Tonight is the first night of the writing class I signed up for last week. I was emailing with Gwen about how she wrote this awesome book and I kind of want to write an awesome book but have no idea how one goes about writing an awesome book. “Maybe I should take a class or something,” I wrote her, and kind of on a whim I checked around on craigslist and there was one starting this week at this place and the class haad “journal” right in the name and when I tried to sign up for it they told me I was on the wait list BUT THEN all of a sudden I was \\off\\ the wait list and I could come in on Tuesday at seven as long as I didn’t forget to bring a check with me.
I haven’t taken a writing class since I was seventeen years old and I don’t know whether to be excited or scared or what. Right now I feel a little jittery, and of course I feel a little stupid for feeling a little jittery because really in the grand scheme of life it’s just a class at a writing center and who knows what we’ll even do there. I know there’s a pack of readings that involves Woolf and Kafka and Cheever, so that’s probably a plus. I think maybe we’ll do some writing (about what, though?) and, like, share it with the class or something, which I am not totally sure I will like. I am afraid of being the worst writer in the class. I am afraid of being the only writer who is familiar with the your/you’re dichotomy. I am a little afraid of the email the instructor sent yesterday, which was all “Your first homework assignment is to be aware of your surroundings on your way to class! But don’t get too involved that you get in a car accident, ha ha!” I am afraid that I am going to drop a chunk of money on a sort of frivolous pursuit, money that could better be spent on a new pair of jeans that actually fit my waist or this CD I really want or books I really want or on any number of other amusements or necessities. I’m afraid that it’s going to be pointless and stupid and that I’ll dread going and that I won’t learn anything and that I’ll just basically hate it.
I guess I’m trying not to be disappointed with myself, in advance. I started this journal (back when everyone was starting journals and not blogs) with the vague idea that it would help me do something I’d always sort of liked, which is sort of write random stuff about my life where other people can sort of see. I’ve been doing it for almost four years now and I’ve been thinking for a while that I’d like to do something more, something different. And this is a first step in the direction of something more and different. Probably it doesn’t mean anything and will lead nowhere and I won’t do anything more with writing except to write this journal, day after ridiculous and occasionally embarrassing day. It’s hard to go for what I want in my life; I almost always find a way to sabotage myself. Even though this is just an evening writing class with a high likelihood of being extremely hippie woo-woo, it’s also taking a rather strange and sideways chance for me, a chance to try to think a little bigger and to want more. I’ll let you know how it goes.