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Give Me Back My Brain!
Jul. 20th, 2005 12:22 amI thought culling the books would be enough reorganization of my study for the week, the month, the year. Goodness knows I'd dragged my heels for two years about doing that much, and Dan had started making plaintive comments to the effect that he'd given up hope I'd ever part with a book, any book, ever again. The books aren't even all the way gone yet, since the guy who handles purchasing for the used-books side of Micawber skipped town for Harry Potter week. Being no longer allowed in the house, the culled books are filling up the trunk of my car until my appointment with him (the purchaser, not Harry Potter) on the 28th. Out, Julia Kristeva! Out, Jacques Derrida! No redemption for you!
But tonight I found myself moved, above all else, to cull my files. Since getting home from Seattle, I've been unable to find the things I need for my daily work on the novel, the tutoring, and the Writer's Weekend program. Something had to be done. You know how it is with mounds of old paper: each page has a separate identity, and therefore a separate destiny, and you have to think about each page at least momentarily before you're free to pitch any of it. Old student papers from 1994? Pitch. Anything with my Social Security Number on it? Well, that would describe nearly all of my official paperwork from the university, which means quite a lot of time with the shredder. Personal correspondence from my beloved dissertation director? It won't be necessary to bury me with it, but I intend to hold onto it until then.
The three foot high mound of paper that has loomed over me as I typed over the past, oh, two months is now neatly sorted. The little rolling carts with drawers have been emptied and repurposed. My three microfilm reels of unpublished H.D. manuscripts from the rare book collection at Yale, however, will be with me until somebody has to decide whether to include them among my grave goods. (Again, the correct answer is no, but in general I think grave goods are a cool idea. What is up with my obsession with funerary rites?) I don't know if the spirit will move me to reorganize my Paganism file cabinet. After all, it's not my identity as a priestess that I'm shedding. Probably tomorrow I'll reorganize the cabinets I've been using to file writing stuff. It's still organized around the effort to get the old poetry manuscript published with one of the respectable university presses' first book prizes, back when I was making a desperate bid to enter the race for tenure. Not terribly relevant to my life as a free person.
H.D. would say I've been "dragging the forlorn husk of self" after me. Goodbye, forlorn husk.
But tonight I found myself moved, above all else, to cull my files. Since getting home from Seattle, I've been unable to find the things I need for my daily work on the novel, the tutoring, and the Writer's Weekend program. Something had to be done. You know how it is with mounds of old paper: each page has a separate identity, and therefore a separate destiny, and you have to think about each page at least momentarily before you're free to pitch any of it. Old student papers from 1994? Pitch. Anything with my Social Security Number on it? Well, that would describe nearly all of my official paperwork from the university, which means quite a lot of time with the shredder. Personal correspondence from my beloved dissertation director? It won't be necessary to bury me with it, but I intend to hold onto it until then.
The three foot high mound of paper that has loomed over me as I typed over the past, oh, two months is now neatly sorted. The little rolling carts with drawers have been emptied and repurposed. My three microfilm reels of unpublished H.D. manuscripts from the rare book collection at Yale, however, will be with me until somebody has to decide whether to include them among my grave goods. (Again, the correct answer is no, but in general I think grave goods are a cool idea. What is up with my obsession with funerary rites?) I don't know if the spirit will move me to reorganize my Paganism file cabinet. After all, it's not my identity as a priestess that I'm shedding. Probably tomorrow I'll reorganize the cabinets I've been using to file writing stuff. It's still organized around the effort to get the old poetry manuscript published with one of the respectable university presses' first book prizes, back when I was making a desperate bid to enter the race for tenure. Not terribly relevant to my life as a free person.
H.D. would say I've been "dragging the forlorn husk of self" after me. Goodbye, forlorn husk.
