Postcards from the Imagination

I'm finding the downside of being verbally inclined is the strong desire to express oneself, if only to the air. I'm trying to do perhaps the hardest thing I've ever done, but I can't talk about it explicitly. (Though looking back over this post, I realize I should definitely state that it's not drug-related.) I went to the bookstore. They asked if I had a discount card. I said no.

Some assertions I read there:

1. There is a fundamental interrelatedness or wholeness to reality which limits the value of analyzing individual parts of a system without relating those parts to the whole.
   
2. Reality is not static, but composed of internal opposing forces out of whose synthesis evolves a new set of opposing forces.
3. The fundamental nature of reality is change and process rather than content or structure.

And some questions:

1. How to balance acceptance of the self with the need to change?
2. How to manage the tension between getting what one needs and losing it as one becomes a stronger person?
3. How to seperate apparent causes from effects?
   

Posted by Ginger at 08:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Posted in Whimsy's comment box:

In my opinion, what we need is to start thinking about the arts and academia as cultural assets whose worth  can't be determined using the capitalist model. That model elevates the Simpson sisters to millionaire status and makes $20,000 NEA grants look like BIG MONEY. Perhaps we should have a 25% fake art tax, and use it to finance real art.

And by the way, can one be powerless and elitist at the same time, or is elitism just a slur used to prop up the status quo?

[Please direct your hate mail to: the_empress@woebegone.com] 

Posted by Ginger at 12:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

My Peculiar Aristocratic Title is: Empress Virginia the Woebegone of Much Madness upon Avon Get your Peculiar Aristocratic Title

Posted by Ginger at 05:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The job search is going to necessitate some changes here. I don't want to give up the blog completely, but I can't have potential employers trolling my archives. For the short term that means deleting the links to old posts, nuking the search function, and doing my best to avoid the personal stuff. I know and you know that some of you only come here to read Ginger the Diarist (it's amazing what StatCounter will reveal about people's reading habits) and I'm sorry to disappoint. However, if you prefer your poetry blogs po-heavy, then you just might find the new format refreshing.

Posted by Ginger at 01:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Christmas sucked, but unlike the rest of you I lost 2 lbs.

Posted by Ginger at 04:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I couldn't sleep this morning. I took Ativan before going to sleep at 1:15, woke up at 3:30 and took another, slept another few hours, but by 6:30 I couldn't stay in bed any longer. Having nothing else to do here at my mother's house, I submitted my online applications to UVA and Columbia. That's four down, four to go. +The New School. +UMass-Amherst. Six down, two to go.

* * * * * * * * * 

Jacinda and I agreed last night that Connecticut ought to be dug up and shipped to Europe. They could use the real estate, and we could use the short cut. Top peeve of the trip was the person on the New York Thruway in the shiny new SUV going 45mph in the middle lane because it was raining. If you've ever driven in the NY/NJ area you know how dangerous that is.

* * * * * * * * *

I'll have my own little home retreat next week with my daughter at her father's house. I think I'm skipping New Year's Eve this year. 

Posted by Ginger at 08:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As some of you who've visited his site may have noticed, Seth and I are no longer a couple. My ring went back to the jeweler's today, and there will be is a new blog address soon. The next issue of TNHR will come out early next year, but after that I don't know. I'm doing what I can to focus on wrapping up my undergraduate work, and applying to grad school. There won't be much merry this Christmas, I'm afraid--not for me, at least. I'm doing what I can to make it a good one for my daughter.

Posted by Ginger at 02:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

This morning Jacinda and I were baking cookies for her school holiday party. When it came time to cream the butter and suger, I told her it was going to be tough, since we don't have an electric mixer. She said, "Then we'll have to use girl power!" And indeed we did.

We're driving down to NJ tomorrow. I've been a single mother again for about a month now, so we're spending Christmas at my mother's house. 

Posted by Ginger at 08:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

710 Verbal
440 Quantitative

Which means (I think) I'll never have to do that again. YAY!!! 

Now it's hurry up and wait on the Analytic Writing and Subject Test scores. 

Posted by Ginger at 06:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

I owe emails, comment responses, phone calls--and I hope to get to those very soon.

