I'm officially an MFA student!

First week as a grad student: long days, but they passed quickly.

I am excited about my classes. My professors are all so esteemed and have a wealth of knowledge to share. Fiction, Nonfiction, and Poetry--all three genres are represented, and this is actually quite accidental. In my workshop class, it was made quite clear from the get-go that I'm [supposed to be] working on a Thesis. The class is designed to help me with that endeavor while also helping my classmates. (My classmates! I guess I should call them colleagues. They're all so incredibly talented, I'm flattered by being in their company.) Studying contemporary nonfiction will have a heavy-workload, but it's primary purpose is to further my understanding of the genre as a writer, complete with writing exercises, practice in a panel, and [hopefully] a conference-worthy paper. And a class about teaching a multi-genre creative writing class? Epic. I'll essentially get to design an introductory-level class. And I'll probably get a conference paper out of this one, too.

I'm excited about being's a GTA. Since I got a split appointment, it is like having an extra two classes to take. I hold office hours, help my interns, do online grading. I have to be familiar with the syllabi and pay attention to deadlines. I need to remember not to forget about my online class--those are 120 students I need to record grades for! But working with The Florida Review, that's really incredible. Its a crash-course in literary journal publication, and even though I've only been around a week, I can tell I'm going to absolutely love it.

And of course, my life wouldn't be complete if I didn't get involved in extracurriculars. I found an Objects in Motion club with jugglers and poi-spinners and the like, just hanging out outside of my main building. I will probably join them every once in a while--they're more than happy to teach. Maybe I'll finally get backwards weaves and thread-the-needle. I'm still looking for a dojo--aikido preferably, but at this point any martial art will do. Preferably on-campus, so there's less travel and little-to-no fees, but it appears that training times only occur while I'm in class, so that's a buzzkill. But one of my professors happens to be 3rd Dan in TKD, and one of my--colleagues (gosh, it's weird saying that)--her parents own an Aikido dojo in south Florida, so there still seems to be hope. I've been trying to go to the gym with my cousin for basic in-shape purposes, possibly to lead back up to Zombie Apocalypse Training, but for now that's on temporary hiatus until I can get the rest of my life organized.

I'm also on a committee to start a new reading series for the MFA program, but more on that later. It's literally just starting, and there's a lot of work to be done, but I'm excited. I've got a great group of people to work with, and I really think it can be something great.

Overextension is a big, massochistic problem I have. I'm trying to avoid doing fifty-million-things-all-the-time like usual, but I hear about projects and I just get so excited I can't help myself. I need to remind myself to keep time for homework and writing, and I'm really going to need to come up with a no-BS policy for myself in regards to organization and time management. (That may be my biggest challenge.)

Nevertheless, there are tons of opportunities for me here. I'm so excited about everything.

Being in school has never been so awesome.