I Put the 'Study' in Study Abroad

Hi guyz!!

My Staying-In-Guilt has decreased to level "pretty much non-existent." I feel like getting lost in London on purpose, exploring Covent Garden, and visiting Windsor Castle have all been very crucial to my recovery. However, a new facet of the balancing act has come into the spotlight. Please welcome "Studying?" to the stage.

That's right, folks. I actually do other things besides roaming the world like a wild woman.

It's been a bit of an adjustment due to quite a different school system. I have each class once a week, and my homework is reading that I can choose to do or not. The only things I'm graded on are two maybe three essays that are due throughout the semester. No reading quizzes, no busy work. For Publishing Creative Writing we were supposed to discuss a topic in groups outside of class, but when I frantically tried to e-mail my group-mates, they all responded "just get to class five minutes early. We'll do it then. Caroline (the tutor) doesn't care." Aye, aye, aye! My school-work orientated self didn't know how to handle such blatant disregard for homework. But as my classmates repeatedly stressed that I needed to stop worrying about it, I did. And then I started worrying because I wasn't doing anything outside of class.

Now before you freak out (especially you, Mom and Dad), let me inform you that I'm happy to report that I have a system. Or at least the outline of a system. It helps that my classes consist of everything I love: writing, reading, and watching movies. All I need to do is make sure I do a little writing, reading, and movie watching in between adventuring. This week I'm doing a much better job, especially on working on my writing for Creative Writing and Place. So good in fact, that I am proud to share the product with you. The non-compulsory assignment was to write a description of a place in automatic writing, and then to write about the same place in a piece of realist fiction. Automatic writing is when you keep your hand to the page and just write without thinking or editing, and realist fiction is a made up story that is realistic. Pretty simple.

Now the way I went about this was to take a trip to the British Library and did my automatic writing in the lobby. I then proceeded to take all my squiggles and type them up and arrange them into a poem. Wa-lah! Art. (P.S. It looks way cooler on Word, but Blogspot denied me the same formatting freedom.)

Ear (/eye) Ration, All a Tease—Observations in Automatic at the British Library, February 16, 2011

First:

Stop thinking.

Let’s go sailing.

The broad cloth is already billowed towards us.

Marshmallow banisters, up , up,

poles of marble wood.

Creamsicles creeping downwards,

                

              melty

              melty                                                  

                                                                           

The vent leaks.                                                     

The vent pours out                                         

words that blend up
                   and swims                                                                                                                                                                                               to spaghetti sauce that's indistinguishable                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      Look:                                                                                                                                      There is an old man

with green rain boots halfway up his calves.

His pants are tucked into said boots and said boots match his sweater.

I could die from the cuteness.

I like the way he walks.

I like the way my shoe taps to my own beat.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             Now:

Does anyone notice that I’m writing like a fiend?

Do fiends even write or do they have fire fingers

 that burn their #2’s to a crispy treat for fiendish sizzlers?

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  See:

Two friends talk, laugh, one speaks so fast –

is it English? I can’t even tell. I love the way it vibes

Up

and down.

                                                                                           Vibrations in a tin can,

a fruit syrup,

a peach fuzz yellow jell-o on Grandma’s table,

a red and white squared cloth,

a heart,

a doily valentine cut-out with a smiley cartoon face.

                                               

                                                 What                             if our           

                                                                    

                                                                     faces

                                                               

                                                        were on our hearts?

                                                                  

No one would have a nose.

The eyes would see just red and inhale ketchup without the fries.

 No crispy chips, no laughing halibut.

 No tap tap.

Walk faster, Hands-in-Pockets-Boy.

 Tip         tap,     tap,                             tip,

                no                 unison,

 out of                 sync.

                   Nsync =

                                 non sync =  

                                                     lip-syncing pilgrims.

What:

A white haired wig, plaid flower.

Clean halls and a plant.

I wonder if they’re real.

A bag with gingerbread men and flowers painted on.

A girl standing and putting on her coat.

Don’t mind me watching.

Don’t mind the cracks of break your mother’s back

and blue tiles with pink sunsets starting to creep from the edges like sand off the dune.

The green boot man has returned.

He walks forward, back, back slow.

