That's the Name of the Game

With all of my applications turned in and out of my hands I am now playing the waiting game, which is actually my third favorite game behind Yahtzee and Are These Leftovers Still Good?  The waiting game consists of me sitting back and doing whatever I want to do until I regrettably receive some kind of "word", meaning the waiting game is over and I have to do stuff again, stuff like make decisions—damn it.

I'm the the dog, the muffins are grad school, now where do I find the guy who accidently bumps the table?

I should point out that I actually completed my applications about a week before I made my claim as being “officially done”.  The week following my applications was spent e-mailing faculty members in my creative nonfiction field from each school to let them know that I am applying.  In some of these e-mails I commented on some of these profs' work, legitimately, in others I commented on their work, not so legitimately, while in others I simply said that I “enjoyed” their work and looked forward to working with them should I be admitted.  Out of all of the games, sincerity may be the most dangerous game—aside from hunting human beings, of course—but if you can win that, then hurrah!  But in all sincerity (is it?), it’s best to stay as honest and brief as possible because the real purpose of these e-mails  is simply get on these people’s respective radars.

This = Grad School?

Upon speaking with a former undergrad professor prior to starting my application bonanza, he told me that of nearly equal importance to submitting a good app was getting my name onto the collective tongue of the selection committee.  He told me about another former student who got accepted with an article detailing the origins of urinal cakes.  For the ladies in the audience, and the less-observant men, urinal cakes are the scented lumps of wax in the basins of urinals that attempt to prevent urinals from smelling like, well, urinals.
       
Maybe this piece was simply stellar and worthy of granting this guy admittance to the program on his own volition, but at the very least, it made him stand out among the hundreds of other applicants.  Selection committees could put a “face” to this guy’s name;


“What about Bill?” one might ask.


“Bill?  Oh, the Urinal Cake Guy, yeah, he was interesting.  Very interesting.”


Good or bad, any publicity is good publicity.  Maybe your piece is pretty good, but when competing with a whole load of other “pretty good” pieces, it becomes forgettable and they can’t accept you if they can’t remember you.
       
It’d be great to believe that my pieces are unique, memorable, and flat-out good enough to merit my acceptance on their own, but with less than a 5% chance of earning that acceptance, I’m going to pump up those odds as much as I can.
       
Some faculty members have responded, some have responded warmly, while others haven’t said nuthin'.  But again, even if they only recognize my name as something they sent to the trash then I’m on the radar.  And that's the name of the game--Yahtzee! 

I-I Think It's Over?

Every story has an ending just like every bottle has a bottom and every all-you-can-eat buffet has some guy there to tell you, "maybe that's not medically healthy anymore" .  The point is that I’ve officially completed my grad school applications.  I repeat, I am done with my grad school apps, officially.  BLAMO! 

BLAMO!  More time for eating Pop Tarts in bed!

Completing these apps—for the second time around—is as satisfying as it is relieving.  It recaptures the sensation of completing your college finals.  You’re not really sure how you did on them, in fact you’re pretty sure that you did horribly, but by George they’re over now and good or bad, you don’t have to worry about them anymore.  I don’t have to give these apps another thought until I start receiving decisions back from schools in about eight weeks and really, that’s an issue for Future Me to deal with.  Present Me is free and loving it.

Some people would hate this eight-week period of unknowing.  They would gripe about how painful the uncertainty is, fearing the worst, and lamenting, ‘If  I could just know—good or bad—if I just knew, then I’d be happy’.

Bullcrap.  I’m calling bullplop on these people.  It’s absolutely a stretch of the unknown, but instead of fixating on the worst possible outcome I like to keep my eye on the half-full glass.  During these next few weeks I have endless potential.  I could get into every school I applied to with glowing reviews.  I could be the #1 choice of every school, schools clamoring to take on this literary genius, this savant of the English language, this wordsmith of his generation.  Yes, it is really possible that every school is thinking these exact things.  It’s a small possibility, I admit, but right now it exists.  Hope lives.  But after I receive my first response from the first school, this possible reality starts to crumble.

Future Me will definitely have a jet pack

So right now when I don’t have to do anything, when I’ve already done everything that I could possibly do, it’s all out of my hands, and anything could happen, it’s a pretty sweet time to me.  It’s a time that I can truly enjoy without feeling like there’s something that I should be doing, which is pretty great.

However, in terms of this blog, such a dearth of happenings could be potentially detrimental.  Yes, I’ll now have time now to post with greater regularity, but to post about what?  I could try to think of some more tips or anecdotes from my growing experience with grad school applications, or I could just make a whole bunch of non sequitor pop culture Top 10 lists.  I’m predicting an amalgamation of choices A and B for the future... mostly choice B...  

Let's Do the Time Warp Again!

Among the many themes of this blog—applying to grad school somehow being among them—is reality and fantasy; escaping from the former into the later and then begrudgingly, forcibly departing for the former again.  I can think of no better example of this than Christmas break.

For students and those who work with students at academic institutions—yes, I know, we suck—Christmas break is actually just that: a break.  Unlike the rest of the world, which only gets a scroogey few days off, we get two or more weeks, thus allowing a true division from reality, into at least not reality, to occur.  Again, we suck.  I am aware.  

