"Take it all back, take your first, your last, your only. Take it back, take it all back, everything you showed me."

Dizzy by Jimmy Eat World has been running through my head all day. It's my get up & go song. Reminds me of things I need to let go.

I should a) be reading Mrs. Dalloway or b) sleeping. Instead, I am writing in here. Go figure. However, I am quite happy to be reading Virginia Woolf this week. I adore her & if I had the time, would read as much criticism and biographical essays on her & Bloomsbury & the writer's life, not to mention delve into her letters & journals. There are some writers I just get carried away with, like that. The same goes for Sylvia Plath. And for the whole American expatriate scene of the Left Bank in the '20's. I am completely enamored with that particular moment in literary history.

Moving on.

So I was expecting to get ripped to shreds in my literature tutorial today, after writing what I thought was a totally shit essay on Eliot & The Waste Land. Surprisingly, that did not happen. I crunched all my work into one less day, knowing I'd be in London all day Saturday. Which was excellent & a very much needed outing. Amy, Alex & I took the train in, hit up Camden Market, where I purchased two cute scarves and another newsboy cap, and Amy got to haggle for me, which she enjoyed. Met Alex's friend Anna for lunch, who was incredibly sweet, and the four of us wiled away an hour at a hole in the wall coffee shop. Let me just say, rose-flavored hot chocolate only makes your day better. Afterwards, Anna said goodbye & the three of us proceeded to walk to Bloomsbury. Alex & I had decided we wanted a literary day, perusing used book stores, and Dicken's house & the like. We ended up wandering through a few bookshops & a comic book store, and I picked up a lovely black beret from a shop Amy remembered having gone to with her sister a few years ago. Alex informed me I looked like a little French schoolgirl, with my red trench coat, dark hair & black beret. We didn't make it to Dicken's house, but we did spend an hour wandering through the British Museum, mainly checking out the mummy exhibits. I kept waiting for Rachel Weisz to pop out from behind a corner. I definitely will be spending more time in Bloomsbury. We left London earlier than initially planned, to make it back for the Sarah Lawrence/Wadham potluck, which was exactly what it promised to be--low key, friends, food, wine. A good weekend, all around.

Got torn apart in my fiction tutorial Monday; that was decidedly less good. Had hit the wall as far as work went last week, and have yet to figure out the balance I need to. Had an hour long phone conversation with my mother about this last night, after recovering from my initial panic attack that went something along the lines of, "Clearly, I suck, and if I don't figure out this balance now, I never will, and I will never write as well as I'm capable of writing, and I will never get into a good MFA program, and I will never have the career that I want." This is how I think. Those of you that know me, are probably more than acquainted with my particular brand of logic. It is a problem though. Balancing the academic & the creative, the disicplined & the introspective. Especially on the tutorial system, where there just isn't any time. I would love to sit in parks & wander in museums & go through photography books for inspiration. I am in complete agreement that those are activities which are vital for any writer's development. I mean, the one thing Rachel had to criticise me on freshman year, was I worked too much, and should spend more time just wandering and exploring and developing my tastes. I did more of that last year, and was happier for it. I had to let some things slide to manage it, but I worked out overall. Here, I don't see how I can do that. Over winter break, I have every intention of writing all the time, and salvaging the last two terms from the wreckage of this one. I will have large spans of days in which to accomplish this, and, god willing, no other pressing concerns. How do you find a balance here though? I don't know. I've never been good at that in general. I want that arty, free-spirited, introspective existence. I really do. But, I am divided because I also love literature, thinking critically, certain aspects of academia. Obviously, this is not an issue that is going to be resolved over night. But it is something that has been on my mind definitely for the past two years, and even more so at Oxford.

I don't want to be "flat & stereotypical;" I don't want to write pieces that are rushed, just because I don't have the time to linger over them. I feel horrible about myself when I do; like I'm just wasting time. It's bad enough I feel that way about at least two or three weeks of my fiction tutorial. I guess I have to think of this as a learning experience, and let it go. I'm trying.

However, in an ironic little contrast to my "I will never be a writer" crisis of faith, I had a poem published in the latest issue of Isis & I was selected to be the Editorial Assistant to the Fiction Department of the Oxonian Review of Books. Both good things; both will look good on a resume, and both were unexpected. Things to be happy about.

I love my flatmates; I really do feel like we're a little family now. I love my friends. On good days, I enjoy my tutorials. At the very least, I'm happy about reading Virginia Woolf & D.H. Lawrence, and once I get my head screwed on straight about this fiction thing, I'll enjoy that as well again. And if Fayyaz & Fern are successful in their hunt for me, that would be the icing on the cake. Things to look forward to on the horizon: Blenheim Palace/Christmas Fair on Friday; Queer Bop on Saturday (a Wadham-hosted dance, one of the craziest of whole year, apparently. For you Sarah Lawrence people, think Coming Out Ball times ten). I think I will make use of my pink corset. Perhaps a sexy faerie costume is in order? Come hither corset juxtaposed with pretty, frilly, lacy skirt? Wild hair & lots of lipgloss? Not to mention, total inebriation? I had better be, if I'm going to be frolicking around Wadham Garden in next to nothing, in sub zero temperatures. Ideally, I will have a bottle of Pinot Grigio & a cute boy to warm me.

Also: Amy's dinner party; Sarah Lawrence Thanksgiving dinner in Hall; our own Thanksgiving dinner with flat across the hall; the end of term in two weeks; planning exciting day trips for ninth week. London for Christmas-y things is a given; Scotland might also be in order.

Saw Shimon Peres lecture at the Sheldonian tonight. Nothing spectacular, though he had some lovely rhetoric about peace. He also, unsurprisingly, dodged direct, more unflattering questions. Also, had trouble understanding what he was saying, his accent was so thick & the protestors were screaming outside, Amy along with them. Outside protests, totally in order. People disrupting the lecture itself, inside the theater, a little less appropriate. I just enjoyed watching the insane amount of Secret Service & Mossad agents have a connipition everytime someone moved.

Mrs. Dalloway, I feel, will be finished tomorrow morning. My schedule is already off track. Ah, well. What can you do?