In the meantime, a funny story. I stopped by the mailbox a few minutes ago, exhausted from having run errands all day, and a little cranky, because the headlight I was supposed to have fixed turned out not to be a blown bulb, but a wiring problem. I have Seth on the phone, explaining the car problem, when I see we have a ton of mail including: a copy of The Cincinnati Review,  a copy of The Journal, and a submission response. The last item is for me, and is from (where else?) The Cincinnati Review. Since the envelope is rather thick, and I can see my poems through it, I grumble down the line, "Jesus Christ, did they have to send my rejection on exactly the same day as your contributor's copy?" Seth gets about five words into his 'on the bright side' speech, when I start shouting, "Holy shit! Holy Shit!" Turns out it wasn't a rejection after all! They accepted "As Freedom Is Kale, Just So" and returned the rest of my poems.

In fact, the issue we received in the mail was not Seth's contributor's copy, but part of his complementary subscription. He had a poem in the last issue, which I read and promptly drooled all over. This, then, is very exciting news! 'Cause I really, really, really, really wanted to place a poem there. :-)

Posted by Ginger at 05:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

"We're just rarefied middle-class San Francisco greenies having a conversation about consumption and sustainability," says John Perry, a marketing executive with a high-tech firm, and one of the founding Compactors. "But suddenly, we decide we're not going to buy a bunch of new stuff for a year? And that's international news? Doesn't that say something?"

Posted by Ginger at 08:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In Kaplan's GRE study book, under Sentence Completions, the following pratice problem is given:

The giant squid's massive body, adapted for deep-sea life, breaks apart in the reduced pressures of higher ocean elevations, making the search for an intact specimen one of the most ____________ quests in all of marine biology.

A. controversial
B. meaningful
C. elusive
D. popular
E. expensive

I chose D. popular, even though at best it seems like the least wrong answer. The book, however, says C. elusive--and I'm thinking huh? It's not the quest that's elusive, but the specimen.

Is this wrong, or am I? Is quest really synonymous with the thing quested for or after?

And if the book is wrong, how can I be sure ETS won't make a similar mistake on the actual test?! 

Posted by Ginger at 03:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

...that I won't share some good news. A fourth poem from my chapbook thesis has been accepted for publication. Thanks, 32 Poems!

Posted by Ginger at 01:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Over the past few weeks I've been noticing that a number of people are getting to my blog by Googling my name. I haven't the faintest idea who these people are, or how they know me, or why they're interested. I was totally comfortable with people surfing in from blogrolls, but this makes me hesitate. I do know that at least one of my thesis readers Google-found me. Also a couple family members. Are editors to whom I've submitted poetry lurking? Will MFA readers? Need I worry that someone will check in on a bad day and draw conclusions from a few posts? If it ever became a choice between not blogging and image control, I'd choose the former. I guess the question is: How long can I keep mustering the a) courage** or b) imprudence for this?

**Not courage in the epic or even real world sense, but in the teeny-tiny personal sense. 

Posted by Ginger at 11:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Thanks CDY, Paul, and Charlie for your advice! Hopefully my application readers and I agree which are my strongest poems {shudder}. The feedback I've gotten, when I've gotten it, has certainly been inconsistent. Suddenly I'm feeling nervous.

I'm also wondering how to indicate which poems in the sample have been published or accepted for publication? An acknowledgements page seems awkward, because the sample itself isn't being published. I tried footnotes, but that looked garish. It's a short list, so I could put it in my cover letter, but what if they don't read the letter? Any more good advice?

Posted by Ginger at 06:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

In putting together the writing sample for my MFA applications, should I just put the strongest poems first, regardless of flow, OR should I organize them as I would a chapbook, for readability, taking the risk that some of my stronger poems might not show up until further into the sample?

Posted by Ginger at 04:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Listening to Ágætis Byrjun by Sigur Rós, and thinking we know--we humans know--how to make our lives beautiful. We just refuse...

Maybe religion was one way, before the moralists perverted it.

And rationalists? They miss the point entirely.

Everything we're surrounded by, everything not spontaneously occurring, is a product of the imagination. Smog is imagination. Currency is imagination. That necktie is nothing if not imagination.

Imagination is reality. And reality is, therefore, ours to sculpt.

Who would decide against beauty given the choice?

Most of us, everyday.

I wish this were news. 

Posted by Ginger at 12:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wandering stars, for whom it is reserved
The blackness of darkness forever...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 

I received my thesis readers' reports Wednesday. They made me cry. They were both so overwhelmingly generous--and specific! It was like being handed two positive reviews years before I've even written a book. I was genuinely touched, even if I can't quite believe it all.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Working on my Statement of Purpose, which is actually not that tough. Poetry's a better excuse for who I am and how I've lived than most others.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Oh, I miss the life--but only sometimes. The rest is...what, confusion(?)

