So happy!

Tonight after class I stayed to talk to L, my teacher. She is awesome. I want to be her when I grow up! (Although I don't know how that would work since I'm 99% sure she is younger than me.)

The purpose of our meeting was for her to give me some feedback on the writing assignments we've handed in so far. She calls them Polished Writing Exercises and I'll be frank--some of the kids in my class don't write very polishedly (yes, I made that word up just now). Creatively speaking, they have good ideas, but their writing skills need some work. I'm not being mean or petty, but I will admit to a certain thrill when I realized that my writing, even before I talked with L, was of a higher caliber, skill-wise, then most of my classmates'.

[As an aside, I think that people who read voraciously make good writers. You see how published authors sell their books, you learn how stories are put together, your vocabulary evolves, and in my case, I think about how I might make something work better if it's awkward or hard to understand.]

So anyway, after not saying a word in class AGAIN, I walked up to L's desk (yet another shy thing I do--sit in the back of the class. This has more to do with the fact that I want to sweat in relative peace--after walking the 1/2 mile up the damned hill from the metered, dirt-and-gravel parking lot where I park my own car like a real grown-up, I am sweating profusely and want to do it in the back of the room where hopefully not many people will notice me fanning myself with a handy file folder containing the class syllabus and wiping the sweat off my face and neck) and she pinned me with her gaze. "We're meeting, yes?" I noticed that she has a teensy diamond nose ring!  I want one too! So dainty and sparkly and unexpected! I nodded enthusiastically (maybe too enthusiastically? Does she know I practically idolize her?) and we went outside.

The stale, baked-concrete-scented, hot outside.

I felt like I had just stopped sweating two minutes before class ended.

I began to sweat again. Not only because it was still warm  from the 90-degree day, but also because L was reading and critiquing and writing on my printed stories. AAAAAAGH!

And she looked up at me and said, "You write well. There's some good stuff here."

This from a published author (at least in literary journals--not sure if she's been published in books yet), a grad student who's presenting her own book-slash-dissertation in November, who's been writing for years and is earning a Doctorate in Creative Writing.  She said I write well!

She gave me some things to think about, and I understood immediately that they are all things I totally agree with, especially after reading the last couple chapters on characterization in our technique book and discussing the short stories she's assigned.

This is exactly why I'm in school. So I can evolve and learn and stay passionate about writing. I hope my professors are all as good as L is!

First day of school!

After the debacle of my summer attempt at becoming a university student, which involved crying to a very understanding girl in the registrar's office (you're the best, Meg!), reapplying to school and being reaccepted (is that even a word?) by the College of English, my first day of Creative Fiction Technique was yesterday. It was awesome! Well, after being very stressful and embarrassing--which is my lot in life.

I couldn't remember the professor's name so I checked out my class schedule during lunch. Noted: class starts at 5:15. I then peeked at her reviews on ratemyprofessor.com (a website with which a grain of salt should always be taken) and was pleased with her raves. Yay! I was excited to meet her and get going with my degree work!

My husband drove me to class. I'm spoiled, yes I am, but I didn't want to have to fight with parking (especially since I don't have my parking decal yet) and worry with traffic and finding my way around the massive campus. He dropped me off behind the building at 4:50 and it was then I realized I didn't know where my class was. I knew which building (duhh, the College of English's building), but not which room. I was confident I would find someone who would direct me. Aww, I'm so cute and naive in this portion of the story!

I found my way into the ginormous building. There were children everywhere. By children I mean kids, from freshman to seniors, milling around, lounging in front of closed classrooms, sitting on the wide windowsills. And everybody was on their phone. I of course have a cheap husband who won't pay for a data plan for my phone. I called said cheap husband and asked him to log into my class schedule with his data plan and check which room I needed to be in. He called me back a minute later (5:01)--he could not navigate the university's website via his phone. By this time I had approached a friendly-looking young girl and she couldn't help me either, other than directing me to the advisors' offices to have them look up my schedule. I made my way to the second floor and walked around. Again, I approached a friendly-looking, bookish young man wearing glasses and told him I didn't know where my class (CRW 3110) was and he directed me to the third floor. I had to tell him my class was 3110, not my room number. He shrugged and I left him to find an office with a computer or an advisor or something more helpful.

At 5:05, I stumbled into a writing lab with online computers! I could have wept! The cute, shaggy-headed, bearded hipster who greeted me laughed as I told him my tale. He explained away my stupidity by saying, "It's the first week of class, no big deal."  I logged on, got my schedule and room number (114!) and made my way back downstairs.

I promptly found the room. It was 5:09. Plenty of time! There was a moment of confusion as there were two rooms, back to back, and I saw only one sign in between them that said 114. But there is a wall separating them, I thought they can't be the same room; and then the door covering up the second room's sign was moved. Ah. Taking a deep breath, I attempted to open the door. And it was locked.

Rather than making an ass of myself in front of all the children already seated at their chosen desks, I looked wildly around for another door to the room that wasn't locked. Just then, a woman--yay, my age!--materialized next to me. Before I could say "It's locked!" she pushed open the door, saying, "The doors here just push open--most of them in the building do." I followed her inside and she went to the front of her room and put her things down. On the teacher's desk.

Yes, she is my professor.

At least I wasn't late to class (it was only 5:12)!

I quietly took a seat in the far right corner, near a handy windowsill on which to place my very heavy bag o'books and my illegal water (No Food or Drinks in Classrooms! all the signs said). She introduced herself as I looked around the class. Just as I had suspected--all children. All 20, or maybe 21. I sighed and tried to relax and concentrate on what the professor was saying. She was going to take roll. Ack! Roll! People would know my name!

I was the 4th to be called, thanks to my last name. All my life I have been near the front of the line, the beginning of the list. And horror of all horrors: I realized she had our student IDs to look at along with our names and personal histories, all displayed neatly on the classroom computer. She knew exactly where I was sitting--I couldn't hide--and as she called my name, she said "Yes, you were struggling with the door." I laughed along with a couple other students and it was okay. I was okay.

Class ended up being great. I consider myself to be a pretty good judge of character, and I think L is going to be a great professor. I look forward to learning a lot and working hard for that knowledge. I am so excited!

Fount of fonts

Hi.

I'm Amy.

I'm a Font Whore.

I just downloaded 20 fonts. I was looking for a simple font for an invitation for a housewarming party, and I ended up with 20 fonts.  All different types. Handwriting fonts. Art Deco fonts. Typewriter fonts (my personal favorites!). Initial-only fonts. Trash fonts (the picture above and to the right is one of the fonts I downloaded--Dirty Classic by Billy Argel. A trash font is something you might see in an old stained book.)

God, I love fonts.

You might ask what I do with hundreds of fonts. Well, I craft with them. When I scrapbook, or make invitations, or cards, or just 2-D paper projects, I'll use my 997 different fonts to add interest with words. I consider them to be another artistic element. Some people Photoshop--I use fonts. They can convey moods, ideas, and the past.

I spent an hour and a half looking through fonts at two different websites (here and here) and I feel like I could spend at least another hour. Ninety minutes, browsing fonts. I amaze myself.