this happening too right and I guess I get why everyone who is watching is so upset because like when privileged people imagine themselves without privilege it must really spark some sort of panic or personal crisis but I'm just chilling and watching the show like the meme below and being like wow this could really be us in like ten years I should probably work out so I'm prepared to escape or fight or something but let me just eat one more cookie and get in one more episode before I start.
But I'm just saying.
*Updates*
Trying to get together a website so everyone can be happy and have access to my work, but if you feel like you don't want to know some things about me then you probably shouldn't read those things, tbh.
Also trying to get back into the groove of writing, but as you can see...I've been watching hella television because it's summer.
It's Gemini season and Beyonce Knowles-Carter had her twins (a boy and a girl) and I am anxiously awaiting any and all photos of the two once they appear. But gemini twins can you imagine? 😟🙏
SZA dropped an immaculate album, so basically no one bother me all summer and for the rest of the year because I don't have time for foolishness when I need to grind grind grind
Friday, June 9, 2017
Junior Varsity (A Reading and a Workshop)
Song: Mad (feat. Lil' Wayne) by Solange
A few months back, I participated in a reading created and run by three (now-graduates) fellow Columbia Nonfiction candidate fellows. The reading series, appropriately named "Chimera" is for writers to share hybrid work: essays, poetry, redacted poetry, fiction-ish things, prose poems, etc. It was my first reading outside of a conference setting (the Sigma Tau Delta conferences I presented at in 2014 and 2015) and I read a hybrid prose poem and an in-progress essay on the idea of God as a black woman. I drank a glass of tequila (Jose Cuervo) beforehand and pulled a Hemingway, throwing my papers to the floor as I went through them. Overall, it went really well and then I forgot about how mortifying it was to read in front of a packed room.
While I was on my short vacation two weeks ago, I was contacted by a woman who had seen me read at Chimera and enjoyed my piece about God. She asked me if I'd like to participate in her monthly "performance workshop" called Junior Varsity. Since I'm done with classes and preparing to write my thesis, I figured I should probably start getting used to reading my work aloud. (As of right now [yes, even after this reading] I don't really breathe when I read my work...I might take two or three breaths and talk very fast, trying to get finished.) The theme for the upcoming workshop was "Myth and Magic in Everyday Life," which made her think about my black woman as God piece and contacting me.
At Junior Varsity, the reader brings in an in-progress piece to be read in front of the audience and briefly workshopped afterwards. The piece I really wanted to read was an essay I'd begun about the Angry Black Woman stereotype, Beyonce and Solange, and my own anger issues. There was only one problem: I couldn't find the essay anywhere.
Let me tell you about the drama of finding this essay. I knew I'd written it because it had a very particular structure that made me hate it, so I decided not to turn it into to workshop and write an entirely new piece. I could find the 1000 word version of the essay, which I hated even more than the longer one because it seemed to have no real subject. So anyways, I can't find the essay on my OneDrive or my Google Drive, I figure it's on my actual laptop. I email the woman, how I'd like to read the essay and I'd be cutting it close, but I get back on Sunday night (the reading is on Tuesday) and I'll email it to her as soon as I find it. I get home Sunday and scour my laptop for this essay, searching my entire hard drive for key words like "Solange" "cornrows" "#BoycottBeyonce" and I'm not finding it anywhere and I'm just like 😓😟. After a couple hours, I'm like, okay, it's missing, I must have deleted it, and I'm mad AF at my past self because I wanted to revise that essay for my thesis. Like I said, I had just gotten back from my vacation, so I'm cleaning off my bed, getting ready to go to sleep and find this thick packet of paper--IT IS THE ESSAY, STAPLED AND PRINTED. So then, I'm excited and frustrated at my past self for printing out a single copy of this essay, the only thing that exists. I email the woman that I found the essay and I'll get it to her the next day. I scan it at work, that doesn't work, so I scan it using my phone and it looks terrible, but I send it to her anyways the day before the workshop.