Posted by Ginger at 09:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I see you've taken a keen interest in my blog over the past few days. Lots of hits, and you've given my search function quite a work-out. I'm flattered! You've even been over to the list. I hope something there took the top of your head off. Given that you seem most interested in the following posts, I do have a few questions.

postcards.heatter-abramson.net/2006/09/from_seths_comment_box.html

postcards.heatter-abramson.net/2006/11/an_observation.html

postcards.heatter-abramson.net/2005/09/um_really.html

postcards.heatter-abramson.net/2006/11/go_reb.html

postcards.heatter-abramson.net/2006/12/up_next.html

Are you just doing research for the next Forward, or are you taking names and shit? Does this mean I ought to save my money and NOT apply to The New School? Are you perhaps a co-worker trolling for juicy gossip about you-know-who? 

Drop me a line. I'd love to hear from you! 

Sincerely,

Virginia 

Posted by Ginger at 09:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A) I have no idea what the hell is up with my blog, and no time right now to investigate.

B) I just wrote one of my professors for a letter of recommendation, but somehow the second half of my email--the most important part--got cut off. She wrote me back, "Hi, Virginia. So, are you asking me for a recommendation?" ACK!!! Pardon me while I go put my head between my knees and try to breathe deep. I hate--hate hate hate hate hate hate hate--asking for these things in the first place. I know they're part of the routine, but I always feel as though I'm fishing for compliments. In this instance, I feel like I've strapped a giant dildo to my forehead and asked, Do you think I'm pretty?

Posted by Ginger at 11:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Good: I just learned that I'm going to receive departmental honors for my poetry chapbook!

Bad: Seth and I both submitted to _______ literary journal--me in February, he about six months later. He had several poems accepted by ________. My poems were just returned to me unread, after ten months, because the editors say they can't read any more submissions this year. I don't know what kind of pheromones he sprayed on his envelope, but I'll have to find out.

Posted by Ginger at 04:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

If it's not obvious from things I've already intimated here, I'm in the midst of applying to MFA programs. I've heard all the arguments against it, but I have my own personal reasons for it.

1. At my age, and with my personality, there's little danger of my becoming some kind of "School of X" drone. My faculty mentor at BC is very traditional, and under her tutelage I've become progressively more open-minded about the other end of the spectrum.
2. I want a couple of years to focus exclusively on my writing, and since I don't play the lottery, the MFA is where it's at.
   
3. I think I'd eventually like to do a Ph.D., but I also think I might like a break from the scholarly stuff for a while.
4. My education has ruined me for "the real world." I've had great relationships with nearly all my professors, and those super smart people have always treated me and my ideas with a lot of respect. I'd probably freak out if thrown into a hierarchy in which I was expected to "know my place."

That said, I'm only applying to top programs. If I don't get in anywhere, I'll take a year to reevaluate what I want and where I'm headed. I'm sure it sounds ridiculous--maybe even is ridiculous--but if I'm a mediocre writer, I'd rather find out now than pay thousands of dollars to keep up the fantasy for two more years.

Therefore I'm applying to: Iowa, Johns Hopkins, Columbia, UVA, NYU, Michigan, Cornell, UMass-Amherst, Brown, and The New School. 

Whatever happens I'll never stop loving poetry. It's what I spend all my free time doing. If I can't eek out a living writing or teaching it, I'll look for work in the non-profit sector, and continue to read voraciously during my off-hours.

Posted by Ginger at 09:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I learned yesterday that in order to keep a few options open regarding grad school, I'll have to take the GRE Subect Test in Literature....tomorrow(!) That's right, it's offered Dec. 2 and then not again until April. And I couldn't register, so I'm going to have to go on 'standby,' which means driving down to Boston in about eight hours and hoping I get a seat. Wish me luck!

UPDATE: Took the test this morning. It was hard, particularly because I've been opting for interesting courses over canonical ones. I'm not actually sure what it's supposed to test. For instance, I got all the Moby Dick questions right, even though I've never read Moby Dick, not even an excerpt(!) Can I tell Pope from Dryden from Johnson? Not sure. But I did know Freud, Lacan, and Saussure. So we'll see...

Posted by Ginger at 11:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)