There, I said it. Now the healing can start. 😜

will gerdes-mcClain

Dr. ~~~~~

ENGL-6026

1 May 2019

Introduction to My Work

               The focus of the semester, writer’s journals, was really useful for me. My goal for my writing, when I started in the MFA program this past fall, was to make a concerted effort to write about myself explicitly. This is not something I’m necessarily comfortable doing, and not something I’ve done in the past, so having these journals to read, with multiple writers doing this exact thing I’m trying to do and providing multiple models of how it might look, was pretty dope. I appreciated it. I also appreciated the directive to keep a journal throughout the semester, as I will almost always avoid doing anything unless obligated to, and this, combined with the focus of the class, was extra ill, because it obligated me to write regularly and it gave me a way to start posting on my blog regularly, as a bonus, since I used that to compose my journals. (I was kind of surprised at the idea that some people actually wrote theirs out with pen and paper—not because I think it’s quaint or anything dumb like that, but just because doing it that way takes away a lot of functionality that writing on a blog affords. Though I guess it does just open up a lot of options that typing takes away. Hm. Maybe I am just being condescending. Don’t tell people.)

The idea of writing about myself directly was meant to encourage me to be more genuine and sincere, but it turns out that that’s easier said than done (which I suppose I expected). I found myself, in my blog/journal posts, saying quite a lot of really honest, raw stuff, but I also consistently undercut that stuff by ending entries with jokes that, I guess, tried to end the thing by forcing attention back towards irony or absurdity, which are much more comfortable for me. I wasn’t doing this every single entry, but it was happening more often than not. After noticing that I was doing this consistently, I actually forced myself to do the reverse, ending a seemingly silly entry with a super raw, out-of-nowhere admission. It made little sense, content-wise, but that’s one of the things that’s nice about the journal format—you can do whatever, because there’s no clear rules, and the expectation is that you’re just trying stuff and riffing about whatever comes to mind.

The more frustrating side-effect of the continued attempts to be sincere was actually evident during our class sessions, where I really felt like I was being one of my worst selves. (My last journal entry that I’m including in the portfolio addresses this.) I was being really an ass, performing and just being terribly glib and lame. I hope I also said some useful stuff, but I was really surrendering to my worst, basest instincts to act like a sarcastic ass, and, looking back over my journal entries and how much I was really trying to avoid giving in to those impulses, it makes me wonder if that just made them come out in a different context.

This sort of explains the workshop piece I shared, which kind of careened back and forth between sincerity and irony, and in the end had no real point. I don’t necessarily feel bad about it not having a point—I submitted it precisely because I wasn’t sure if it had a point and I was interested if other people might see something in it that I was missing—but it is really frustrating to see how the piece bounces between sincere expressions of emotion and responding moments of discounting of that emotion. I’m a lot more comfortable suggesting emotion than owning it, and when I reread this first draft now, that’s what I see. As I revise this piece, and as I (possibly) continue to write entries for my blog, I want to keep working on this, focusing on being sincere and genuine and trying not to immediately deflate those moments as soon as I, like, do them.

I am suspicious of emotion. I distrust sincerity. I think they can easily lead us away from reflection and insight. On the other hand, I also don’t know how much further I can go with ironic detachment. It’s hard to see some things clearly from too far away, even if shit does tend to get a little blurry up close.

Am I the asshole?

I love my cats.  (•_•) ( •_•)>⌐■-■ (⌐■_■)

i’m glad the semester is almost over, because i’ve sort of settled into being one of my absolute worst selves in my prose forms class: glib, sarcastic, and obnoxious. and, last night, under the guise of being ‘honest,’ i made a truly stupid and thoughtless remark.

wait, hold on. let me start over.

fuck Jay-Z.