The day of the workshop, I revise and revise and revise as I walk to and from getting my lunch, and while I wait for Panera to make it. For the performance workshop, we're supposed to read for 3-10 minutes and two hours beforehand, I still haven't read the essay aloud. *upside down smiley face*
Junior Varsity is a performance workshop held at Joie DeVine, a small neighborhood bar in Andersonville (north side of Chicago). In exchange for hosting the reading, the hosts tell the owners of the bar that we will come, read and drink merrily. I arrived to the reading with one of the hosts of Chimera, who had shared my info with the hosts of Junior Varsity. Of course, I'm nervous AF--I'm about to read an essay about black women and anger to a predominantly white audience, an essay I haven't practiced, and am not very proud of. I order a Moscow Mule and talk to the few people that came to hear me read/perform/workshop.
I'm a writing nerd, so, of course, I love workshops. I love the cone of silence. I love receiving criticism. It turns out that I'm going to be the last reader at Junior Varsity. There are four readers: myself, a man reading a fiction piece, a woman reading poetry and a woman who reads a poetics piece. I read my piece last, getting up onstage and forgetting to breathe as I breezed through ten pages of nonfiction separated into sections with hashtag headers. I was the only reader who was a first-time reader. What's great about Junior Varsity is that the hosts take notes and facilitate the workshop with the audience, following their three Ps: point, prune and ponder. A lot of people commented on my structure and ways that I could expand the essay, building on things I'd briefly mentioned: mental health, relationship to anger and the history of stereotypes (i.e. Sapphire). The workshop got me very excited about my essay and I feel a lot better about its current state than I did before the performance workshop. I am officially a Junior Varsity alumna! Which means I can return whenever I feel like I need to be workshopped on a specific piece and I can attend workshops and help listen and workshop other JV participants (while enjoying moscow mules and popcorn)!
Junior Varsity was a wonderful and eye-opening experience. Good vibes all around, even better people, and a community I can return to and trust with my work.
Now to get back into the groove of writing and revising...
A few months back, I participated in a reading created and run by three (now-graduates) fellow Columbia Nonfiction candidate fellows. The reading series, appropriately named "Chimera" is for writers to share hybrid work: essays, poetry, redacted poetry, fiction-ish things, prose poems, etc. It was my first reading outside of a conference setting (the Sigma Tau Delta conferences I presented at in 2014 and 2015) and I read a hybrid prose poem and an in-progress essay on the idea of God as a black woman. I drank a glass of tequila (Jose Cuervo) beforehand and pulled a Hemingway, throwing my papers to the floor as I went through them. Overall, it went really well and then I forgot about how mortifying it was to read in front of a packed room.
While I was on my short vacation two weeks ago, I was contacted by a woman who had seen me read at Chimera and enjoyed my piece about God. She asked me if I'd like to participate in her monthly "performance workshop" called Junior Varsity. Since I'm done with classes and preparing to write my thesis, I figured I should probably start getting used to reading my work aloud. (As of right now [yes, even after this reading] I don't really breathe when I read my work...I might take two or three breaths and talk very fast, trying to get finished.) The theme for the upcoming workshop was "Myth and Magic in Everyday Life," which made her think about my black woman as God piece and contacting me.
At Junior Varsity, the reader brings in an in-progress piece to be read in front of the audience and briefly workshopped afterwards. The piece I really wanted to read was an essay I'd begun about the Angry Black Woman stereotype, Beyonce and Solange, and my own anger issues. There was only one problem: I couldn't find the essay anywhere.
Let me tell you about the drama of finding this essay. I knew I'd written it because it had a very particular structure that made me hate it, so I decided not to turn it into to workshop and write an entirely new piece. I could find the 1000 word version of the essay, which I hated even more than the longer one because it seemed to have no real subject. So anyways, I can't find the essay on my OneDrive or my Google Drive, I figure it's on my actual laptop. I email the woman, how I'd like to read the essay and I'd be cutting it close, but I get back on Sunday night (the reading is on Tuesday) and I'll email it to her as soon as I find it. I get home Sunday and scour my laptop for this essay, searching my entire hard drive for key words like "Solange" "cornrows" "#BoycottBeyonce" and I'm not finding it anywhere and I'm just like 😓😟. After a couple hours, I'm like, okay, it's missing, I must have deleted it, and I'm mad AF at my past self because I wanted to revise that essay for my thesis. Like I said, I had just gotten back from my vacation, so I'm cleaning off my bed, getting ready to go to sleep and find this thick packet of paper--IT IS THE ESSAY, STAPLED AND PRINTED. So then, I'm excited and frustrated at my past self for printing out a single copy of this essay, the only thing that exists. I email the woman that I found the essay and I'll get it to her the next day. I scan it at work, that doesn't work, so I scan it using my phone and it looks terrible, but I send it to her anyways the day before the workshop.
