Responsive

So, I finally got up the nerve to write to the professor that I mentioned in my first post, and it was far from the "Who are you?" response I was fearing. I guess I should have had a little more confidence in myself, but since I never intended to go into poetry for my masters, I never really thought that I'd honed my skills enough to be a decent poet.

This professor, however--an established poet herself--sent me a response to my message that nearly made me cry. She was one of the professors that I've met that I've really, truly respected during my time as an undergrad. She was always very frank about our work and what she thought of it. If she had something to say, she'd say it, even if it was far from sugarcoated. After having so many teachers that didn't want to hurt anyone's feelings, praising very obviously terrible work, it was kind of refreshing--if not a little terrifying--to know that she'd tell me exactly what she thought.

So, anyway, I sent her this message a little over a week and a half ago and was starting to feel super embarrassed about it, because I thought she must have read it and discarded it--kind enough not to write back and tell me that she didn't feel complimented since I was a horrible student. Yeah, that's where my imagination goes. It's brutal.

But, thankfully, I was wrong. I received my response from her yesterday, and it was very warm and appreciative of the things I'd had to say (mainly thanking her for being an honest and helpful teacher), and she went on to tell me that, even though I'd considered myself a fiction writer, I'd been the best poet in her beginner's poetry class. Which, yeah, might have been beginner's, but I'd sat in that class feeling embarrassed and inadequate, reading the work of a few other classmate's that I'd felt completely obliterated my work.

Apparently not. I could over-analyze it and say that may she was stretching the truth or misremembered me, but I did get an invitation into her advanced poetry class before I'd ever taken intermediate, so I like to toot my own ego horn and believe it. Either way, it may just be one of the best compliments ever paid to me, and I'm not going to dismiss it or try to tell myself that she was mistaken. If you knew this woman, you wouldn't take a compliment from her lightly. If she thought something was crap, she'd call it crap.

Besides that glorious moment, I'm also finally fully registered for my semester in school. The worst part will be eventually discovering how much it's going to cost me.

To fill up my down time, I've been embellishing my portfolio with some poems I'm pretty smug about as well as reading books from a list my former professor sent me. I read her book of poetry and loved it, but next to that my favorite so far has been First Indian on the Moon by Sherman Alexie. I've read one of his stories as well, and I just love the guy. I need his other book of poetry as well as my teacher's. Christmas present? Even though I know I should be branching out... I'm still waiting on a book called Omeros to arrive in the mail. I need to read it for school, but the sender is taking light years to get it to me.
So anyway, I'm starting to feel more like a poet. I think I'm making that transition. Even though I'm still dreading that day on my syllabus that says "Poetry Reading by MFA students." Oh, public speaking, my lifelong sworn enemy. It's already about the end of November. January will be here before I know it. But that's okay, I'm really excited.

In the meantime, I'm thrilled that Christmas is on the way. Adam and I bought our first tree, and I've been replenishing the ornament stock from my childhood. Yeah, I know I'm ridiculously sentimental, but Adam's been indulging me. He even let me buy our dogs Christmas sweaters. I hope the new semester starts soon. You know you have too much free time when you start buying your animals clothes.