Last Chance.

Last chance to weigh in on whether I should add something stupid to my already packed schedule. The schedule wherein I have less than one day off a week. The schedule wherein I don't have time to poo. The schedule wherein I wish I had more time to work so I could afford more heat later on. The schedule wherein I don't have enough time to both attend class and do the work for it. The schedule where it's as if the reply button on email doesn't exist.

I'd like to write something. Maybe. Mayyyyyyyybe. Maybe. Something in the area of what I used to write,long ago, when the world was young. Not as young as it was during my ill-advised poetry and long skirts period. I'd like to spend some time finding out if fiction doesn't make me throw up anymore. Not that it actually did- more like a cringing constipation more than anything else. And only while editing.

People have been telling me that I'm somewhat nonshitty at the writing thing. Pretty much since I left Bennington, I've been launched into this bizarre world where

1. Everyone thinks I'm stupid (Coworkers, certain professors customers, strangers, monkeys, cavemen...) and theorizes that I'm lazy.
2. Everyone thinks I can, maybe, write (Some professors, strangers, boyfriend, some customers, lemurs, pirates...) and theorizes that I'm lazy.

I fucking hate it when people think I'm stupid. I can deal with being plain. (Which, basically, I am.) I'm not pretty. But I get the benefits of being pretty that would be important to me...so I'm fine with it. But I'm so tired of being 'stupid'. My boss laughed at me the other day, for putting the iced tea in the fridge (actually, she did, and I saw her). "That's just the kind of thing she does!" Glee. Bonding. I die.

My coworkers don't understand, either. I can help them with essays for school, totally push the team around at Trivia night. They've heard about my grades...and yet, it's known that I'm a dim bulb. Totally flaky. Totally dumb. Doesn't get it. I'm so tired of being the comic relief. I can take some of the blame myself. A lot of the reason people think it's ok to openly admit that they think I'm stupid is because I do so myself. It's my schtick, as much as misogyny is. As much as self-deprecation used to be.

I wonder why I run myself down in public about the things that bother me most. When it was my looks, they were my running joke. Now, when it's my intellect, I put on the dunce act. It hurts me so much. I actually want to quit my job, find one I'd be good at. I love my coworkers, but I desperately need to get away from them. But since I can't do that, I'll have to find a way to do something I'm good at on the side, or at least work on something that clicks for me.

My work at school doesn't help. People who've gone to real colleges wouldn't understand. An A at Umass means virtually nothing. Praise on a paper means virtually nothing. It means competence, not excellence. It means a serviceable, grammatical, spell-checked series of paragraphs graded by an objective, accessible rubric and aligned with attendance and extra credit. I don't want to go on being extraordinarily good at being noone in particular.

So maybe I'll write something.

Stop me now.