deadlines

coming up to my last deadline this semester, i never thought it would end, but i'm grateful it is upon us. i'm tired. i'm out of words. yet i've got this last great push before delivery. i will pass. that i'm sure of. just have to make this last deadline. five poems, two revisions, and a long critical paper to write. it's all so much bullshit, and i've come to the conclusion that a master's is mastering the saying of what people want to hear (in proper formatting). that's all.

i hope to not be so stubborn next year. :)

i know, good luck with that. a zebra cannot change her stripes.

so i will be who i am, and struggle through this program and all the cognitive dissonance that drags me back to the ring for another round. i have so many artistic issues with this work, this study, i have to put those aside. i essentially realized this semester that if i'm going to make it through this program, i have to stop thinking. isn't that sad? i have to divorce my conscious mind from the process and just let my process take over. i can do this work. the doing is not the problem, it's the bullshit of it all. the, mine is bigger than yours, mentality.

so, so, tired of it. and i've just begun.

i have a friend who has slogged through the mud of my doubt, dragging me through with her outright love for the program we are both in. i needed that ballast against my disdain, because i would have quit if i had not had it.

residency then will be a great party for me. ten days to enjoy. and struggle. but at least it is ripe with fun.

i drowned my phone, by accident of course, and now have a new one. i barely knew the ring of my last phone, and now, this strange ring. so i get a call tonight and i look at my kid and wonder why she's not answering her phone. she looks at me and picks up my phone.

it's yours mom.

oh.

so if you call and i, a. don't answer, or b. hang right up on you, it is because i am technologically delayed. i need my paralyzer ring tone again. i have had it for so many years now, i don't even recognize anything but that as a phone call.

and my little girl grows in strength and beauty. and that is all i can ask for. all a mother wants or needs (well, mostly).