Walk slow, walk and talk and tell telephone missus you love her.

I hope she has the same rain boots in yellow.

I hope they are dry with a little dirt from the garden.

Mud and a slug squelching and slimy on the windowsill.

Hold her, hold her. It is warm.

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And, if you're up for it, here's a story set in the same place:

MAZES

            Sam wishes coffees were cheaper, because he’s checked twice now and the single quid in his pocket remains un-multiplied, even after a closed-eye plea to any higher power trapezing between the marble staircases above his head. It’s such a maze up there, almost experimental, but of course no rat would require a collection of books in a sky-reaching glass tomb like the one in the library. It touches the top of the seven story building, and a marble trail of staircases and open-top corridors frame it, forming a square at each floor with staircases at two ends to keep the ramp uninterrupted.

            Sam leans against his third floor railing and takes in the glass column of books in front of him. Shelves and shelves of titles he cannot make out bare their naked spines to the eyes of everyone who enters. Sam wishes he could smooth his hand over their pages, but they are out of reach – a dissected tree version of Rapunzel. What a shame.

            He supposes there are books he can look through, but he is just a visitor here. He doesn’t know which way to go or which door to enter. Besides, he might get lost in someplace he’s not meant to be, so he stays in this open middle, the heart of the library and watches humanity stream through its white veins.

            A gray-haired man paces down below. He is miniature and perhaps glass, though it is impossible to tell without plucking him up from his musings and holding him to the light. Sam watches as the man switches his mobile to the other ear. Yes, of course, he is not walking alone. He is powering his voice with repetitive movement, like the wind-up of a pocket watch. Sam wonders who is on the other line. Perhaps a gray-haired wife? Perhaps she is reminding him what to pick up from Sainsbury’s on his way home. Perhaps milk. Perhaps bread. It will be a long, slow walk. Sam realizes even his own legs are tired. He takes his eyes off the man and searches for a bench.

            There is one in Sam’s corridor, but two young blokes have already claimed it and sit laughing over something on the screens of their laptops. Sam moves towards a staircase in hopes of better luck on the next floor. A tall girl in a billowy dress is descending.

            There is nothing remarkable about her face, but her blue dress is so bright in contrast to the black and denim his eyes are accustomed to, that he pauses at the bottom of the stairs to watch her pass. She looks like spring, and it is both refreshing in its promise and agonizing in its impossibility, for outside is damp and chill as cement. Yet she wears her dress, and she smiles a slight smile although she is alone. There is a messenger bag slung across her chest, and she keeps one hand near the hem of her dress where the bag leans against her thigh, as if she fears letting go will mean an accidental revelation of what is underneath. She moves away down the corridor, passing the boys on the bench and continuing around towards the opposite staircase.

            Sam returns to his watch-post at the railing and sees her walking the square below. She slows as she nears a bench, but a woman with a baby approaches from the opposite direction and the girl passes by, her stride quicker but the reminder of a smile still in place on the corners of her mouth. Sam realizes she too has tired legs. She is searching for somewhere she can claim as hers to rest, a place unshared and maybe even hidden.

            She descends another flight of stairs and reaches the ground floor. It contains a lobby, an indent in the marble, with long rows of benches like teeth. It is here that he loses sight of her. Her spring blends with the planted ferns spreading large leaves over the benches behind them.

            Are the leaves real or wax? He will find out.

            He follows the girl’s path downstairs and pauses in front of the plants. The leaves are plastic-shiny, but the soil beneath is genuine. He tears a leaf between his thumb and forefinger. It is a leaf through and through. He moves down the row, a hand rustling the fronds as he does so. When he rounds the corner and looks down the long bench, it is empty. He searches the lobby for a glimpse of blue, but spring has gone in search of sunlight. The gray-haired man passes by, his mobile still pressed against his ear. “See you soon, darling,” he says.

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Thanks for bearing with me, peeps. The first thing I want to do when I write something is show it to people. It might have something to do with my constant need for praise and attention. And anyway, isn't this what a blog is for? Instant publication of one's writing? Ooh, speaking of which, I should do some research on self-publishing for my Publishing Creative Writing class tomorrow.

Yours studiously,

S