Parental Advisory Warning

I had about a 45-minute meeting this morning with a professor in the English department about my short story I gave him last week. I gave it to my Lit professor first, and he had wonderful things to say about it, and recommended that I let this other guy read it. Which he did. It was very sweet of him to do so, as I'm not even one of his students; he had no idea who I was when I walked into his office and out of the blue asked him if he would read my short story and give me feedback. Which he did. It was very thoughtful and instructive, and I could tell he spent a lot of time on it, as the margins were full of notes.

But he said he liked the story very much, found it "moving" and "sad," and said that I wrote "elegant sentences." But he also had a lot of recommendations, and while even he admitted they were mostly "cosmetic," urged me to really think about them and take them or leave them. Then he gave me the name of the new head of the "fiction" branch of the English department, and told me to have him read it, and see what he thought about the suggested recommendations. Which I'm going to do this week.

This is why I love school. This guy also seemed to think that, despite the very explicit nature of the story, that I should have no problem finding some literary journals to publish it, as long as I did my research and sent to ones whose editors liked "edgier, more boundary-pushing material" (his words). I left his office filled with glee.

I also got my written essay exam from my Lit class back today that I took on Friday. We had 50 minutes to write 3 essays about 2 short stories and a novel, and I was pretty worried about how I did. Turns out I got a 98.

Today's been a good day.