in her dreams, she can fly

Some of us can tell when you don't.

If you're reading this: I'm posting because talking to an audience is much more productive for me than writing a text doc to myself; I'm not sure why. Performance anxiety, maybe. It's good for you.

I've been thinking lately about how I talk to people about what I do, because what I say seems not to translate well.

I can do anything. Really. Whatever I've got, I'll figure it out with some time - as long as I'm interested. This doesn't mean I'll do it better than someone else trained in it, though.

When I say I'm a writer, I'm talking about the creative/poetic/literary/storytelling kind of writing. I've focused on poetry for the last few years, and lately I've been exploring a more surrealist style. I've thought about going to graduate school to study fairy tales, which I think are tremendously culturally relevant and reflective, and symbolically fascinating. I do draw on autobiographical experience and I sometimes write non-fiction narrative, or academic essays, or articles. These are special cases, though; I'm pretty solidly in the creative portion of the writing map.

I can edit writing in general, of course, and I have high standards when I do. In a casual edit, I often keep much of what I think to myself. I think intense criticism is generally inappropriate and destructive, though that will vary depending on the recipient and the project.

Everywhere else I've ever lived, the introduction of myself as a "writer" was always met with either the assumption that I did creative writing or the question of what type. Within Vegas Tech, though, saying you're a writer seems to imply that you write copy? I'm not entirely sure where this comes from, aside from the possibility that people just don't understand why I'd be around if I didn't write copy? I've been confused by this and not sure how to deal with it, especially since people are super nice about brazenly jumping to this conclusion. In fact, on several occasions I haven't bothered to correct it.

I really... don't write copy.

I'm this kind of writer:

... Not this kind of writer:

I like Vegas Tech because the overall mindset, the community slant, is intense personal drive. I'm also very interested in information science, and I've been thinking about learning more programming as a side project. I'm a passable tech nerd in general (my phone aside), but none of these points are anything that come up when someone asks me what I "do." (For a while I was saying "I don't do anything yet; I just moved here," but no one was ever content with that.)

I want to write about Vegas Tech - but I don't really have interest in writing for Vegas Tech. I'm interested in what brings people to Vegas. I'm interested in startup culture. I'm interested in oral history and personal journeys.

I had this really intense relationship in high school and (at that time) the person I was dating deemed many careers extremely wasteful to the point of making your life wasteful and he thought advertising as a whole was pretty much a scourge on humanity. I never agreed with him on this, but I've also never really liked... consumer culture? Or something. The rampant commodification of the modern age. There's an interesting dilemma for me in how little I like selling things and how the internet has personalized consumerism to the point of almost coming back into the community way, which I do like. (See: Amanda Palmer, John Green.)

There's another dilemma (paradox, almost) in how everyone in Vegas Tech is focused on selling themselves/their product (which is obviously important for startups, and I find interesting to listen to, but don't have much to contribute, nor much interest in contributing) vs. their focus on community. It's VERY VERY interesting to me. I could write a whole other blog post on the dichotomy which I don't really want to do right now so I'm going to leave it like that. But I love it. I love it!

I want to watch people work. I want to write about them, and also write poems about old and new stories. Also I want to make people feel happy and appreciated. I like that a lot. And I like feeding them, and asking them lots of questions and having them tell me things. I want to learn about everything and everyone. Only... I don't really want to write copy for any businesses. Although I find the rhetorical strategies interesting.

My mood today:

Major points of address:

1. Car

My car has been fixed! Hurrah.

2. Living situation

I sent in my application for a one-bedroom apartment in downtown Las Vegas for October (probably starting late September).

3. Job

I still haven't heard back, but we're now out of time for me to drive cross country and make it there for work on Monday, so work shall start in October.

4. When I'll be back in NV

This Saturday is Sept 8. I'm not sure when my lease might start, but I think I'll drive out in a couple weeks. Before then, I hope to spend a week in my college town, and probably a week on the road out, accompanied by a lovely friend.

Seems like I could be back in Vegas a while before the end of the month?

Which means I'll be devoting this weekend to packing up my room, I think. Eep.