This Is Who I Am Now

"Rules for Self Discovery:

1. What we want most

2. What we think about most

3. How we use our money

4. What we do with our leisure time

5. The company we enjoy

6. Who and what we admire

7. What we laugh at"

-A.W. Tozier

1. Unlimited writing time; that breathless, teary eyed laughter; freedom from unnecessary time-sucks;  creative collaboration; being surrounded by enthusiastic people; travel opportunities; room to explore varied interests

2. Stories; words; dogs; photography; the last podcast episode I listened to; the future; memories of the people I love; Shakespeare; learning to play the mandolin; my to-do list; the last book I read; the universe; faraway places

3. Coffee; chocolate; books; cross-country train tickets; concerts; school supplies; the occasional twirly dress

4. Read; write; watch youtube videos; participate in long conversations; take walks; have impromptu dance parties; go to coffee shops; daydream; sketch; listen to music and podcasts

5. Friends; family; dogs; enthusiastic people; artists; book lovers; travelers; people with a high tolerance for embarrassment; storytellers; perceptive people; knowledgable people; nature; books; silence

6. Anyone who is unapologetic about what they love; perseverance; Shannon Hale; John and Hank Green; people who are experts at something; Emily Graslie; optimism; generosity; anyone who is trying to make a difference for other people; Jad Abumrad; Roman Mars; my best friend; people who are good at time management

7. Goofy faces; puns; my dog; word play; inside jokes; catch phrases; old memories; strangers who do/say weird things

Fear, Plans, and Journaling

I am a maker of plans. A list maker, a dreamer, a person who functions best when she has something to look forward to. But what happens when that something (that project, that trip, that social event) evokes a mixture of fear as well as excitement? In a fight between the two, fear usually wins. No, I usually let fear win. And the stupid thing is, that of the two emotions, fear is always the smallest, physically. Fear is the tiny ball in the pit of my stomach, while excitement is the thing that makes me want to get up and actually do something. Excitement is in my blood and fear is a parasite.

When I look back through my old journals, which I've been keeping on and off since the 6th grade, I see a major shift take place between middle and high school. In middle school I wrote mostly about my life. I wrote about things that happened to me, or interesting conversations, or something my teacher said, but in high school a lot of that reflection got replaced by plan-making. I stopped writing about what my life was actzually like and started writing about what I wanted my life to be like. And that doesn't have to be a bad thing, but when I look back at those entries I realize that almost all of them say the same things: Write more. Procrastinate less. Get out of your comfort zone.

Figuring out what caused this shift inevitably lead me to wondering why I keep a journal in the first place. When I was younger, I wanted my older self to be able to look back at my entries and learn something about what it was like to be me at that age. As I got older, my priorities changed. Keeping a journal became less about recording my life and more about the the act of writing. Writing was how I figured stuff out. Writing made me feel empowered, and when I wrote out exactly who I wanted to be, and how I was supposedly going to get there, I felt more in control. The problem was, of course, that I never remembered.

One of the innate things about keeping a journal is that you write something down, get something off your chest, and then you forget about it. It's like putting your emotions or experiences into a jar that you only take down from the shelf once a year. So no matter how many times I wrote out my plans, I was putting them in a place that wasn't going to help me very much.

Realizing this has pushed me forward in a lot of ways. For one, I understand now that I don't want to look back at my journals every few years and read about everything I wanted to do, but never did. That, to me, is a far stronger motivator than a million lists and action plans and ideal life scenarios. That fear, the fear of always planning but never doing, is actually a good thing. It keeps me motivated and on track. And more importantly, I can choose it over the other kind. At the very least I'll end up with the kind of journals my older self will actually enjoy reading.

