Half-bucket list: Clock's a-ticking

Four years ago, I made a list of things I wanted to do before I turned 40. There are about six months left on that clock. So let's revisit:

1. Be able to walk across a slackline: I haven't done anything towards this goal. Well, not true: I bought a slackline. But I've never used it. Maybe next time I go camping, but that will be perilously close to the big four-oh.
2. Do macaco: I quit capoeira a few months ago. During the previous almost-four years, I lost a good two years due to shoulder issues and eventual surgery. Even so, I feel like I gave it a fair amount of effort, but I never got any closer.
3. Be fluent in Portuguese: Fluent? No. I learned a good bit, but I found out my limits when I was in Floripa. I'm okay with calling this one good enough, though.
4. Travel to Brazil: This I unambiguously succeeded in, for a good seven weeks.
5. Have a novel published: After making this goal, I reconsidered it, keeping in mind what I tell my students about goals - not to mention my department chair's admonishments for setting annual goals. To wit, a goal should depend mostly on your efforts. Since I wasn't considering self-publishing, as formulated it was not necessarily achievable. But if I revised it to write a novel, that was within my control. And I did, having just finished NaNoWriMo.
6. Do the Annapurna Circuit: Given the timing when one needs to do this, I'd have to be heading over there right now, and I'm not. So nope.
7. Hold a handstand for a minute unaided: Much like macaco, this goal suffered for a bit thanks to my shoulder. However, I still occasionally do handstands. I still am not anywhere close to holding it for a minute.
8. Successfully traverse the swing-a-ring: Much like the slackline ... I haven't even tried.

On the other hand, I picked up some new goals along the way. I decided to hike all the fire towers in the Catskills (done!) and complete the 3500 peaks. The latter will be completed by my birthday - there are ten left (out of 39), and I'll get two done in January. Then there is the SBM End-to-End, which I was supposed to do last year, but stayed home sick instead. This year, folks. My sister and I decided to do a walking tour of Wales, which we had initially talked about for summer 2016; we've pushed it back until 2017 for a couple of reasons, a not-insignificant one of which is that she is having foot surgery in a week or so. We'll see where I am come June. It's likely that Annapurna will slide onto the "life bucket" list, and some of the others will get quietly folded in a drawer to die. And then I'll have to set up new goals ...

NaNoWriMo 2015

It’s been radio silence for a couple of weeks here because I was only doing one thing: NaNoWriMo. I am now the proud creator of one shitty first draft! I definitely learned a lot from doing it:

1. Lots of writers hate prescriptivist advice, but I can confidently say: Your production curve should not look like this:
   
   Writing 1,667 words a day is a lot for someone with a full-time job. I started off strong but was knocked off course by attending a conference in early November, and I should have worked harder to make it up. The last couple of days were not fun.
2. Word 2008 for Mac sucks. What do you mean, you can't spellcheck anymore once I get up to about 35 pages?
3. I'm much more comfortable with writing novels than short stories. I always assumed that one had to master the short story before moving on, and so I really took notice when a couple of writers (I think, Kate Elliott) said that wasn't the case.
4. I'm a plotter, not a pantser (not news), and plotting is hard for me (also not news). I love world-building and characterization, but I struggle to figure out what happens next. (This is probably why writing fan fiction has never appealed to me - it seems to be skipping over the fun part.) That said, once I reached a certain point, the plot started to figure itself out. My plot outline only went so far, and then characters started surprising me (there wasn't going to be a sex scene, and certainly not with a character I didn't plan on even existing). I was actually writing to find out what happened next, which I had never experienced before.
5. Is it good? Of course not: It's a shitty first draft. What I don't know is whether revision will turn it into a decent novel ... or a shitty tenth draft. But it's DONE. DID I MENTION IT WAS DONE?

NaNoWriMo

Today I started doing NaNoWriMo, so there goes my free time for November.

