This post will be less writing-specific and more about what's going on with my life, though writing has been a huge chunk of it these days.
I have one week left in California before I head back to New Orleans. Everyone's been asking me if I'm excited or nervous or whatnot, but truthfully? I'm kind of dreading it. I'm dreading getting to my house and finding out that my car battery died while I was gone. I had issues with it before I left, and I even had a dream last night about trying to start my car. I'm dreading all the small-talk I'll have to do with new people to make new friends, because even though I've gotten A LOT better at small-talking, it doesn't mean I've gotten over my dislike for it. I'm dreading having to go to class and study again, because a part of me is scared that this is going to be like college freshman year all over again. (And trust me, I do NOT want that shit show to happen again.)
I got into an argument with my mother earlier this week. In hindsight, it was kind of stupid. The thing with my mother is that she usually presents well-meaning advice with a loud angry voice, which ends up making me defensive, which then pisses her off, which escalates into her roaring and me crying silently and not saying anything. And then we don't talk for the rest of the day.
She was harping on the fact that I edit a lot of friends' writing without expecting anything in return. It's not really one specific friend or anything, so I don't mean to single anyone out, but the truth is that I've done this a lot, especially with school assignments and college apps. So I think her well-intended point was that I should start thinking about setting some sort of fee-based system (since time is money, blah blah blah), but I got defensive and said I don't want to charge friends and I've never charged anyone so I don't feel comfortable starting that now. And then she got really angry, and reminded me about one person who e-mailed me out of the blue asking if I could look over their grant application (which I did), and she was like, IS THAT PERSON A FRIEND? YOU CALL THAT A FRIEND? WHAT KIND OF A FRIEND IS THAT? THAT'S CALLED BEING USED. And then, as my mother is wont to do, she started pulling out all sorts of other crimes from the ether, like my grades could have better in college, or my study habits are terrible, and then... she said, "You have time for it because you make time for it. You like editing. Your first love was always English. You wouldn't have taken all those science classes if you didn't have to."
And I dunno, that really hit me in an uncomfortable way. Because let's say society was reversed and humanities were so much more valued than science, and people made jokes about biology majors working at Starbucks.... I don't think I would have taken such a science-heavy curriculum. And this happens just as I'm about to embark on the fun times that is medical school....
In other news, since the last progress report in mid-June, I've written three chapters in the last month. Last night, I finally finished Ch. 16, which turned out to be a whopper... over 7,000 words. I wrote around half of it in one day, and it sucked the life out of me. I'm not an emotional person (I didn't cry reading or watching The Fault in Our Stars, though I felt something), but by the time I finished writing the last scene in Ch.16 (let's just say it takes place at a cemetery), I was drained and just wanted to go to bed.
Also, sort of related (sorry for the jumpiness) -- I was at Graydyl's place last weekend, and she had me watch a bunch of episodes from season 1 of Hemlock Grove. There was a character in there who would constantly say something like, "I aim to be a writer, so I want to understand people's motivations." GAHHHHHHH SHE WAS SO ANNOYING. Am I like this?? Graydyl kept teasing me with, "Is that what you think too, writer?" If I ever come across like this, someone please smack some sense back into me.
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