To Brockport, From Goddard, With Love

Goddard College Clockhouse (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I haven’t traveled much in my lifetime.  I can count the times I’ve been out of the country on one hand, and most of those trips were hour-long drives to Niagara Falls, when I’d squeeze my eyes shut and hold my breath over the Rainbow Bridge.

I love Vermont.  During this residency at Goddard College, my MacBook is on its last leg, and I had too much Sauvignon Blanc last night.  I’ve never been to France, and I can’t do that accent, so I practiced “Sauvignon Blanc” over and over, meaning to order it without sounding idiotic or pretentious.  Practice doesn’t make everything perfect.  I can hardly get the keys on my Mac to type words I’ve spelled since first grade.

Yesterday, I tried to get to the RocRoots page from my aging Mac to see a story I’d written for the Democrat & Chronicle about Edgar Coapman and his dog.  It took me an hour.  I managed, and the piece looked like it had when I sent it out, familiar in many ways–not just in the way that it was my work, but in the way that it was my place, as though I can peer into the depths of this village I call home, all the way from Goddard, the place I call home for this week.

I’ve been out of town for a few days, and since, life has gone on in startling ways–my brother gave birth to kidney stones, my sons have become still more articulate (and are getting along), my uncle has come to visit from Florida, bringing with him a larger sense of home than can fit between the boundaries of our village, our house has glimpsed, perhaps, its new owners, and I am here, on the outside, gathering reports like I do during research– only reporting from decades later–preparing to write some story, some thing that can hold tight to pulp of human life.

Dear Johnny: To My Son as I Pack for Goddard

English: Colargol with a suitcase. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Dear Johnny,

On Thursday, I leave for Vermont.  Specifically, Goddard College, for a residency in creative writing.  Remember this when you decide that your Silly Putty masterpieces are worthy of a career in sculpture, that your crayon drawings or chocolate-syrup-fingers are on to something artful, or when you want your comedic presence to be shared with a room of people in the dark, who laugh at your will.  Art is often thought of as the least-practical route, but is looked to, by everyone, for meaning, when reason ultimately fails.  And it often will.

Today, you told me that the “countdown chain” I made you was “reawwy awful” because I put you in timeout.  When I was little, Mrs.Ewanow, my Kindergarten teacher, had us all make chains with 25 Lick-N-Stick links, alternating red and green.  I brought mine home to my mother.  We hung it on the door to the basement, and I tore one away each day, though when I felt really anxious to unwrap the presents under the tree, I wanted to take two links away.

Today, when you told me you didn’t like my chain, I thought, Well, it serves me right for thinking I could compare to Santa.

I’ve tried to tell you so many ways that I am going.  Here’s how it went the first time I broke it to you:

“Johnny, I’m going to go to work.  For a whole week,” I said.

“Yeah?” you asked.  “Are you going today?”

“No,” I said.  “Not for two weeks.”

“Okay!  Well, wanna build a train track?”  you asked.

Sammy is so little, Johnny.  Today, you tried to knock him over with your whole left side.  You scratched him on his back like a cat would.  You hugged him with so much love you left ten little white fingerprints on his tan back.  He loves you, too, so he just smiles.  Promise me this will not change by next weekend.

You get your dramatic, sensitive side from me.  Your grandmother is our opposite.  Her fingers are split and calloused.  Her eyes are darker and stronger than her coffee.  She is so small, but like the trunk of a tree, she is unwavering.  As a mother, she did whatever she wanted.

Her first day of work was the first day I went to Kindergarten.

And now, I am vanishing for a whole week.

So, what does one week equal in pre-school years?

I will be home in eight baths.  Or seven re-runs and two new episodes of Phineas and Ferb.  Or in ten chicken nuggets.  Eleven juice boxes.  Nine pairs of Spiderman underwear (if you don’t have any accidents).  Eight bedtime stories and missed-kisses goodnight.

It is hard for me to understand.  I am doing what I want, too.

Someday, you will tell me it was right.

Applications, Out.

Image via Wikipedia

MFA letters are the most difficult damn things to write.  I had at least three versions of each essay I sent to each school.  If I am rejected, it’s not because I didn’t try.

Maybe I’ll post my sample after I hear the results, just for others to look at.

After the third proofread, I was afraid that if I looked at the piece again, I’d find an error or some better way to say something.   So I stopped myself.  I would have been revising until eternity.

Confession:  I sent my application to Bennington with a spot of coffee on the back of one of the pages.  I was just too tired to print it all over again.  Maybe the reviewer will think they dribbled their coffee.

They’re gone, and since they’ve monopolized my last few weeks, I am giddy with the expanse of time that’s opened up.

Now, I wait.

Dear Goddard, and Bennington, and Warren Wilson,

Please accept me for study at your MFA program along with my hefty application fees.

Please disregard the coffee stain,

Sarah