Writing

Since I'm not doing capoeira, I have more free time on my hands, which gives me the kick in the pants I need to work on my writing. So, hooray? It occurred to me that with five year of practice, how much could I improve? Would I get "as good" as I was at capoeira? Better? But that leads down a thorny philosophical and practical path ... First, how do you compare the two realms? It's easy enough to say that Abby is as good at karate as Beth is at capoeira: They're both martial arts with some sort of ranking system. Maybe it's not 100% precise, but at a rough level it will do. You could maybe even say that Cassandra is as good at capoeira as Dionne is at chess. While they are very different sorts of activities, chess players, too, are ranked. But how does Evangeline's skill at tennis compare to Fabiola's at oil painting? Unless they're both utter novices, or at the very top of their field, where would you even begin? Second, I estimate that I spend about 8 hours a week doing capoeira. I don't suddenly have eight free hours; some of that time has been replaced by doing workouts I have no particular commitment to. (I've gone to a few gymnastics classes; they make a great rebound relationship.) Should I spend 8 hours to make it equivalent? What about the writing I already do, or is counting composing an email as "writing" as desperate as counting "walking a block to the drugstore" as exercise? Second.five, I am planning on doing NaNoWriMo this November. If I aim for the minimum 50,000 words, that's 1,667 words per day. At the rate I write, that's more than 2.5 hours per day, or almost 20 hours a week. That's assuming no days off, mind you. (I am hoping that exhaustive outlining will bring this number down.) Third, I started capoeira with zero experience in any martial art, and I am not starting as a writer with zero experience, so after five years you would expect my writing skills to be higher than the equivalent of a green-yellow cord. (I'm still not sure how this writing ranking system would work. Is, like, Morrissey the lowest cord and a Pulitzer Prize-winner a mestre?) Fourth, I need a better schedule. Group exercise works for me not because I'm an extrovert who just loves people! but because it makes me show up. I like the Shut Up and Write meetup for that reason, but I don't think that's a viable solution for seven days a week. Well, no answers, except: (1) I guess I can tell you in five years. (2) Less time watching kittens on the internet would free that time right up. (2.5) Although not that much time. (3) I'd like to think I outrank Morrissey now. (4) This is one way the irregular schedule of a professor is actually a problem.

Book is out!

In non-hiking related news, I finally have a copy of my new book with Tim Caboni! You too can have your very own copy.

100 days of new things

The 100 days project was born in a moment of rage. Someone had hurt me badly, and while I was angry at them, the impetus for this was rage at myself that I had let it happen. I had changed my life and fallen into a rut for someone who wasn’t worth it. Me! I was the one who, as a young child, always voluntarily tried new foods at restaurants. I moved across the country for college alone. And here I was spending my weekends sleeping in, going to brunch, napping again, and then, if we were feeling adventurous, watching a video. Something had to change.

I decided to do something new every day for 100 days. While the new thing could be something big like skydiving, it didn’t have to be. After all, I wouldn’t have time for that every day. But it had to be bigger than a new restaurant with familiar cuisine,

Over 103 days (including three rest days), I tried things I liked (glitch hop music) and things I didn’t (Insane Clown Posse). I shot a gun and smoked pot (in Colorado), but I also read Harry Potter fanfic and tried coco helado on days when time was short.

I tried a lot of new foods and cuisines. The best was Taiwanese from a food cart in Midtown, but the most surprising food was ramen. It turned out it didn’t have to be the dry-packet experience I swore off after college.

I consumed some new media and art forms. The dinosaur erotica was far and away the best conversation starter, although Straight Stuntin’ magazine was more educational. The Mary-Kate and Ashley movie proved to be un-get-through-able, while listening to ragas led me down a Wikipedia rabbit hole.

And Wikipedia - I edited a Wikiepedia entry, one of several technological new ventures. I also made a vine, tried Pinterest, and used an iPad in the classroom. And in the classroom I also tried polling software, took my students on a field trip, had a guest via Skype, and made an video with iMovie (not new - but not swearing at it was).

I hiked above 12,000 feet for the first time, took barre, Brazilian jiu jitsu, TRX, high intensity interval training, kettleball, and burlesque classes (where I learned to fan dance and chair dance). I went to capoeira classes at Joao Grande’s and the LIC Palmares groups, and I went to my first open roda.

