Day #8494 - New Look!

For the first time since I started this blog back in 2008, I've made the jump to go ahead and try a new look. I'll probably be playing with it in the coming weeks and months, but I decided that change is good and a fresh look is just what the doctor ordered.

Plus playing around with settings and colors and Photoshop are all excellent procrastination tools for avoiding my NaNoWriMo story. Not that I don't want to write, I almost always do, it's just that I know this next scene coming up is going to be challenging (emotionally speaking - it's the first scene I thought of for this whole book, so I've been thinking about it for MONTHS and I've unintentionally put a ton of pressure on myself to get it perfect now that it's time to add it to the story - eek!). So there's that, too.

I loved you, old layout, but I think we both know this is for the best. Life needs color, and so does this blog.

Goodbye, 2008!

So let me know what you all think!

Okay, really need to get back to writing now....

Day #8476 - Blog Reboot

To say that it's been a while since I've written here is an understatement, as would the remark that for the exception of the summer of 2008 when I started this blog before studying abroad, my entries have been sporadic at best and completely random at worst.

But things can change. Blogs can be updated and repurposed and before you know it, they're like new again. And that is my hope for this blog.

What started out as a place to share my thoughts and experiences while traveling around Italy eventually became a spot where I wanted to share my many grand ideas with the world. It would get discovered by a plethora of readers who would find what I had to say interesting and it would be EPIC.

Or, you know, not.

So that didn't happen, but that doesn't mean it never will. But until it does, this blog is going to be getting a facelift and a new direction. Rather than simply being a home to my rants and ramblings, this is going to be a place where I more specifically document my writing life.

To some people, this may be a bit of a surprise because since when is Monica a writer? I know, it was a bit of a shock for me too. But since July of last year, I've been consistent about writing in my journal (a habit I would occasionally turn to in college). But I've actually written entries in my notebooks every day since mid-March, and after a few months of that, a thought formed: I feel better when I'm doing this.

So this past summer, I wanted to take it a step further. Writing down my thoughts and feelings and the things that were happening to me was all good, but I kept wanting to play with those things. What if this had happened instead, or it took place here, or I'd said the clever remark that I didn't actually think of until two days later? I'd been kicking around ideas for stories for years, but I never had the courage to seriously try to write. I figured there was no time like the present, so four months and 60,000 words later, I had the first draft of a young adult novel completed.

Let me tell you, it felt great. I still need to massively reread and revise and all that fun stuff before the next step that comes with being a writer, but to say I got a draft down of a BOOK is a dream I never thought I'd be able to actually accomplish.

And now it's the seventh day of my first NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month for those of you who are just as new to the party as I am), I'm just over 15,000 words in, and so far, so good. Every day I come home from work and I'm anxious to get back to my characters. Even as much as I plan and ponder, my characters are the ones in charge (for now - it's a first draft) and they're surprising me left and right.

Guess I might actually be more of a writer than I thought after all.

So who knows where this road may lead me. My expectations are low. I don't expect anything to come of this. All I know for sure is that I like writing. Whether or not I'm any good at it is a whole other ball of wax.

So that is what this blog is going to be about until further notice: me writing about writing. I'll be going through past posts and cleaning up what I'm actually comfortable with the rest of the world reading and what is probably best filed away. I'll be adding labels and tags and even picking a new page design because I've had the same one for over three years.

Sometimes change is scary. But it can also be liberating, and you never know what wonderful adventures it will lead to.

Comments always welcome, and let the blog reboot begin!

Day #8034 - Another Year Gone

In just under an hour and a half, my life as a 21 year old will be over. I know that a lot of people joke that turning 22 means your life ends because it really means you're an adult (because now you've had a year of legal drinking, which means you ought to be more responsible about life), but I have mixed feelings. It has been one crazy year.

It's hard to believe that this time last year, I had just moved in to Barton Hall, yet to experience the joys of CI403, and the chaos that is student teaching was still five months away. It feels like all of that was so much longer than a year behind me. So being 21 was full of big changes - legal life, a temporary return to dorm life, leaving the campus that had been my home for the last three and a half years, surviving a semester as "Miss Fuma - Student Teacher", graduating from college, changing my life plan and starting my master's degree, a new puppy, travels near and far, I could go on and on and on. There have been plenty of ups and downs, many of which have been documented either here or in my journal, but I made it. We're back here again.

So I should be hitting the sack soon seeing as tomorrow, in addition to being my birthday, is also the first day of the new school year. My classes don't actually start meeting until Tuesday, but I'm going to go to the library and try to get ahead on some homework anyway. So so long, 21. It's been quite an interesting time to say the least. Catch you on the flip side.

Day #7351 - I Now Pronounce this Season, Autumn!

Today has been one of those days that I have been waiting for since the weather started to cool off. The air has been crisp and clear, the days are cloudless, the nights have a breeze that, frankly, is freezing. It's even been October for over a week already, yet I have not truly felt like it was Fall yet. And then today, it finally happened.

The leaves turned! It's one of those things that you can just sense Nature is just taking her time with. Any time soon, the trees would finally surrender. Baseball season is over (at least for any Chicago fans), football weather is upon us, and the Greek system is in the middle of barndance shennanigans. Everything has been leading up to this moment, suggesting that the time has come. I love seeing the green quad covered in the yellow and maroon leaves, everyone dressed in hoodies and jeans. It's a good feeling indeed.

In other news, life is keeping me busy (but mostly in a good way). My current cause of some frustration is my CI 335 class aka Education Technology. Long story short, technology hates me when I actually NEED to use it and right now, I'm not such a huge fan of it either. But I'm trying and the instructors were really understanding at class tonight when I explained to them why I had nothing done. I keep reminding myself that things could be worse and that in the grand scheme of things, I'm really doing okay. So good deal.

Side note that I meant to write about a couple days ago: I love it/get freaked out slightly when the music I might be listening to perfectly fits the situation at hand or the mood I'm in. It's like for however brief a moment in time, my ife has it's own soundtrack :o)

Day #7189 - The Finals Countdown

Cheesy title for an entry, I know. But it really says it all. Plus I'm an English major who has been writing term papers non-stop for the past three weeks and is now completely out of original thoughts. Deal with it :-)

It hit me today just how fast this semester and, in fact, this whole year has gone by. A new roommate, a new major, a new floor not to mention the sorority, all the new friends I have been making (and getting to know old ones even better), and getting ready to leave for Italy. I cannot believe that in a short two and a half weeks, I'll be living in Verona. I've been dreaming of this ever since I read Bloomability in 7th grade and now, the time is almost here.

So while I sit here in my ISR dorm room (which I'm not at all ashamed to admit part of me will miss), I ought to start sifting through my endless pile of notes and stacks of books and study what it is I have been learning in my classes this semester. However, I can't help but think more about the things I have learned that weren't necessarily on any syllabus. My courses have shaped me, of course, but not just academically. As a person as well. A year ago, I would have been terrified to go to office hours and have a professor critique my thesis and then burst into tears when the criticisms started, no matter how constructive they might be. Today, though, I held my head up, was eager to hear what my professor had to say, and had an intelligent conversation with this PhD on some of the most difficult literature I've ever been asked to master on my own. I never thought I'd be able to do that. Why can't accomplishments like that be considered in my grades instead of pesky final exams?? haha :-)

In other news, I had a dream last night that I was in a dance class...how random...