THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS—Eric and Donna Style

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the rooms

There was pounding, hammering, even loud booms;

The dust hung thick in the air like a cloud,

“I hope we like it,” says Eric out loud;

The kitties were nestled all snug on our beds,

While visions of plump mice danced in their heads;

And Eric in his respirator, and I in my mask,

Had just settled down for this demolition task,

When in the dinning room there arose such a clatter,

I sprang from the kitchen and said, “What’s the matter?”

Away to the attic I looked up to see,

A hole in the ceiling and Eric waving at me.

The pantry was gone, the wall had tumbled

The three floors were tore up, splintered, and jumbled,

When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,

But Eric and a shovel, smiling ear to ear,

With hope that this task could go a little faster,

He went back to work breaking up plaster.

More rapid than eagles his curses they came,

As he yelled, and shouted, and called out some names;

"Ah, Dasher! You Prancer! My hammer’s a pisser!

You stupid shovel! You gave me a blister!

To the top of the ceiling! to the top of the wall!

Now dash away! dash away! dash away all!"

As drywall that before the wild hurricane fly,

When they meet with a sledgehammer, mount to the sky,

So out to the floor the drywall it flew,

Covered in insulation came Eric down, too.

And then, in a twinkling, I heard it on cue

Pop goes electricity—the fuse we blew.

As I ducked my head, and was turning around,

Down more ceiling came with a bound.

“We have walls to rebuild and arches to make

We really have to hurry, our kitchen’s at stake!

Appliances are ordered and no interest is paid

Buyer’s remorse has no time to be weighed.”

His eyes look worried, his respirator wheezy

But laying bamboo is supposed to be easy.

He frantically sweeps dust and trash into rows,

As the beard of his chin turns as white as the snow;

He discovers sewer pipes protruding from the wall,

And pauses, calculating the cost to cover it all;

He had a sad face, full of wonder and worry,

If we’d recoup the money and profit on this flurry.

But his eyes were excited as he broke another shelf,

And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself;

A wink of his eye and a twist of his head,

Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread;

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,

And knocked down the cabinets; then turned with a jerk,

And laying his respirator up on his head,

He gave me the sledgehammer to pound on instead;

He sawed through the counters in one awesome move,

And our kitchen was destroyed as we continued our groove.

I heard him exclaim as he threw the last piece on the heap,

"Happy Kitchen to all, now let’s get some sleep."

Teaching Is Infectious to My Writing

So I thought that as I majored in writing and I actually have a passion for it, that teaching it would be great.

There are two problems with this line of thought:

1) I was an adjunct, so I never actually made any money. Instead, I had to teach a crazy amount of classes at like four different campuses to make ends meet. And even if I had become a full timer, I realized they didn't make much money either. The result is that I never seemed to have enough time with my students or in analyzing the textbook or syllabus handed to me by the college. I felt as if just keeping myself afloat and on top of grading was about all I could do. As a result, my writing suffered tremendously. I wasn't very relaxed and couldn't seem to find my groove.

2) Teaching writing hampered my ability to free write. When you are often looking at writing at the sentence level, helping students condense their words to what matters, staring at simple sentences that should make sense but for some reason don't--you start to look at your own writing differently. Maybe if I wasn't taking so many classes or had so little time for my own writing, I could have distanced myself more. Even now, teaching one class while working a full time job has left me segregating my writing time to one morning a week. I can't grade before I write as my students' papers will be in my head instead of my novel.

This has become my medicine for this infection. Pick a day and time to write and come hell or high water, write at that time. It has made such a difference to me, and 50,000 words later, I think I am getting better with my infection and can make a clearer distinction.

Still Alive after NANO

I've done it, I wrote a novel in November. Well, sort of. I mean, I have 52k words, but the novel is far from over.

*sigh*

It's a start and I didn't lose my mind, my jobs, or my boyfriend. Something must have gone right.

While sometimes I wish I could write full-time, what I realized is that when pressed for time, I actually get more done. It seems as if when I plan my day and set out goals, I actually get them done. Shocking, huh?

Seriously, I was a bit surprised that when I have loads of free time, I do nothing. I don't really even surf the net. It's not like I have writer's block or anything, I think I have activity block since I just want to watch episodes of Dr. Who or Torchwood or Dollhouse--maybe sit in a Snugli and drink coffee.

Ah, now I can already see what Christmas will look like.