Cooper West ponderings

New Orleans – soul food for a writer

Jul 15, 2012 | gradschool, Modus Operandi

I spent the past week in New Orleans for a conference where I was co-presenting. Due to the nature of my participation (I was not a member of the organization the conference was for) I got the chance to spend two of those days wandering around NOLA in the dead of summer, visiting historic houses and the National WW II Museum.

First, let me say, if you are in NOLA for any reason, visit The Green Goddess Restuarant for amazing, unique food and cocktails. No, they did not pay me to say that, and they don’t need too, because the small little restuarant is just outstanding all on its own!

As I was wandering around (I basically walked the whole of the French Quarter at least twice!), I gave a lot of thought to the area, and my life, and my goals.

The conference was interesting, but despite my boss’ encouragement and hopes, I don’t see myself in that field. It made me wonder what conference I would be excited about. There are plenty in the library science/archives field, I assure you, with the crown being the massive, annual headtrip known as the ALA (American Library Association) conference. I could go to a different conference every month of the year if I wanted to. But I wondered which ones would I want to attend, really?

And…nothing came to mind.

I’m in this field because it felt like a good fit for my interests, and I thought I should pursue a master’s degree in something, and responsible adults build great careers in it.

Which, honestly, I’m not the least bit interested in doing. What comes my way, I’ll take, but after two years of grad school and internships, I’m finally coming to be at peace with the fact that this is not my passion.

What drives me is storytelling; writing is my passion, the thing I enjoy doing for the sake of doing it. I want to live a writer’s life, which is not particularly an easy one (even the most successful writers have grueling publishing schedules in order to stay “current”) but is still the one that appeals to me the most.

I’ve been half-assed about getting back to writing since the spring semester ended. I’m a little intimidated and a lot burnt out from two long, hard years of full-time graduate school and part-time jobs. But I graduate next month, and what I need to focus on is not particularly finding “the perfect job” that fits my degree, but writing.

I’ll need to get a job for a little while, until my publishing queue picks back up again (right now, I’ll be lucky to have anything published this year! ACK!). That doesn’t change my goals.

My dreams. I deserve to make them come true.

~

Sign up for the Cooper West Newsletter!

Sign up for the Cooper West Newsletter!

Add your name in order to receive irregular updates on releases!

You have Successfully Subscribed!