Mid Term

(yes, that spelling is intentional)

It is now past the technical "middle" of the spring semester, according to the calendar; our official "midterm day" at Flat State University was Wednesday, the 7th.

To me, and pretty much everyone else I know at the university, this means precisely dick.

Aside from, of course, that half the semester is over.

For those of you working in academia (as I am) or attending college-level classes within it, you probably already know that midterms mean nothing without midterm exams. This is the first semester of graduate school that I've not had any sort of midterm exam -- my previous three, up to this point, were loaded for bear with them. Now that I'm rapidly approaching the end of my second year, I have "turned the tide," as they say, and almost all of my requirements for graduation are accounted for. According to my calculations, I have but two more courses I have to take before graduation next spring. Two. Over the course of a full semester year. Two courses and six thesis hours (which, really, are just credit hours tacked onto my schedule so that I have built-in time to put together my poetry collection...which I plan to do this summer). Registration, apparently, starts next week for graduate students.

Despite several assurances and/or compliments from friends that I at least have a decent shot at it, I don't believe that I will win the department fellowship for my third year. While it would be nice, I am also realistic. Then again, I also strongly believe that most everyone else in the department is a better writer than I am, even if that's not necessarily true. To the best of my knowledge, the winners have not yet been announced, and probably won't be announced until shortly after Spring Break.

Ah yes, that's coming up soon too. Spring Break. A week from now at this time I will have been back home in West Virginia, visiting my parents, for three days. My plane leaves Friday morning at 6AM. That's about four days away. It will be the first time I've flown anywhere in almost a year -- the last time was last April, when I flew to San Antonio and back for the National PCA/ACA Conference, a conference I'm not going to this year. I make a (very short) stopover in Minneapolis around 8AM, and I'm on the ground in Pittsburgh by noon. It is just my luck that I will be paid on Friday as well, but I do have some spare cash for the trip as well, even if my tax refunds don't come in before then (read: they probably won't). I don't plan to spend any more money than I must while I'm there -- even when on "vacation" I am still fairly thrifty most of the time. For example, even when I was in the glittery Texan town of San Antonio, I didn't spend a penny that wasn't cash I'd saved beforehand. This trip back home for a few days will be no different, if I can avoid it -- if for no other reason than the fact that summer is rapidly approaching and I'll have to scrimp and save to be able to survive -- especially if I have to spend some time without work, however short, between the two semesters. You'd be surprised how fast money disappears when it stops coming in at regular intervals, especially when rent and bills are involved.

Some of you may be thinking but Brandon, you have tax refunds coming to you as well...that should help, right? And you'd be right, to a certain extent. I could survive on my tax refunds all summer if I were able to do so -- it wouldn't be a plush, extravagant life, but it would be survival, without many real/pressing issues. However, I can't do that -- as you may already know if you've been paying attention to my blog as of late, my car needs some serious work if I want it to keep running for the next year until I graduate and can get the fuck out of this state, and while most of that work isn't difficult, the vast majority of it is expensive. For example, four new tires. Yeah. They're not bald yet, but they're rapidly getting there. The spark plug job will be about $400 or $500 on its own, and it desperately needs an oil/filters change and a coolant flush/swap. So yeah. It needs work, and work costs money. Like I've said, the vast majority of my federal refund, at least, will be going into that stuff. I don't want it to, but I have little choice. That car must last me another fourteen months or so. It simply must.

After that, once I get out of here to wherever I'll go next, the fucking thing can fall apart if it wants to. Hell, as long as it will still (legally) get me back and forth for school, it can start falling apart now. I just need it to work for the amount of time I'm in school. While I love that car, make no mistake -- I am also fully aware of its problems and the fact that the poor girl's days are numbered regardless of how much work I put into her. If I can keep her running longer than she would otherwise if I put the work into her, then to me it's worth it. Without that work I'm not certain she'd last through the summer.

Of course, if I win the fellowship, I'll have a little more money to work with to keep her running, but not much.

I also say wherever I'll go next because, truthfully, I'm not sure where that will be. Because of some new, ahem, connections in my life, I've had an entirely new realm of possibilities for teaching and/or writing opportunities opened to me over the course of the last month or so, all of them on the east coast. And when I say "east coast," I mean just that -- the coast. Mid-Atlantic area. Amusingly enough, this is an area I'd never thought about before, really. I'm not sure why -- the areas are within a half-day's drive of my friends and family (traffic and weather permitting, of course), and aside from places like, say, Washington/Oregon/Northern California, the east coast is the last bastion of educated liberals like myself. I have talked to a friend who lives in the Boston area, who tells me there are all sorts of teaching/writing/editing jobs to be had in and around that area, and the fact that I'll have teaching experience as well as an MFA will make me highly marketable there to small colleges and publishing companies. To be more blunt about it, said friend works for an education publishing company, editing textbooks -- she said I'd be that company's "wet dream" if I were to look for employment there.

Do I want to edit textbooks for the rest of my life? Not necessarily. But do I want a job in which I can use my degree(s) and thrive in my environment? Yes, absolutely. Do I want to live on the east coast and/or in New England? Again, absolutely. It's better than West Virginia and a hell of a lot better than Kansas. By leaps and bounds. So, for the moment at least, that's a more focused plan than I had before -- start looking for places to work out there and see if I can get any leads and/or opportunities to pop up in the next year or so. It's at least a start. Yes, it'll be a huge pain in the ass to move cross-country again, especially now that I have a reeeeeeally old car and three cats to move with me when I do. However, I have realized more over the course of the past month or so that I really, really don't want to stay here in Kansas any longer than I absolutely must, not just because there aren't jobs here -- there really aren't -- but because while I like the people (well, most of them) as well as the geography, it's time for something new. Somewhere I've never been before. Somewhere that I can start the next stage of my life's adventure.

Besides, I probably would've ended up moving back home (or home-ish) after graduation anyway. So I would've been moving cross-country again anyway. Except there really aren't jobs in West Virginia either. Just so you know, if you didn't already know that. Just sayin'. So, really, for now it's east coast, mid-Atlantic job hunting.

I know I've mentioned here before that I've been looking at doctoral programs. While I have, amusingly enough, none of them have been on the east coast, but in the south. Well, no, that's not exactly true -- I did look at schools in Maryland and in the Carolinas. Briefly. I have already had my fill of schooling, however; entering a doctoral program may still be an option at some point, but right now? When I graduate, within six months I'll have to start paying off student loans. A doctoral program would more than likely just prolong the inevitable, and I'm almost thirty. I'm not young anymore, and I'm certainly sick of being a perpetual student. I don't have anything to prove to myself or to anyone else, really, but I do desperately want to settle into a rather relaxing career, become comfortable in life, eventually start a family, etc. I mean, these are life goals we're talking about here. As humans we only have so many minutes on this planet, so many hours, so many years. It's time to start using mine more effectively, starting upon graduation.

How is life otherwise? Well, it's good. Really good right now, actually. My writing has been inspired as of late, my car has been running, and I'm not completely broke. Those are all big pluses. And, of course, I get to see my family (and a few beloved friends, like Andrea) this week, which will be one of the biggest highlights of my year. There are, of course, other good things going on as well, behind the scenes, that I haven't written about yet. I'm sure I really don't have to say it, but 2012 is shaping up to be a banner year already, which is good -- because 2011 was a fucking trainwreck disaster for the most part.

I'll be sure to update you again at least once before the break, and my trip, starts. But yes, things are good for the most part. Very good.