The day of the workshop, I revise and revise and revise as I walk to and from getting my lunch, and while I wait for Panera to make it. For the performance workshop, we're supposed to read for 3-10 minutes and two hours beforehand, I still haven't read the essay aloud. *upside down smiley face*
Junior Varsity is a performance workshop held at Joie DeVine, a small neighborhood bar in Andersonville (north side of Chicago). In exchange for hosting the reading, the hosts tell the owners of the bar that we will come, read and drink merrily. I arrived to the reading with one of the hosts of Chimera, who had shared my info with the hosts of Junior Varsity. Of course, I'm nervous AF--I'm about to read an essay about black women and anger to a predominantly white audience, an essay I haven't practiced, and am not very proud of. I order a Moscow Mule and talk to the few people that came to hear me read/perform/workshop.
I'm a writing nerd, so, of course, I love workshops. I love the cone of silence. I love receiving criticism. It turns out that I'm going to be the last reader at Junior Varsity. There are four readers: myself, a man reading a fiction piece, a woman reading poetry and a woman who reads a poetics piece. I read my piece last, getting up onstage and forgetting to breathe as I breezed through ten pages of nonfiction separated into sections with hashtag headers. I was the only reader who was a first-time reader. What's great about Junior Varsity is that the hosts take notes and facilitate the workshop with the audience, following their three Ps: point, prune and ponder. A lot of people commented on my structure and ways that I could expand the essay, building on things I'd briefly mentioned: mental health, relationship to anger and the history of stereotypes (i.e. Sapphire). The workshop got me very excited about my essay and I feel a lot better about its current state than I did before the performance workshop. I am officially a Junior Varsity alumna! Which means I can return whenever I feel like I need to be workshopped on a specific piece and I can attend workshops and help listen and workshop other JV participants (while enjoying moscow mules and popcorn)!
Junior Varsity was a wonderful and eye-opening experience. Good vibes all around, even better people, and a community I can return to and trust with my work.
Now to get back into the groove of writing and revising...
Wednesday, May 24, 2017
(Still) An Ambitious Girl
Song: Humble x Kendrick Lamar
*insert prayer hands emoji*
Yes, it's been an entire year since I've let you all know what I was up to. (I've already made it clear how terrible I am at maintaining a blog, right? I'm still going to try, but I just wanted to make sure we're all on the same page...)
Anyways, what's happened since last May:
But then came the results of the election, inauguration, and the downward spiral of the country. To combat all of that--because writing wasn't working, in fact, writing was extremely difficult--I started watching Steven Universe at the beginning of the Spring 2017 semester. And TBH Steven and The Crystal Gems got me through the darkness that was January/February.
In February, I attended my first AWP conference in Washington D.C. (in a very conflicting place for a black female writer), which was really buying books, meeting authors, and attending readings. I went to a reading sponsored by the African Poetry Book Fund, a dance party/poetry reading, a feminist reading (which included Sonia Sanchez, one of the leaders of the Black Arts Movement), and more. I ended up staying within my book budget, but going home with five books and a tote bag from Graywolf Press.
Once I got back from AWP, I was inspired to get back to the grad school grind. I think this past semester was harder than the Fall: my schedule was even more tightly packed (topics in nonfiction: non-narrative thought (elective), nonfiction workshop, topics in nonfiction: film essay), I had even more to read, and even more to write, along with teaching. I simply cut out my social life (sorry friends) and tried to sleep as much as possible.
Even so, I made it through the semester once again, with a few more publications to my belt and projects to continue, mountains to climb. (All will be revealed at the right time!)