Letter to October #11

Dear October,
      Here are some of the things I did today:

1. Wrote words.

2. Had pumpkin cake for breakfast at my favorite coffee shop.

3. Listened to several podcast episodes.

4. Finished reading First Light by Rebecca Stead.

5. Wrote more words.

6. Talked about Paris, cats, and music videos over dinner.

7. Watched one of my favorite movies ever, for like the millionth time. (Ever After - Oh, 90s movie trailers how I love you)

Extra Thoughts:
-First Light was really good! It's a middle grade book about two kids from separate worlds: one is a boy visiting Greenland with his scientist parents, the other is a girl who is part of an ancient civilization who have build a home for themselves deep under the ice. I've read one other book by Rebecca Stead, and each time I am blown away by her writing. It is beautiful in its simplicity, and she is one of those rare children's book authors whose prose feels effortless, as though someone is just telling you a good story. I enjoyed this book just as much now as I would have when I was ten, and if you're up for a good adventure story with endearing characters, I highly recommend picking it up.

-I actually didn't write as much as I had hoped for today, but I'm trying to teach myself to be happy with new words, now matter how abundant they are (or aren't). Most of the time I think I have to rush through writing stories or I'll never finish them, but I've been trying to go at a slower pace and let this story unfold at its own pace. I have a sign up in my room that says "Trust the Process." It's so easy to want to jump to the finish line, but I'm re-discovering the joy of simply putting down words.

-Need podcast recommendations? My go-to's are Radiolab and 99% Invisible, but lately I've been listening to the Love Hurts series on a podcast called Strangers. Just, wow. So raw, so real, so fascinating. Also, if you don't listen to podcasts, I suggest you start. Audio is the one of the most incredible storytelling mediums I've come across.

-And finally, Ever After. I did sort of watch it for a reason besides, you know, re-living my childhood. In my Renaissance Art History class we are talking about the "making of an artist," and specifically the stories we tell about artists and why some of them loom so large in our cultural consciousness. One of the ones we've been talking about is, of course, Leonardo da Vinci, and we have to do a project where we write our own narrative about the artist, based on both scholarly and pop culture sources. Since da Vinci makes a pretty prominent cameo in Ever After, I thought I'd give it another viewing. I'm not sure I gained much more insight into da Vinci as an artist besides the fact that his movie self fits very nicely into the "wise old man" trope, but I did discover that I can quote almost every line. I guess that shouldn't come as a surprise, judging by the number of times I've watched it...

Well, I think that's a long enough letter for one evening. Tomorrow will most likely be another day of writing and reading, and maybe some laundry....Exciting, I know.

Laura

Song of the Day: Land of the Living by Roo Panes

Letter to October #10

Dear October,
      I'm sorry I've been so silent lately. I'm sure you don't want to hear excuses, but this was midterms week, and you weren't the only thing I had to neglect in favor of studying. Luckily today I turned in my last assignment, and I'm officially off for the next four days! Fall break is always a little depressing because so many of my friends live near enough to go home, while I'm still stuck a couple thousand miles away. Still, I'm going to have company this time in the form of my roommate, which is certainly a nice change.
I spent most of my evening doing the things I haven't had time to do all week. It was a night partly inspired by an author interview in the back of one of the books on my shelf (why yes, I am one of those people who skips to the back of books I haven't read).* The question she was asked was "What is your idea of fun?" and she answered, remarkably, with a description of what she and her family like to call Abbey Nights. (No, not Downton Abbey. That's where my mind went, too.) Basically they turn off all unessential power in their house - lights, TV, computers, phones - and spend the night doing "nineteenth-century activities": reading, talking, and playing music. "Suddenly," she says, "the night is so long, and we feel so much more connected and grounded, away from all the noisy screens we're so addicted to." And so, I spent my evening reading and writing letters, drinking apple cider, and letting the stress of this week melt away with each scribbled word and each soft rustling of a page. I couldn't do an all out "Abbey Night" namely because we aren't allowed to have candles in our dorm room, and because I am sitting here, typing this letter to you, but it was close enough to remind me just how slowly time passes when you're not mindlessly clicking between tabs. Over the next couple of days I plan to disconnect from the internet as much as possible and return to the thing that has always been a place of refuge for me: words.
So it's been a wonderful day, October. Thanks for being patient with me while I struggled my way through this week, and I think you'll be hearing from me much more frequently in the near future.

