writing is a form of therapy

from "Questions to Get to Know Someone"

 

54. What would be your ideal way to spend the weekend?

reading, writing, sleeping, drinking tea, watching movies, going for a drive, listening to music, taking pictures...

55. What's the best way a person can spend their time?

precisely the way that they wish to. That, of course, requires that a person listens to his heart and soul, pays attention, and follows the instructions he has been given. Maybe easier in theory than in practice - but what else can we do?

56. What one thing do you really want but can't afford yet?

the leisure to dedicate myself to writing for publication

57. What is the luckiest thing that has happened to you?

    when H was done with grad school and earned his Ph.D., and I had finished my course work for my M.A., we were at loose ends. Wanted to move closer to what we thought of as home - what we called "the real Midwest" - but needed a place to land. He had applied and interviewed for scads of jobs, but had not found the one. I had applied for a bunch of schools, and unfortunately for our needs, had been accepted by all of them (except the one that I really wanted, but that is a story for another day). We finally just had to make a decision, and what we went with was the school that required a deposit by a deadline, which was the law school.

    About a week after my deposit was accepted and I had a spot reserved in the graduating class of the century, he got the call for an interview at that very same school. He blew them away, got the job, got tenure, was made assistant chair of the department, and was elected chair of his national professional organization.

    All because we sort of picked that school out of a hat. How lucky is that?

58. What are some small things that make your day better?

flowering plants, hot tea, kitty purrs, a good credit report, texting with an old friend from grade school

59. What's the best thing that happened to you last week?

I am working from home again, "permanently, until further notice." 

My hair has been updated in a fun way.

I took a really great (spontaneous) photograph.

60. What are you looking forward to in the coming months?

participating in some virtual-5ks

61. What's your favorite piece of clothing you own/owned?

a black silk wrap dress, slit up to here

62. What is the most annoying habit people have?

making messes that others then have to clean up

63. What game or movie universe would you most like to live in?

there are a few I would like to visit, but no others in which I would truly want to live

64. What is the most impressive thing you know how to do?

I can turn my tongue fully upside down (i.e. I can lick my bottom lip with the top of my tongue)

65. What was the best book or series you've ever read?

    that is like asking a parent which child is their favorite! "Best" is so relative, to the time and place where it was read, who I was at the time, what came before and what I chose after because of it.

    I just finished re-reading one of my very favorites, Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell. Her prose books are absolutely worth the time.

66. What question would you most like to know the answer to?

"where is the map to the buried treasure?"

67. What are you interested in that most people haven't heard of?

it is not something I would care to discuss on the blog...

68. Why did you decide to do the work you are doing now?

because someone offered me a job that paid better than the last job, with an office (with an entire wall of windows) and theoretically fewer staples and paper cuts

69. What state or country do you never want to go back to?

no big fan of the deep south

70. Where do you usually go when you have time off?

time off usually means relaxing - or running errands and getting things done that have waited for a day off!

71. What are you most looking forward to in the next 10 years?

it's about the days, not the years

72. What is the most annoying question that people ask you regularly?

this is one of them - so I am calling a free space and asking myself something else. 

[#] What do you think are the best and worst aspects of the COVID quarantine, etc.?

    • worst: pretty much everyone acting like they are entitled to decide for everyone else how it all ought to go down

    • best: having it boiled down for me - however against my will. What really matters. What is truly important to me. What I am willing to bend on, that I had thought was just soooooo vital before.

73. If you suddenly became a master at woodworking, what would you make?

loads of money

74. What could you give a 40-minute presentation on, with absolutely no preparation?

Spanish and Irish neutrality in World War II. Trusts & estates. My theory of the value of personal journals.

75. What amazing thing did you do that no one was around to see?

if I tell, then part of the amazing gets washed away. Some things are supposed to stay secret!

[excerpted from here; the title quotation is by Graham Greene, from Ways of Escape, and reads in its entirety:

Writing is a form of therapy; 

sometimes I wonder how all 

those who do not write, compose, or paint 

can manage to escape 

the madness, melancholia, the panic and fear 

which is inherent in a human situation.]