The rewards of college life

Today was chock-full-o surprises. First, my Feature and Freelance Writing professor altered our class format. Rather than discuss our reading assignment from our computer terminals, he opted to have us gather in a circle. It was a little more communal than the pseudo-journalistic approach we usually take to critiquing a feature story but it worked out rather nicely. More people joined in the discussion, so that was a plus. On the downside, our professor did not yet grade our last feature writing assignments. The deadline was last week. The slow return of the stories is a little off-putting. We worked our tails off to meet a deadline, it would have been nice to have received feedback by now.

Alternately, I did get back the paper I wrote examining propaganda for my Mass Communication Theory class. It turned out to be a fun assignment. We were encouraged to take chances with and reflect on our own experiences with propaganda. I did one thing I never do, at least not in the confines of my University writing; I wrote exactly what I thought - and in the first person! It was a breath of fresh air. A total departure from the normally stodgy type academic writing that dominates college writing. My enthusiasm was rewarded with an 'A' on the paper.

The best surprise of the day came from my Literary Theory professor. We've been immersed in reading 'Of Grammatology' by Jacques Derrida. It is slow, difficult reading to say the very least. Anyway, our midterm was scheduled for next week. Tonight in class our professor informed us that he was giving us our midterm - tonight. The collective gasp of the class could best be described as terror mingled with utter panic. He didn't leave us hanging for too long before he told us that he was indeed giving us our midterm tonight, to take home and return - completed - next week. That announcement was followed by sighs of relief - one girl was nearly moved to tears, explaining that she was so stressed out about the approaching midterm that she's been a bundle of nerves all day.

It is a take home midterm now, but that also means that it has morphed from an exam into a major paper on the deep, difficult philosophies of one of the most elusive minds and hard to grasp writers in modern culture. Should be fun.

Plus I have four additional midterms next week and one this week. This is when writing my own material becomes nearly impossible. It is the ultimate test in the fortitude of being a writer. The prospect of abandoning your own work so you may fully concentrate on the works of others is sometimes frustrating. Actually, it's always frustrating. But that goes with the territory of academic life. And if being a writer in the midst of academia has it's drawbacks, the former would be my top pick.

For now, I'm off to fill my mind with information that will only ever be of use to me in passing this week's midterm. Hopefully with an 'A.' Anything less than that elevates the temporary abandonment of my own projects from a frustration to a total waste of time, effort and creativity. Ah, the rewards of college life.