Package 2: sent

I sent my second MFA submission yesterday, which means that I'm officially half way through my third semester. Gulp! (The feelings that go along with being close-ish to done with my MFA program deserve another post.) I feel pretty good about what I sent, in as far as I ever feel good about sending someone my SFDs (Shitty First Drafts).

I experimented with the omniscient point of view in both a long short story (20ish pages) and a short short story (3 pages). I'm proud of myself for stepping into this unknown and scary territory. After all, the omniscient POV means you (the author) have to make many more decisions than you would if the story were told from one person's point of view. Which characters' heads do we get into in the story as a whole? What about in each particular scene? What would you gain from hearing the thoughts of each character? What would you lose? Is it OK to be in a character's head in one scene, but then not another? (If anyone would like to comment on this issue/these questions, please do!)

I usually try to take some time off between submissions, but unfortunately this week will be devoted to more work, though not for my MFA. I will:

* Revise The Rest of June, a story I'm submitting for my Harvard MLA thesis.
* Revise the prologue for the medical memoir I worked on for my IS last semester.
* I also want to try to take some photos, especially of my garden and knitting projects and post them.

No time!

I've had this song stuck in my head all week because, you guessed it, I have no time! (I love the part late in the song when they keep repeating "No time! No time!" with urgency in their voices.)

The odd thing is that I have much more time than I will in the fall, when I start TAing and my graduate assistantship. But I had meetings regarding both of those things--and my Harvard Extension School thesis--this week, so all sorts of thoughts, ideas, and worries about them are floating around in my head. Thank god for this sleep/meditation CD or I would've spent a third night as an insomniac last night.

So, what do I do when I feel stressed? Make a list, of course! Here goes:

Things not to worry about right now:
1. TAship (expiration date 8/15, when I should email professor some thoughts on which classes I want to lead)
2. Grad assistantship (expiration date 9/1, when I should email supervisors and touch base)

Things to do this weekend
1. Add baking scenes into my main story for my upcoming MFA submission
2. Revise the short short story that I will be submitting too
3. Expand the outline to my MFA essay
4. Brain dump about the stories I am adding to my final MLA thesis essay

Things that will get done sometime, and it's fine that they're not done right now (really, it is):
1. Fix up my garden (front)
2. Add elevated beds for my back veggie garden
3. Paint the floor/ceiling of my back porch
4. Put together a wedding album (yes, I've been married for 3 years and I haven't done this yet...)
5. Get down the many essays that are floating around in my head, especially one on dealing with a loved one's sickness and an essay on covering neighborhood meetings now, in my own neighborhood vs when I was younger and a reporter for a town newspaper in a ritzy area that I could never dream to live in (and with snobby people worried about the stupidest things...)

On that note....
I have two articles that will be in this week's Sunday Globe. I'll post links on Sunday.