My job: I work in the Strategic Marketing and Communications department of my school's administration, meaning that I'm a student, faculty and staff. I'm the student editorial assistant for marketing and communications--I do a lot of writing, proofreading, copy-editing, interviewing, and more writing (sooooo much writing). But I love my job. It's prepping me for what I ultimately want to do, which is now (in case you still though we were on the behavioral neuroscience/scriptotherapy route) publishing. I'd like to be a creative director or EIC of a small press or large publication. Though I prefer literary, I've been leaning towards pop-culture/fashion editorial magazines, which have a little bit of interview/profile and cultural-critical writing, as well as colorful fashion spreads and makeup looks.
So here I am now, Summer 2017. Back to blogging (hopefully remaining consistent), working, gearing up to move forward in my program. I have successfully completed all of the required courses for my MFA, and have one final, gigantic hurdle: THESIS.
Fortunately, I've been blessed with one of the OGs of contemporary creative nonfiction as my advisor: David Lazar. A professor who has intrigued me since I showed up at Columbia College Chicago and found out he created the Nonfiction undergrad and PhD programs at Ohio University prior to coming to Chicago and creating the undergrad and MFA programs for Columbia. (I'm biased as to which program is better, so...) But anyways, I'm really excited to create and conquer this 120 page thesis (hopefully a book) with him. I didn't get to meet David until my third semester (Fall 2017) when I took his workshop because he received a Guggenheim my first year and wasn't teaching (I went to a reading of his, but we didn't meet).
Somehow I made it through my program having had every single nonfiction graduate professor. They're all lovely and different, and I appreciate each one for the forms they've taught me, the advice they've given me, and the encouragement and support they've given me over the past two years.
This MFA life takes a whole different level of ambition.
Summer 2K17 is all about working, getting my life together, writing and preparing for thesis.
*insert prayer hands emoji*
Yes, it's been an entire year since I've let you all know what I was up to. (I've already made it clear how terrible I am at maintaining a blog, right? I'm still going to try, but I just wanted to make sure we're all on the same page...)
Anyways, what's happened since last May:
- Two more semesters of graduate school
- I saw Queen Bey 🙌, Kanye West, Chris Brown, Rae Sremmurd, JoJo (again), Fabolous...
- I've been to a lot of readings!
- Honestly, I went to an entire writer's conference and had a blast (AWP)
- There's a new commander in chief and, well...
- Lots of publications, including the ones I teased about with my last post
- Jordan Year...
- So many pop culture happenings (i.e. Kimye, the Carter Twins are coming, Serena's baby, Kendrick's new album, JoJo's album, Lady Gaga's Tour, Chance the Rapper's tour...)
- I've been to Baltimore/D.C. (twice), Elon, Wisconsin, Philly...
- A lot of things emerging in my writing, and even my writing has started moving off the page...
 |
| Fall 2016's Semester Book List |
 |
| My Top 5 of the Fall 2016 Semester |
But then came the results of the election, inauguration, and the downward spiral of the country. To combat all of that--because writing wasn't working, in fact, writing was extremely difficult--I started watching Steven Universe at the beginning of the Spring 2017 semester. And TBH Steven and The Crystal Gems got me through the darkness that was January/February.
In February, I attended my first AWP conference in Washington D.C. (in a very conflicting place for a black female writer), which was really buying books, meeting authors, and attending readings. I went to a reading sponsored by the African Poetry Book Fund, a dance party/poetry reading, a feminist reading (which included Sonia Sanchez, one of the leaders of the Black Arts Movement), and more. I ended up staying within my book budget, but going home with five books and a tote bag from Graywolf Press.
Once I got back from AWP, I was inspired to get back to the grad school grind. I think this past semester was harder than the Fall: my schedule was even more tightly packed (topics in nonfiction: non-narrative thought (elective), nonfiction workshop, topics in nonfiction: film essay), I had even more to read, and even more to write, along with teaching. I simply cut out my social life (sorry friends) and tried to sleep as much as possible.
Even so, I made it through the semester once again, with a few more publications to my belt and projects to continue, mountains to climb. (All will be revealed at the right time!)
