gobbledygook and upside downs
louise gluck was supposed to come speak; she got bogged down by freak snowstorms and a bad flu. johnathan franzen is coming but somehow between the time the “reserve your spot!” email was sent out (10:15 a.m.) and the time i next checked my email (1:10 p.m.) all tickets had been taken. ridiculous! that’ll teach me to actually try to be productive in the mornings instead of frittering away all pre-noon hours on the internet.
the plus side of my what-the-hell, may-as-well proactivity was that i had a full rough cut to show my class today. that put me in a good mood. as did the weather, as did a long overdue lunch date. however, no degree of good mood can withstand wednesday afternoons. i skipped into class and several hours later dragged myself out, in sullen teenager fashion, darkly envisioning nooses and pills and dorothy parker poetry.
my mood never rebounded. when i tried to watch junk television in the lounge, the christians kicked me out. and i couldn’t go to sleep because i had to read barthes for my attachment meeting tomorrow. i couldn’t talk to anyone because to talk would be to whine and i feel unjustified in whining.
because: i have a grad skool option. i have a grad skool option colocated with two of my sig.fig.’s grad skool options. my grad skool option offers cheap health insurance and priceless film industry connections. i have a job offer for the summer that would pay $2100 for 6 weeks — the most i’ve ever earned. my hair hasn’t started falling out yet. my history professor from LAST YEAR finally returned the paper i handed in LAST YEAR, which i need to revise for honors.
sadly, logic does not speak to malaise. if i could pinpoint my malaise (beyond “what if i don’t have talent, i just have a better-than-average ability to bullshit?” which in some fields is talent anyway) i could at least try to rip off its wings … maybe the key is to resume sleeping late in the mornings. my brother does that and he’s mostly happy.