Back to school today, with a really fun class -- we got to talk about Ginu Kamani's somewhat subversive "Just Between Indians" and then moved on to Shyam Selvadurai's "Pigs Can't Fly" (an excerpt from
Funny Boy). Also some background on the JACL (Japanese-American Citizens League) and their controversial decision to support the Hawaiian same-sex marriage lawsuit -- which, of course, my students have never heard of, as it was Before Their Time. God, they're young. But it's just so interesting, having smart conversations with them about ethnic identity vs. civil rights issues vs. supporting members of your community vs. moral concerns... I don't know that we came to any conclusions, but we had a good discussion, and by the end of it, we were talking about women and skirts and straightening hair and Clinton and four hands were still up after class had ended and we could have just kept talking for hours and the best part is that I get to do this all again on Wednesday. I love this class SO MUCH.
Actually, Wednesday will be interesting, because we're talking about three of my stories. Eep.
The rest of today was my fiction class (also good, and in addition to critiquing and craft (chastity exercise: descriptive narration without adjective/adverbs, per LeGuin), we got to talk about all the things you don't put in a cover letter and practice their elevator pitches for novels they haven't actually written), and then prepping for my lecture to the general NW community, part of the whole Visiting Writer thing. I'll be doing my standard Identity Exercise, should be fun. Hopefully. :-) Afterwards, nice dinner at an Italian restaurant with colleagues and students, so I'll be home late tonight, and may be rather tired, but will hopefully survive the drive home without crashing into anything.
Tomorrow -- grading frenzy, as I need to get back short response papers before they hand in longer papers. The next few weeks until the end of the quarter may be a bit crazed. But in a good way.