My job: I work in the Strategic Marketing and Communications department of my school's administration, meaning that I'm a student, faculty and staff. I'm the student editorial assistant for marketing and communications--I do a lot of writing, proofreading, copy-editing, interviewing, and more writing (sooooo much writing). But I love my job. It's prepping me for what I ultimately want to do, which is now (in case you still though we were on the behavioral neuroscience/scriptotherapy route) publishing. I'd like to be a creative director or EIC of a small press or large publication. Though I prefer literary, I've been leaning towards pop-culture/fashion editorial magazines, which have a little bit of interview/profile and cultural-critical writing, as well as colorful fashion spreads and makeup looks.
So here I am now, Summer 2017. Back to blogging (hopefully remaining consistent), working, gearing up to move forward in my program. I have successfully completed all of the required courses for my MFA, and have one final, gigantic hurdle: THESIS.
Fortunately, I've been blessed with one of the OGs of contemporary creative nonfiction as my advisor: David Lazar. A professor who has intrigued me since I showed up at Columbia College Chicago and found out he created the Nonfiction undergrad and PhD programs at Ohio University prior to coming to Chicago and creating the undergrad and MFA programs for Columbia. (I'm biased as to which program is better, so...) But anyways, I'm really excited to create and conquer this 120 page thesis (hopefully a book) with him. I didn't get to meet David until my third semester (Fall 2017) when I took his workshop because he received a Guggenheim my first year and wasn't teaching (I went to a reading of his, but we didn't meet).
Somehow I made it through my program having had every single nonfiction graduate professor. They're all lovely and different, and I appreciate each one for the forms they've taught me, the advice they've given me, and the encouragement and support they've given me over the past two years.
This MFA life takes a whole different level of ambition.
Summer 2K17 is all about working, getting my life together, writing and preparing for thesis.
"This that Grey Poupon, that Evian, that TED Talk, ayyy"
Friday, May 20, 2016
MFA Year 1 Wrap Up
Song: 6 Inch (Feat. The Weeknd) x Beyonce
I am really not doing well maintaining this blog at all. But if I can manage a post every two months with my hectic schedule, I feel like that will be just fine.
Year one is done! I somehow have successfully managed to teach an entire semester of first-year writing and fully participate and create in all (well, most) of my classes. Since it's May, it's been nice to see so many of my friends and so many people I know succeeding and achieving, be it graduation or receiving awards or like me, completing another year of school.
Arts Criticism: I tested the waters writing in a new nonfiction form, which is that of the criticism kind. I wrote book reviews, conducted interviews/Q&As, and wrote cultural-critical hybrid pieces. This class really pushed my boundaries and even led me to getting a freelancing gig wit NewCity Lit (a Chicago publication), an interview with a Pulitzer Prize winner, an interview and acquaintanceship with a very cool, very smart poet/professor at the school, and challenged me to write short. For a class that I was no excited for in the beginning (not a big fan of book reviews, but they are necessary), it turned out to be my favorite class to attend by far due to the conversations and discussions about the field and genre and the success of my peers.
Workshop: Workshopping with a MacArthur genius is terrifying for the first five weeks, maybe 7 of the total 15. By the last two months though, we had him laughing every class and things weren't as stressful. Working on a single piece the entire class was new and it really taught me a lot about language, editing, and revising and how to perform those skills on my own work as well as I do for others. My essay (which was on breasts) certainly evolved over the course of the semester and ended up in a good place, so hopefully this summer, I'll have an opportunity to work on that and revise it further.
Lit: This class was a struggle. I'm not going to talk about it, in fact, that's how irritating it became. But, I challenged myself to write a paper on how Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart can be read as a womanist text due to the roles women play throughout the novel, which is an argument that was very difficult to make and to believe in, but somehow I did it. It was a rookie move to write a paper on a book I really liked though. Still waiting on that grade.
Recent Publications:
I am really not doing well maintaining this blog at all. But if I can manage a post every two months with my hectic schedule, I feel like that will be just fine.
Year one is done! I somehow have successfully managed to teach an entire semester of first-year writing and fully participate and create in all (well, most) of my classes. Since it's May, it's been nice to see so many of my friends and so many people I know succeeding and achieving, be it graduation or receiving awards or like me, completing another year of school.