Laura

* The book, in case you were wondering, is The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente

Song of the Day (to quiet your mind): The Violet Hour by The Civil Wars

Letter to October #5

Dear October,
      As crazy as this upcoming week is going to be, I don't feel too nervous about it because I spent most of today studying. I still don't feel completely caught up, but I feel a lot more prepared than I did a few days ago. One of the things that has been helping me stay disciplined is writing every day, not just your letters, but also my own stories and poems. I'm discovering that if I'm disciplined in one aspect of my life I become more disciplined in others. That seems like common sense now, but for some reason I hadn't thought of it before. It also just feels really good to be taking time each day to indulge my imagination, and to see my progress spool out in lines of text, a little bit more each day. Maybe at the end of the month I will show you my calendar that I've been using to keep of track of my writing, where I get one star sticker for each day that I write. There's something to be said for personal encouragement through stickers. I highly recommend it.

Laura

Song of the Day: One Minute More by Capital Cities

Letter to October #4

The Haunted Bookstore!

Dear October,
    Here's something I need to remember for future reference: Book-filled days are the best. Today I went to Iowa City for their annual book festival. I don't think it will ever not feel strange to be in Iowa City, because it's a place that feels both intensely familiar and foreign at the same time. The one thing that isn't foreign is books, and, oh man, did I acquire a lot of them. We went to a reading by a Jamaican author at Prairie Lights, and walked around the booths that were set up around downtown. The highlight however, was visiting The Haunted Bookshop. It's a used bookstore nestled just off the beaten path. We spend at least an hour wandering its convoluted shelves and getting lost in it's nooks and crannies. Afterward we got into conversation with the owner, who just happened to be a Coe College Writing Center Alumni. She talked about the bookstore as if it was an extension of herself, and in a way, it was. It was her personally curated anthology, and her life's work was devoted to putting the right book in the right person's hands at exactly the right time. Picture four college students and the owner sitting cross-legged on the floor of the bookstore, listening to stories of her time at Coe and updating her on things that had changed. When we left (and we didn't want to), she gave us a ridiculously generous discount on our books.

That one conversation was enough to remind me why I wanted to go into writing in the first place. The desire hasn't waned, of course, but it's encounters like these that make me realize more and more why I do what I do. I write for people like the woman who owns The Haunted Bookshop, people who love words and learning and believe that real connection is more valuable than money or success or the latest gadget. I want to be the kind of person who builds their life out of things I love, and I think today was a pretty good start.

Laura

Song of the Day: Carrying by Jukebox the Ghost

Letters to October #3

 Still life from the front desk of the writing center

Dear October,

       It's almost midnight, so once again my letter will arrive a few minutes late. I've been finding it more difficult to reflect these past couple days. Each day is impossible to categorize, swinging between glorious highs where I'm surrounded by friends, or my writing is going really well, and pockets of boredom or stress about the upcoming week. Overall, I can't shake the feeling that I'm being swept up in some kind of slow-burning change. I can feel something shifting, and I don't know if it's me or my environment. Could it be both? I'm doing my best to steer it in the direction I want it to go, but there are times when it feels like I'm trying to catch up to my own life.

You always hear people talk about living in the moment, but what they don't tell you is that when you let go of the future, you let go of your last road map. That's not to say you've lost the ability to navigate. There are still signs to go by, and you can figure out where you are from the sun and the stars, but suddenly everything is more instinctual, more uncertain. Right now, I'm clinging to a direction and hoping it will take me to where I need to go. Let's hope I end up somewhere new.

Laura

Song of the Day: Everything Moves by Bronze Radio Return