[Most] of my students' final grades are submitted, and as I sit here, slightly uncomfortable in the attic during a strange off-season warm spell (not that I'm complaining), I'm looking at the wide-open door of future writing. Writing, that poor sweet creature, that generally likes to hide from "what have you been working on?" will now have to step up and start flexing her muscles again.
And since I"m no longer under the gun to turn papers around with ninja-like quickness, I have some time to reflect on the projects that I haven't been paying attention to at all for far to long of a span.
Not an Autobiography -- I'm sort of on the down spin of this one right now. Though the final Johnny story, "Cliche" is definitely in the works, I've sort of hit a point in the project where I'm questioning it's overall import in the world of literary worth. Most of this is fueled by my more or less recent growing distaste for literary snark. So unless I'm in a snarky mood or I stumble across a gem of an idea, I'm sort of floating this to the side of my headspace. Aside from "Cliche," I figure that I need to write 1-2 more first person narrator stories, overhaul the second Johnny story, "Endings Lead to Beginnings" (starting with the title, which sounds real clunky to me) and finish up Clare's last story, "7500 Miles to Find Herself" A tall order, but a good todo list.
Shadowman (the working title of the series) -- this will probably be my main project for some time. I want to take and revise and continue working on the NaNoWriMo project from November. I have some plans to workshop the NaNoWriMo project with another NaNoer this summer, and I'm hoping to kick into high gear on continuing Nigel's story here soonishly.
Ontologica -- We're aiming to have Ontologica's second issue out in late June, early July. At the moment, I'm not really sure if I'll contribute anything, but I am looking forward to a smoother publishing this time.
All of this, of course, is made possible by my decision to not return to teaching in the fall. The decision, while a bit of a mixed bag of emotions, I think is a good one overall; not only for me but for the family. Adjuncting is rough stuff financially when you're single; damn nigh impossible when you're trying to support a family with just adjuncting. Overall it was a really great experience, but it's time to move on; time to move back to a more regular writing schedule; back to working more regular hours; back to not having to blow off my family to grade papers.
Teaching is a funny thing. At once it's vibrantly exciting--especially if the class is both active and involved, like my rockin-awesome ENGL004 class from this past semester--but it can also be a super-drag. Nothing is more gut-dropping depressing than a bright student that doesn't give a shit. It gives me fits to watch kids piss away their college careers. Someday down the road, I hope to find myself in a classroom again; hopefully bullshitting about fiction instead of composition, but the future is no mistress that I bed with regularly, so she can keep her secrets for now.
On the more professional side of the writing world, my marketing job is taking me to some pretty wild places. I've been going hog-wild on developing some pretty keen stuff, and it's got me thinking back about the creative nature of programming vs. its scientific nature...something I think I want to expand on more. But not tonight. I think tonight calls for some sort of outline of Nigel's timeline from forever ago to current.
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