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i teach composition to first-year college students. as a general rule, they don’t know what the fuck they’re doing. which is fine. they’re not supposed to know what they’re doing. it’s why they’re in the class, to learn what the fuck they should be doing. (it’s ridiculous that one or two classes is expected to teach a skill as complex and context-driven as writing, but that’s a whole other discussion.) it’s a skill they need, and it’s not one that just comes naturally. what frustrates me to no end, though, is how often they believe that it’s actually supposed to just come naturally, that being a good writer is something that originates from some deep magic inside of a motherfucker, and that’s all there is to it. you either have this magic, and you’re magically a good writing motherfucker, or you don’t, and you aren’t. teachers rarely say these exact words, but they do often discuss writing as though it’s a mystical, mysterious art that follows its own inscrutable rules. i know they do, because i talk to other writing teachers, and i’ve shared office space with them. these motherfuckers; i’ve heard them do it.

consequently, i spend a lot of time in my class trying to dispel my students of these ideas. i try to convince them that writing is a skill that you build, that no one just writes well without failing, without being exposed to other writers, without any kind of training, formal or otherwise. they’ll tell me, cannily attempting to work the ref, that they’ve never been good writers, implying that i shouldn’t expect anything from them, because they just don’t have the magic, so they’re going to need my charity to succeed in the class. i try to help them see that writing is not ‘art’ (or not only art)– it’s communication, it’s how everyone gets anything done in the world, and this is why everyone is forced to take composition. you can do this, i tell them, because it’s about building a set of skills, and if you’re willing to keep working at it (and failing a lot), anyone can do it. i say a lot of shit, and they nod their heads and agree, because i’m the teacher, so what else are they going to do? but i know what they’re thinking: this motherfucker; what does he know? they’ve had a lifetime full of people, some of them experts, telling them that writing is this esoteric superpower thing that some people are able to do because god or what-the-fuckever gifted them a special talent, so why should they listen to me? i’m not even getting them feedback on their shitty writing in a reasonable amount of time.

what was i saying?

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=/=

so yeah, fuck a Jay-Z.

i’ve been annoyed with Jay-Z for a little over nine years at this point. he’s never been my favorite rapper, but he’s undeniably talented, and a couple of his records (The Blueprint and Reasonable Doubt) are straight classics. he’s got some problematic themes in his lyrics, but so do the lion’s share of mainstream rappers. what makes me crazy, however, is another tic that he shares with plenty of other rappers, but that Jay-Z has made a key component of his persona, his mythos: the idea of ‘One Take Hov,’ that dude who just hears a beat and makes it all up on the spot, who’s so good that he doesn’t have to sit down and compose. as he himself puts it in “Welcome to New York City,” “the man that write checks with the hand that don’t write.” it’s the myth of the freestyle. the idea that there’s motherfuckers that can step behind the mic and black out, just go straight off the top and blow your mind with some shit that no one else could even do if they had their whole lives to write a response. you know, magic.

Jay-Z is prodigiously talented. almost no one can do what he can do, and i regularly marvel at his gifts when i listen to his music. sometimes when i listen to him, i’m so amazed that i temporarily forget that there are, like, two dozen rappers i think are better than he is, because he’s that good. when he casually tosses out a couplet like “Catch us both coast-es, racin twin Porsches/Boxters with Glocks that’ll pop ya to make you ghost-es,” it’s some legitimately chill-bump inducing shit. which makes it beyond baffling to me why he would insist on perpetuating this bullshit myth. like, dude, can’t you just be amazing at rapping? can’t you just be one of the best to ever do it? i don’t think anything is lost if Jay-Z says, “yeah, i work hard on this stuff. long hours writing and re-writing, but that’s what it takes, because i want to be the best and i know i can be.” at the very least, can’t he just say “yeah, i put it together on the spot, but there’s hours of work that goes into the composing and coming up with ideas before i ever step foot inside a studio”?

