mimsy and outgrabe

This week delivered a wonderfully surprising sinus infection (yay spring! yay compromised immune system!) that made me feel as if my brain was trying to escape my head through my eye (we can't really blame my brain for wanting to leave, can we?) -- which did all sorts of inconvenient things to my productivity ... so I'm behind in almost everything: grading, festival prep, applications for conferences and grants, household/children maintenance, etc. I do try to be conservative when it comes to taking antibiotics but after 24-hours of a headache that made it difficult to see or think, I decided to go to the doctor and ask for something. Because who has time for this? And it turns out that -- sometimes -- a good ol' blast of antibiotics to your system is just what it needs. Sometimes.  I can think again! And now that I can, and I'm facing all of this. . .  stuff . . . that I'm supposed to finish by the end of the day/month/semester, I'm also thinking abou...

"You have to simply love writing, and you have to remind yourself often that you love it."  -- Susan Orlean The last thing I want to do is turn this blog into a listicle repository of inspirational quotes written down in my journal, but this week I'm focusing on this little soundbite from Orlean, a New Yorker staff writer and book author, because it's something I've been wrestling with. In short, I've been trying to do the latter -- to remind myself that I love writing, and to focus on that.  Also: Accolades and publication are not writing. Accolades and publication are not writing. Accolades and publication are not writing. Another reminder that I need. The rejection from the residencies, coupled with the sabbatical debacle, have dealt a large blow to my ego, sure, but they've dealt the largest blow to my psyche, because they represent having less time for something that makes up a huge part of my identity (or at least, how I identi...