This semester
Arts Criticism: I tested the waters writing in a new nonfiction form, which is that of the criticism kind. I wrote book reviews, conducted interviews/Q&As, and wrote cultural-critical hybrid pieces. This class really pushed my boundaries and even led me to getting a freelancing gig wit NewCity Lit (a Chicago publication), an interview with a Pulitzer Prize winner, an interview and acquaintanceship with a very cool, very smart poet/professor at the school, and challenged me to write short. For a class that I was no excited for in the beginning (not a big fan of book reviews, but they are necessary), it turned out to be my favorite class to attend by far due to the conversations and discussions about the field and genre and the success of my peers.
Workshop: Workshopping with a MacArthur genius is terrifying for the first five weeks, maybe 7 of the total 15. By the last two months though, we had him laughing every class and things weren't as stressful. Working on a single piece the entire class was new and it really taught me a lot about language, editing, and revising and how to perform those skills on my own work as well as I do for others. My essay (which was on breasts) certainly evolved over the course of the semester and ended up in a good place, so hopefully this summer, I'll have an opportunity to work on that and revise it further.
Lit: This class was a struggle. I'm not going to talk about it, in fact, that's how irritating it became. But, I challenged myself to write a paper on how Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart can be read as a womanist text due to the roles women play throughout the novel, which is an argument that was very difficult to make and to believe in, but somehow I did it. It was a rookie move to write a paper on a book I really liked though. Still waiting on that grade.
Recent Publications:
- Mario Walks In on Peach and Bowser - a (flash?) fiction/poem-y thing I wrote in undergrad, which was recently published in the 10th issue of FREEZERAY Poetry.
- Book Review on Mary Kubica's Don't You Cry - another NewCity Lit byline
- ...and several forthcoming pieces that I'll reveal as they're published.
- Find a job (necessary, working on it)
- Write an essay a week (which will come out to about 17 essays this summer)
- Hopefully knock out a few more publications
- Take new head shots/photos
- 2 workshops a month (different group of people, still producing work)
- Read all (or at least half) of the books that I have collected and bought over the past year and a half.
- Figure out and possibly fully plot out my thesis ideas and get started on that terrifying task.
Saturday, March 26, 2016
**Squeeze**
Song: Non-stop x Original Broadway Cast of Hamilton
I've noticed that this has become a pattern. I'm steady blogging at the beginning of a semester and then about week two I am thrown into the chaos of academia and the literary/creative writing communities and I become a hermit from everything including this blog. So, I apologize for anyone who might check or read this, though I don't know who you are.
So I'm going to squeeze in a post as I watch Selma, let my nails dry, and ignore the work that I should be doing, which includes a brand new 10-15 page essay, revisions, reading 3 books, and grading papers. Also, I'm sick...due to exhaustion...from last week. It's spring break, well, the last day of spring break. Anyways, what do I have to say:
Teaching is hard. Something I knew already, but am being reminded of as I teach first-year undergraduate students and try to make writing a paper interesting. For some it's working, for others, it's not.
I've begun this new habit of procrastinating where I write new essays instead of revising the essays that are steadily piling up in my documents/onedrive folders. BUT over this spring break, I have pushed the submit button a few times, so that's something to be proud of because I was certainly slacking in the submission and publication areas ever since I started in graduate school. *hold on, Selma just got very intense* So, I submitted to a few publications that interest me, and I also revised one of my essays from last semester, so I'm working on it. Hopefully during the summer, I'll have more of a mind towards revising my work instead of producing more as a way to ignore it.
**OH. BY THE WAY. IN THAT KANYE POST, THAT IS NOT FUTURE ON HIGHLIGHTS.
What else? Oh, the class list for next semester is mouthwatering. Hopefully I get all of the nonfiction classes that I want, if so, my work production (I assume) will sky rocket in the fall, just in time to apply for grants and scholarships.
