well friends, it has just occured to me that i’ve spent so much time recently trying to catch up with life and stay afloat that i haven’t really had a chance to bask in all the moments. i don’t even know where to begin the telling anymore…

last thursday edwidge danticat came to penn, and i think she stirred something in me, that i had allowed to settle. in one her books that i have not read a character discovers that behind the mountains are more mountains. and that is something i am learning not just physically. that beyond every challenge there are just more hills to climb. there seems to be no rest and no escape. sure, you can stop half-way up the hill, but then you never get anywhere. i think maybe if i keep climbing i can make it somewhere. i may not be beyond the mountains but i’m at least further into the range. i don’t really know what all this means. i don’t even really know what i just wrote, but it is something i have been thinking. i don’t think it is pessimistic.

she also talked about autofiction, which i have never thought about but i am reading a lot of kincaid for this class i’m taking, and it a lot of sense. i think i shall try it. i’ve been thinking alot about my mom and babies lately. i don’t quite know what it means but there is something that needs to come out of it. i don’t know where to start. i just want to have a sizeable manuscript done by the time i graduate, so i’ve been thinking a lot about what kind of project i want to work on for the next two years. i think this may be it. i think i’ve been avoiding myself in my work for a while. i’ve been writing all these “I” pieces, first person, thinking that these voices are not me but maybe they need to be.

i’m applying for a mellon mays fellowship this month so that i can do some research on lusophone african women’s literature. i’m kinda psyched. since i need to be practical, i’m looking into phd programs with creative dissertations, so hopefully i can get some research done, get a collection of my creative work published and secure a tenure-track job in my semi-near future. i think i have a lot to look forward to and a lot to work towards. i feel like i can finally make a few decisions because i feel so stable in my present moment, thank the spirits. i surely am saluting the cemetaries and acknowledging the rivers, rejoicing that this year is moving in the direction that it has so far…

i’ve also applied for a curf summer internship at the writers house. not really sure if i’m gonna get it, but i think it would be a great way for me to continue my literacy outreach projects without taking a huge summer hiatus. i was so disappointed that the books thru bars project fell thru, but i have such a good feeling about the spelldown…i’m organizing an adult spelling bee/ book drive and i’m getting kinda excited that things are coming together. it should be a really great event…

tommorrow i have a presentation to give at the tchange meeting so that they can give us funds to bring rebecca walker to penn, something i’ve been working on for almost a year! i usually don’t like to talk about things before they happen. i think i have bad luck or something. like i jinx things, but we’ll see….i think i need to not live so much in fear of having any effect on things. i didn’t really even realize that i was like that until marcus pointed it out. i think i am falling in love with him. there isn’t much to say about it but that i think it’s happening and that it’s not like falling at all. it just feels like a natural slipping into place. i’m always so afraid to say things like that though, in case they aren’t true. i don’t know. i guess that’s what bothers me. the not knowing. well, it doesn’t bother me, because the uncertainty of the future is as liberating as it is frightening. there are so many possibilities.

don’t really know if anything here made sense. this was mostly for me just to make space in my mind. i feel so full. i thought writing this would help. instead of just sleeping. but it’s still here and i am tired, so goodnight.