Last Days
Wow.
Its officially 5am on Saturday and I have pulled my last Clarion West all nighter. No, I don't have a story due. Instead I spent the last twelve hours in pure fun social land with my classmates. One last time.
Naw, it wasn't all weepy like that either. After we had our graduation ceremony (following my last story critique -- a revision for life and death that went well but indicated that I still have LOTS of work to do -- and a conference with Michael -- which was fun and informative) we ate cake --mmm cake -- and got ready for the final official shindig of the workshop. We also got our T-shirts --yipeee-- and they look phenomenal.
As a side note, we also had "Michael Swanwick Made Me Cry at Clarion West 2005 and All I Got Was This Lousy T Shirt" shirts made in jest to Michael -- who we were sure would eviscerate one or all of us (and get away with it) this week. As other blogs have noted, what we got was a phenomenal, energetic story doctor who carried us through week six on sheer strength of will and determination alone. He was pretty amazing. First the glowing pickle, then the marshmallow fight after class and a whole lot of fixes for everybody's story issues.
At the party tonight we had a Clarion West first -- a class photo with three of our six instructors. Thanks to Octavia and Timmi for coming back for the killer shot, which hopefully will run in Locus soon. We did lots of goofing off, hugging and t shirt reading. Too much laughing, joking and a whole lot of picture taking...I wound up hanging out till the bitter end with Heather, and had a nice long talk with Michael about my name (to publish under my real name or an adapted version of -- and all the pluses and minuses that go along with) this of course assumes I will get published sometime soon, which I guess means I'd better get cracking on some revisions.
Being home one last time with everyone present was charming, 11 of us hoofed it over to IHOP for a last pancake-a-thon(after fielding such ridiculous questions from the slobbering drunk frat boys across the alley as "so do you read Harry Potter and stuff?") then returned home for a read aloud of The Viking. It felt good to laugh -- and laugh hard, reading to each other and inserting our own novel version of Mystery Science Theatre 3000...
Every so often I would catch myself sitting, just watching everyone and soaking it up. I kept thinking this would be the last time we would be together like this, and how amazing a thing that was. I'm so glad I stayed.
So tonight I'm burning some mix music for the long drive home. I don't really feel like sleeping, it seems like a waste of the last few hours we have here, and even though everyone's gone to bed, I'm feeling like the house is still so full of our vibes, I'd like to just marinate for a bit. In the morning (ah, I guess that means in a few hours) I'll be taking Amy and James to the airport for the first wave of departures. WOW.
I'm so not ready for this.
I miss home, and work and Bj and Echo. I miss my bed and the beach and the quiet nights. I miss the stars and house and walking around barefoot and in my jammies.
But I have loved every moment of this, whether or not I knew it at the time. I will be sad to say goodbye. Tonight I went through my stories, editing out the pages that were unmarked for recycling and saving the crit sheets and line edits for later. It was actually kind of inspiring, and as I read crit sheets I could hear the voices of people that I have come to know in my head. I remember the things we laughed at -- I have a whole t-shirt of full of the best of them. Damn, I am so happy right now. And so sad.
Blame it on the fact that its 5am.
I'm sure in the next few days I'll have lots of insightful things to say about the workshop experience, and things I learned. Right now there's just a big soft warm fuzzy spot in my chest for the whole damn thing and all the people that I shared this experience with.
But above all:
We Made It. We survived six weeks, 18 stories a week, 4-6 stories (each) written overall. We laughed, we fussed and we came together in the end. Nobody complained (seriously) about the workload. Nobody quit (including me!)
I am so proud to be here, with this group of people. I still love each and every one of them.
Sun's on its way up. Oh I am tired, and if I close my eyes, I won't sleep a wink.
Its officially 5am on Saturday and I have pulled my last Clarion West all nighter. No, I don't have a story due. Instead I spent the last twelve hours in pure fun social land with my classmates. One last time.
Naw, it wasn't all weepy like that either. After we had our graduation ceremony (following my last story critique -- a revision for life and death that went well but indicated that I still have LOTS of work to do -- and a conference with Michael -- which was fun and informative) we ate cake --mmm cake -- and got ready for the final official shindig of the workshop. We also got our T-shirts --yipeee-- and they look phenomenal.
As a side note, we also had "Michael Swanwick Made Me Cry at Clarion West 2005 and All I Got Was This Lousy T Shirt" shirts made in jest to Michael -- who we were sure would eviscerate one or all of us (and get away with it) this week. As other blogs have noted, what we got was a phenomenal, energetic story doctor who carried us through week six on sheer strength of will and determination alone. He was pretty amazing. First the glowing pickle, then the marshmallow fight after class and a whole lot of fixes for everybody's story issues.
At the party tonight we had a Clarion West first -- a class photo with three of our six instructors. Thanks to Octavia and Timmi for coming back for the killer shot, which hopefully will run in Locus soon. We did lots of goofing off, hugging and t shirt reading. Too much laughing, joking and a whole lot of picture taking...I wound up hanging out till the bitter end with Heather, and had a nice long talk with Michael about my name (to publish under my real name or an adapted version of -- and all the pluses and minuses that go along with) this of course assumes I will get published sometime soon, which I guess means I'd better get cracking on some revisions.
Being home one last time with everyone present was charming, 11 of us hoofed it over to IHOP for a last pancake-a-thon(after fielding such ridiculous questions from the slobbering drunk frat boys across the alley as "so do you read Harry Potter and stuff?") then returned home for a read aloud of The Viking. It felt good to laugh -- and laugh hard, reading to each other and inserting our own novel version of Mystery Science Theatre 3000...
Every so often I would catch myself sitting, just watching everyone and soaking it up. I kept thinking this would be the last time we would be together like this, and how amazing a thing that was. I'm so glad I stayed.
So tonight I'm burning some mix music for the long drive home. I don't really feel like sleeping, it seems like a waste of the last few hours we have here, and even though everyone's gone to bed, I'm feeling like the house is still so full of our vibes, I'd like to just marinate for a bit. In the morning (ah, I guess that means in a few hours) I'll be taking Amy and James to the airport for the first wave of departures. WOW.
I'm so not ready for this.
I miss home, and work and Bj and Echo. I miss my bed and the beach and the quiet nights. I miss the stars and house and walking around barefoot and in my jammies.
But I have loved every moment of this, whether or not I knew it at the time. I will be sad to say goodbye. Tonight I went through my stories, editing out the pages that were unmarked for recycling and saving the crit sheets and line edits for later. It was actually kind of inspiring, and as I read crit sheets I could hear the voices of people that I have come to know in my head. I remember the things we laughed at -- I have a whole t-shirt of full of the best of them. Damn, I am so happy right now. And so sad.
Blame it on the fact that its 5am.
I'm sure in the next few days I'll have lots of insightful things to say about the workshop experience, and things I learned. Right now there's just a big soft warm fuzzy spot in my chest for the whole damn thing and all the people that I shared this experience with.
But above all:
We Made It. We survived six weeks, 18 stories a week, 4-6 stories (each) written overall. We laughed, we fussed and we came together in the end. Nobody complained (seriously) about the workload. Nobody quit (including me!)
I am so proud to be here, with this group of people. I still love each and every one of them.
Sun's on its way up. Oh I am tired, and if I close my eyes, I won't sleep a wink.
posted by Eddie at 5:04 AM
1 Comments:
How fun to look in here and already see an update for what happened the rest of your evening. Tami and I shut down the party. We literally were the last people out the door. Didn't do that at any other party, so it must have been the boost we got from having *actual conversations* with all you interesting students.
Have a safe trip home! I'm kind of worried about the amount of sleep you're going on there, but if you think you can...
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