I've been trying to work on my personal brand. I intend on creating a website that will have access to my portfolio, resume, and published works, as well as blog posts. What do people think about Tumblr as a platform for a professional portfolio? The circulation and audience options are great, but I feel like a lot of people look down on Tumblr due to the community (which is great, but not too professional) that it represents... Also business cards? I'm working on a design, but since I'm not the best drawer (is that a word?) I'm not sure I can really design a business card for myself. *How come no one told me how good Selma was, like I knew, but still...it is so good! I would have been a wreck if I saw this in theaters (which I was supposed to, but that's a bitter story I won't get into).*
I'm "looking" for a job because I can't continue to be unemployed over the summer, I will be bored out of my mind. I need need need need need need a job.
Got my first byline! Newcity lit, check it out here: http://lit.newcity.com/2016/03/18/cave-canem-fellow-puts-poetry-first-always/
Also (I know I'm late, but): obsessed with the Hamilton soundtrack. Lin-Manuel Miranda has done no wrong since he entered my life with the In The Heights soundtrack. So that's what I've been doing with my free-time, learning all the words and jamming out to Hamilton.
I don't know what else to tell you about my "adult" life. My writing professor questions quotation marks and also sentence fragments, but he's a genius, so I ask no questions. My friends are doing big things: graduating, law school, teaching, graduate school, parenting, etc. We're making it. Glad I could squeeze in this post.
I've noticed that this has become a pattern. I'm steady blogging at the beginning of a semester and then about week two I am thrown into the chaos of academia and the literary/creative writing communities and I become a hermit from everything including this blog. So, I apologize for anyone who might check or read this, though I don't know who you are.
So I'm going to squeeze in a post as I watch Selma, let my nails dry, and ignore the work that I should be doing, which includes a brand new 10-15 page essay, revisions, reading 3 books, and grading papers. Also, I'm sick...due to exhaustion...from last week. It's spring break, well, the last day of spring break. Anyways, what do I have to say:
Teaching is hard. Something I knew already, but am being reminded of as I teach first-year undergraduate students and try to make writing a paper interesting. For some it's working, for others, it's not.
I've begun this new habit of procrastinating where I write new essays instead of revising the essays that are steadily piling up in my documents/onedrive folders. BUT over this spring break, I have pushed the submit button a few times, so that's something to be proud of because I was certainly slacking in the submission and publication areas ever since I started in graduate school. *hold on, Selma just got very intense* So, I submitted to a few publications that interest me, and I also revised one of my essays from last semester, so I'm working on it. Hopefully during the summer, I'll have more of a mind towards revising my work instead of producing more as a way to ignore it.
**OH. BY THE WAY. IN THAT KANYE POST, THAT IS NOT FUTURE ON HIGHLIGHTS.
What else? Oh, the class list for next semester is mouthwatering. Hopefully I get all of the nonfiction classes that I want, if so, my work production (I assume) will sky rocket in the fall, just in time to apply for grants and scholarships.
I've been trying to work on my personal brand. I intend on creating a website that will have access to my portfolio, resume, and published works, as well as blog posts. What do people think about Tumblr as a platform for a professional portfolio? The circulation and audience options are great, but I feel like a lot of people look down on Tumblr due to the community (which is great, but not too professional) that it represents... Also business cards? I'm working on a design, but since I'm not the best drawer (is that a word?) I'm not sure I can really design a business card for myself. *How come no one told me how good Selma was, like I knew, but still...it is so good! I would have been a wreck if I saw this in theaters (which I was supposed to, but that's a bitter story I won't get into).*
I'm "looking" for a job because I can't continue to be unemployed over the summer, I will be bored out of my mind. I need need need need need need a job.
Got my first byline! Newcity lit, check it out here: http://lit.newcity.com/2016/03/18/cave-canem-fellow-puts-poetry-first-always/
Also (I know I'm late, but): obsessed with the Hamilton soundtrack. Lin-Manuel Miranda has done no wrong since he entered my life with the In The Heights soundtrack. So that's what I've been doing with my free-time, learning all the words and jamming out to Hamilton.
I don't know what else to tell you about my "adult" life. My writing professor questions quotation marks and also sentence fragments, but he's a genius, so I ask no questions. My friends are doing big things: graduating, law school, teaching, graduate school, parenting, etc. We're making it. Glad I could squeeze in this post.
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