there’s an old interview with Jay-Z. in it, he comments on the myth of his never writing anything down, joking that “I’ve inspired a generation of bad writers.” lol. what bothers me about that joke is that, more than inspiring bad writers, he’s almost definitely chased off countless potential artists who bought into the myth of Jay-Z, the myth that some innate, un-replicatable magic is what it takes to be a great rapper, and decided that they just didn’t have it. his self-aggrandizing, absolutely unnecessary myth-building shut the door on others being able to imagine themselves doing what he does.

you know what, though? maybe it’s true. maybe Jay-Z really is magic. it really is easy to believe it when you hear him rap, because the words spill out so effortlessly, like he really is just saying shit as it comes to him. it’s the opposite of rappers like Eminem or Freddie Gibbs or Pharoahe Monch, whose rhymes are so obviously, painstakingly labored over and constructed, and it’s quite something. let’s just say it’s true, that Jay-Z is magic. then lie, motherfucker. do it for the culture, you dick. at this point, what do you have to lose? no one’s going to go back and reassess and decide that you’re not talented, that your legacy is undeserved. fine, you needed to build this myth because it was a key component to your success. i don’t believe that, but whatever. but at this point, you don’t need it. don’t erase the work, dude. it hurts future potential talented artists more than it helps you. even if it’s true, if magic is real (it isn’t), fuck that truth. you’re the writing instructor that teaches students that they can’t write. you’re slamming the door on people by implying, purposely or not, that they can’t rap just because they’re not Jay-Z. that’s not empowering. that’s whatever the opposite of empowering is, like power-stealering or something.

boo, Jay-Z. boooooooooooooooo.

[<><><>]

in class last night, we were asked what we struggle with most in our writing. one dude said ‘revision,’ other people said other things. i decided to push my dumb ass into the conversation by saying something entirely useless, though i did think to preface my fuckery by acknowledging that i was ‘kind of embarrassed to say this, lol,’ so i could be sure everyone was paying attention and would know that i am the biggest fucking fuckhead alive.

i disclosed that i, too, struggle with revision, but i had to build on the point, so i mentioned that i never struggle with getting something down on paper, that that part is easy for me. my exact words were “shit just tumbles out of me.” this after people had shared the common writer’s anxiety of not being able to write anything. i decided to throw out there that “lol writing is easy for me i just sit down and it flows out of me like a magic river,” like that nonsense is helping anyone, including me. i tried to really hit hard how i struggle with revision, because i do, but it still felt like i was such a jerk for being so ‘honest.’ and it wasn’t even honest, actually.

beyond the fact that it’s just a super fucking ass thing to say, once i had an opportunity to think about it later, i realized that it’s fucking misleading, anyway. i’m always writing. my brain is constantly running through ideas, drafts, revisions in my head. it never stops for one second. by the time i sit down and actually write something, it’s usually gone through multiple false-starts, aborted full versions, and/or global/minor revisions in my head. if it ‘tumbles right out of me,’ that’s only because of all the agony and frustration that happened inside my head. and it still sucks. so i’m an obnoxious braggart and a liar.

however, this is me flattering myself that they were impressed and/or intimidated. that they believed my claim for one second. A room full of people trying to be writers know enough to know that this isn’t how it works, that it doesn’t just fall out of you, that writing is hard fucking work. Regardless, my embarrassment is the point— I felt to me like it was bragging, that’s what I felt like I was saying. fucking Jay-Z ass chump.

But who knows how they were taking it. it’s very possible they were just thinking yeah, that’s what shit does—it falls out of assholes…

!!!

i really need to think more before i talk. everything i say needs to carefully considered, calibrated even, so that it perfectly reflects my values and deepest, most sincerely constructive hopes for every other motherfucker that lives, even graduate students. it can’t be allowed to just tumble out of me, because when that happens i am a dumb, thoughtless fuck. it doesn’t come naturally to me, but i will never be better than Jay-Z if i don’t work harder.

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i worked hard on this blog post. realest shit i ever wrote, real fucking talk.

^_^