I led a Ramblers hike, made a snow angel in July, and brushed my teeth with baking soda. I helped build a rock-lined ditch and opened a Smarty Pig account. I bought a lottery ticket (not a winner) and hiked with the Catskills 3500 club.

And there were a few things that required actual courage, although not as much as jumping out of an airplane. I talked about one of my goals that I tend to keep to myself on Facebook. I went a day without complaining; that took two tries. I wrote up a business plan. I opened up to my capoeira Mestre. And on day 99, I finally forgave the person who had hurt me in the first place.

Towards the end, it became harder to find truly new things I could fit in around a busy day at work. There were also things I wished to try but couldn’t. I never did get that pickleback or try that taxidermy class. But I still can. To the extent I’m still in a rut, it’s only to the extent of having a regular job and activities I enjoy, and that’s okay with me.

Time Management III: Research and writing

Disclaimer: This is the part of time management I don’t have down yet. With research and writing, the few externally imposed deadlines are for near-complete projects, such as conference proposals. Unlike grading, which is naturally breaks down into single-assignment bites, research projects must be artificially chunked. The actual doing of the work then reveals flaws in my original estimates and plans.

No doubt it helps to be part of a research juggernaut - to have grad students looking to you for assignments, to have funders with reporting deadlines, to have senior faculty not-so-subtly pressuring you. Those of us at teaching-oriented institutions (or in teaching roles at research-oriented institutions) have nothing but our own willpower to go on, and vey few of us have much of that.

I’ve found that scheduling research and writing the way I do grading is not as successful. I’ve poked around at various kinds of scheduling and productivity software, but none of it seems to be set up in ways that I find helpful. (There are even a surprising number of sticker-chart apps for kids, but they are all premised on earning some sum of points, rather than on due dates. They are also ugly. Where is the Lisa Frank reward app?) I suspect Gantt charts might be ideal, but they don’t integrate with calendar apps well.

At the moment, I am playing with using BusyCal’s To Do list. BusyCal is much like the basic calendar that comes with the Mac OS, except it seems to work better and isn’t quite as ugly. To dos keep my calendar less cluttered than adding them to each day (they appear in a sidebar) while still being visible.

It’s been helpful thus far with tasks easily chunked down into small enough bits, such as “write blog posts.” The challenge of breaking down larger projects is still there: “Write article” is just too much, and I certainly won’t accomplish it in one afternoon. How much progress should I be satisfied with in one session? But breaking some of these projects down into tasks ignores any dependencies, bringing me back to Gantt charting …

I’m working on it. I’ll keep on trying with the to dos for a while, at least, and see if that improves my work flow and rate.

Rejectomancy

The word came down today that both Clarion and Clarion West had rejected me. However, as I have a pretty good idea of their notification schedules, today's rejection by CW was no surprise.

I was surprised to be completely rejected by both workshops. To be clear, I didn't expect them both to accept me - I didn't even expect one to accept me. I wasn't convinced my unheralded genius would bring the readers to their knees! But for those of you not familiar with the workshops, each has three possible responses: yes, no, and almost. Clarion gives you an "almost" by putting you on their waitlist, and CW does it by rejecting you with a more encouraging letter. Both gave me the plain no this year.

To the extent I was surprised, it was because when I applied for Clarion previously, they waitlisted me. As my writing has gotten better since then, I didn't expect a lesser outcome. I could say, "Oh, I don't know why they rejected me," but that's not true; I was rejected because at least 36 other applicants submitted better stories than I did. There is no mystery or conspiracy there.

As I said, by today it was no surprise, so it was a relief in some ways. I could go back to planning my summer trip to Colorado (which couldn't have happened if I'd been accepted) and my hiking trips to the Catskills. I took the chunk of money I'd been saving and lobbed it at my credit card debt. And, yes, I put in today's minutes toward my current story.

The thing is, I'm still discovering what needs to be fixed in my writing. As I continue to uncover problems and work towards solving them, my writing is getting stronger. It'll improve this summer whether I'm at a workshop or here. And maybe that's the best explanation for why I wasn't accepted. If my writing is still in a state where I can diagnose and treat its ailments, I don't really need Clarion yet, and I couldn't get the most out of it.

