2012: A Year in Review
Dec. 31st, 2012 10:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerTen things I did in 2012:
1. Read Wuthering Heights. This was my New Year’s Resolution last year, presumably because I realized the only way I would ever read something so soul-destroyingly awful was if I had a New Year’s Resolution hanging over my head. I loathe Heathcliff to the depths of my being and feel that the book would be much improved if Cathy stabbed him to death with a poker early on.
2. Wrote a ridiculous number of words on the novel I did not finish. I really like the characters and the setting - so much that it is part of the problem with writing it, because I want to drift off on tangents about all the characters. I need to focus on the main characters and give them an actual emotional arc so it will be a book rather than a thicket of vignettes.
3. Got rejected by all the grad schools. Except one, where I was waitlisted. My ego was pulverized.
4. Got into grad school.
5. Went to DC. Twice! The National Portrait Gallery is A+++. Should you find yourself in DC you should totally go. (Also it’s two blocks from Chinatown, where you can get an inexpensive and delicious lunch.)
6. Started grad school. Have not had a nervous breakdown yet! Orientation was all about “So when you have your nervous breakdown...” so I feel this is a win. (I mean really. I am all in favor of mental health awareness, but there is “mental health awareness” and then there is “trying to terrify the new students in their first week by assuring them that they are going to fail.” What is this, postmodern hazing?)
7. I have a dissertation topic! Or rather a dissertation area of interest. Visions of female creativity from 1880 to 1920: that seems promising, right?
8. Attended an opera. Three operas, in fact. I even liked one of them!
9. Wrote a truly ridiculous amount of fic: seventeen stories, for a total of 42,242 words. (Some of them are still hidden, as they are Yuletide stories.) The longest by far is Freedom for Felicity, at 8831 words (discounting the historical note) - the second longest fic I’ve ever written, after Tea and Sympathy.
10. Met Sutcliff fandom! You are awesome: one of the best things that happened to me this year.
Resolutions for next year: I'm not really sure. I ought to rewrite the novel, I think, but I don't know how that will work out timewise with grad school. Presumably it will work out about the same way that fic worked out last semester. But there probably won't be time for both novel and fic.
1. Read Wuthering Heights. This was my New Year’s Resolution last year, presumably because I realized the only way I would ever read something so soul-destroyingly awful was if I had a New Year’s Resolution hanging over my head. I loathe Heathcliff to the depths of my being and feel that the book would be much improved if Cathy stabbed him to death with a poker early on.
2. Wrote a ridiculous number of words on the novel I did not finish. I really like the characters and the setting - so much that it is part of the problem with writing it, because I want to drift off on tangents about all the characters. I need to focus on the main characters and give them an actual emotional arc so it will be a book rather than a thicket of vignettes.
3. Got rejected by all the grad schools. Except one, where I was waitlisted. My ego was pulverized.
4. Got into grad school.
5. Went to DC. Twice! The National Portrait Gallery is A+++. Should you find yourself in DC you should totally go. (Also it’s two blocks from Chinatown, where you can get an inexpensive and delicious lunch.)
6. Started grad school. Have not had a nervous breakdown yet! Orientation was all about “So when you have your nervous breakdown...” so I feel this is a win. (I mean really. I am all in favor of mental health awareness, but there is “mental health awareness” and then there is “trying to terrify the new students in their first week by assuring them that they are going to fail.” What is this, postmodern hazing?)
7. I have a dissertation topic! Or rather a dissertation area of interest. Visions of female creativity from 1880 to 1920: that seems promising, right?
8. Attended an opera. Three operas, in fact. I even liked one of them!
9. Wrote a truly ridiculous amount of fic: seventeen stories, for a total of 42,242 words. (Some of them are still hidden, as they are Yuletide stories.) The longest by far is Freedom for Felicity, at 8831 words (discounting the historical note) - the second longest fic I’ve ever written, after Tea and Sympathy.
10. Met Sutcliff fandom! You are awesome: one of the best things that happened to me this year.
Resolutions for next year: I'm not really sure. I ought to rewrite the novel, I think, but I don't know how that will work out timewise with grad school. Presumably it will work out about the same way that fic worked out last semester. But there probably won't be time for both novel and fic.
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no subject
Date: 2012-12-31 04:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-12-31 04:07 pm (UTC)Also, I was reading the Kate Beaton comics about Wuthering Heights, so I had the dim idea that it might be so bad it's funny. But no. In fact, it's just so bad that it's terrible.
no subject
Date: 2012-12-31 05:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-12-31 05:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-12-31 07:42 pm (UTC)Hey, I'm kind of glad it wasn't just us! (3 and 4 were also me!) I share your feelings of triumph at having so far evaded the inevitable breakdown! Congratulations!
no subject
Date: 2013-01-01 01:12 am (UTC)They've just managed to say it in a way that makes them sound concerned for our mental health rather than evil mastermind-ish.
Let us hope that we both continue evading the inevitable breakdown! Maybe if we evade long enough we'll get through grad school before the breakdown catches up.