the further you go

I spoke to a class the other day about hybridity and experimental writing as if I know anything with certainty. Responding to questions (How did you know you wanted to write something experimental? Do you find traditional forms constraining?) is as close as I have gotten to writing in some time. Thinking in the abstract about work I am not working on.

This morning, I took a little time to make some notes on a project and it only took a few minutes to realize that it needed to be completely re-conceived. Perhaps this is what I have been avoiding all along. The recognition that there is still so much work ahead.

It's been difficult to sustain a thought for very long. A series of family exigencies. Such things do not wait for you to get yourself together. Everything persists, relentlessly.

Classes have begun, although I haven't yet been there. This week, I'll be back on campus navigating all the administrative details of these early weeks. And I know, before long, I'll be settled back into the familiar (comforting?) rhythms of the semester. The academic calendar has always felt deep and true to me. I was reminded not long ago, then as a child I had said, I would like to be in school forever. We make our own realities, don’t we.

This summer, I've been working on a series of quilt blocks, gathering up a bunch of scraps and ends of fabric. It feels significant to now be putting them together, to see how each piece becomes new in relation to the blocks around it, how the colors and patterns advance or recede in relation to one another.