Truths about myself I find disappointing

1. Despite not being a morning person, that's the best time of day for me to write. My teaching schedule is carefully crafted to avoid teaching before 10 a.m., and I'd rather suffer any end of bodily ailments than exercise before breakfast. I can be civil in the morning, as long as you don't expect exuberance. But, much to my disgust, that's when I am most focused for writing.
   
2. Risk aversion has negative consequences, too. I'm okay with not losing all my money in Vegas or never experiencing the joy of skydiving. The flip side is that I'll hold on to mediocre circumstances far too long rather than take a small gamble, even if what I'm betting on is myself.
   
3. I like guys who will never move. Our family moved around a lot, and it was a valuable experience. I learned to meet new people. I learned how people are alike and cultures are different, and how socially constructed our world is. I can face moving again with aplomb. Yet, consistently, I am attracted to guys who are strongly rooted in the place they grew up in. The good news is, at least I live in New York City instead of Indiana now. The bad news is, me and the future Mr. Turducken will never pick up and move to London for a year.
   
4. One drink is enough. Not that I want to be an alcoholic, but any more than two drinks isn't worth it the next day. I'm never going to drink Indiana Jones under the table, and that kind of was one of my life goals.
   
5. I'm not really a fan of the Beatles. I guess I'm a Stones person, or even a Zeppelin person.

Money III of III: Trust fall

The first rule of writing is "Don't use too many exclamation points." The second is, "Show, don't tell":

I had a friend in college who worked on the paper with me. He wanted to be a fashion designer, but his parents wanted him to pursue something that reliably paid well, so he was majoring in one of the many flavors of engineering we offered.

A couple of years after graduation, he was working in Detroit in the business that made the city famous. That would have been a decade ago; I don't know what he's up to today. I don't know if he ever made a leap to something else. And I don't know how reliably Detroit is paying him now.

***

At Kroger, there is one clerk that I usually stop and chat with when he's working. This gentleman is probably a decade older than I am. The last time I was in there, he told me this:

Last year, he was bit by a brown recluse spider. While this is never a pleasant experience, his was worse than most. He was in a coma for five weeks, nearly losing his leg.

But he saw the upside in this; during his six-month convalescence, he was able to finish writing three novels and a lot of short stories. (He writes science fiction. Not the kind with zombies or vampires , he says, and no soft-core paranormal porn.) He's in the process of revising the first book to submit it to publishers.

***

My yoga teacher can testify that it took a long time before I got over my fear of handstands enough to even try them against a wall.

Now that I study capoeira, nearly every class brings me face to face with something I would be terrified to try on my own. Walking in a handstand. One-armed cartwheels. Rolling somebody over my back. Now I'm being threatened with backflips.

Capoeira is the first time I've had to face some of my fears in an ongoing, sustained way. It's a very particular set of fears; nobody asks me to battle spiders or jump off a ski lift. Nobody asks me to go up for tenure.

But capoeira is supposed to be a way of life both in and out of the game. It's not just that there is a lot to learn and that one's fellow capoeristas are a family. It's that the lessons you learn in the roda are also supposed to carry over to your life. This is one of the reasons that in Brazil it's used as a lifeline for kids growing up in less than ideal circumstances, just as team sports are in Anglo culture.

My capoeira lineage is Capoeira Angola Palmares, and it is based on four pillars: Safety. Respect. Responsibility. Liberation.

There's good news and there's bad news

I found out this morning I was waitlisted for a writing workshop I had applied for. That's the good news and the bad news.

I nearly didn't apply, and I had no expectations going in. The competition was pretty tough this year - at least 145 applicants for 18 spots. Many of the applicants are already published or are regular participants in workshops and critique groups. To be considered one of the top 30 out of this pool is, for me, a huge honor. Don't get me wrong, a waitlist isn't as exciting as a "yes," but it told me what I needed to know - I'm not wasting my time. And think of the money I'm saving!

Technically, I have over two months to continue to wait - but realistically, I figure it's over now. I'm not going to hold my breath waiting for bad things to happen to the folks who are going!

Publishing a book

Here, go depress yourself.