My break entailed me flying back to my hometown to spend it with my family and friends for a week.  Every time I come back to my hometown, like stepping into a timewarp, I revert to my high school self.

I'm the bigger one.

I slept in my old room, my old shared room with my little brother where I retook my top bunk perch.  I also had to share with/ fight him for our parents’ car, the TV, the computer (our parents’ still have our favorite games on it), just about everything else too.  You can throw my little sis into that equation and double it when it came time for fighting for the bathroom.

I hung out with my friends all the time whilst complaining about my overly-smothering family as per the high school usual, getting rides from my friends when I couldn’t get the car myself.  My mommy made me breakfast lunch, and dinner, but also wanted to know where I was going each night, who I was going with, and when I’d be back.  I got to take a break from being 27 and hang out as a 17-yr-old again with all the perks and drawbacks associated with it; a liquid variation of fantastic bliss and caged hell all at the same time that had little to do with the real world.

Thanks Mom!

Needless to say with four grad school application deadlines staring me in the face from only two weeks away now I did nothing over my break, as per the high school norm.  Not having to worry about grad school apps, now that is a true fantasy, which I hope will some time soon become a reality. 

A Very Special Christmas Blogging!

With Christmas verily nie and the universities I’m applying to closing shortly (the employees have already shut down) I’m settling in for my long winter’s nap.  With seven applications submitted and four to go, all of which aren’t due until January 15, I’m pretty okay with this.

So as pertinent and actually on-point as this blog has been over the past few weeks, I’m taking a break this week from writing, thinking, or doing something about grad school applications.  It’s a good thing.  So for your yuletide pleasure--and mostly mine--here are some occasionally deep thoughts about the holiday season;

 *Nobody ever wants pants as a gift, even if they need them.  Giving someone pants for Christmas is like saying, "I was too lazy to consider what you’d really like and felt too awkward to just give you money so here are some slacks".  It’s Christmas; get over the awkwardness and give the money.

*I wish Michael Buble and Justin Bieber would just get it over with already.  This is worse than watching Ross and Rachel.

A forbidden love... because the Biebs is a lesbian.

*Traditional eggnog is a wiley beast.  Copious amounts of dairy and alcohol mixing together in one’s stomach, usually over the duration of a party, sounds like a reasonably horrible idea.  So much for reason, right?

*If Santa is real, why doesn’t anyone look for the reindeer turds on the roof?  Every other animal can’t seem to walk ten feet without dropping some coal into the stockings so how are we to believe that these deer can go a whole night keeping it to themselves?  If I was a good little gentile boy or girl, I’d be up on the roof December 26th looking for what didn’t come down the chimney—click, click, click.

*Apparently it’s only cool to wear sweaters during Christmas season and Cosby Show marathons, so get your fill now because I haven’t seen Rudy and Theo for a while now, unfortunately.

Which is better?  Can there really be a loser?

*Stop trying to make Hannuka happen.  It’s not going to happen.  The only people who Hannuka is a big deal for are christians and commercial retailers, trying to assuage their guilty consciences for ramming Christmas down our collective throats or trying to find way to turn the jews into buyers during December.  I’m not even entirely sure that Hannuka is a Jewish holiday!  Sure, I learned about it in Sunday School, but really, I have skepticism. 

*Is there anyone that does not think “Do They Know It’s Christmas Anyway” is a piece of condescending, ethnocentric crap?

*The Muppet Christmas Carroll is the greatest Christmas movie of all time, hands down.

I'll take suggestions for runner ups, but you look into those felt faces and tell me they aren't #1.

*Wish everyone 'Merry Christmas' because it shows that you care (how horrible, right?) and it's the only holiday that anyone cares about this time of year--seriously.  Not sure?  Feeling guilty?  Experiment Time!  Wish jews Happy Rosh Hashana in the fall while wishing christians a Happy St. Eusebia Day and see who cares about which holiday.  Go!

Merry Christmas!

The End is Nie-ish

Let’s let the application counter roll over to five.  Six more apps to go.  As per usual, I’m behind my targeted pace, but I run on the ‘Speed Limit Theory”.  If I set my goal as submitting six applications in a week, I’m not going to reach six, but I’ll hit four or five where I probably would have only hit one or two if I had set my goal as four.  The results speak for themselves.  By the by I have to attend driving school this weekend because of a speeding ticket I received so perhaps the Speed Limit Theory only works well in the theoretical, and not so much in the practical. 

You'll go 35, but not 45.

Now that I’ve developed templates for most of my application items—statements or purpose, curriculum vitae, writing samples—the remaining applications should go relatively smoothly.  I just submitted my app to the one MA program I applied to, which required altered variations of everything that is designed for MFA applications, and I’m about done crafting those items for the Creative Writing and Environment MFA I’m applying to (the big difference there is that I insert the words “conservation” and “wild fire” in regard to my AmeriCorps experience about a dozen more times each).  So now, relatively smooth sailing as long as I stick relatively close to that Speed Limit.

I know I’ve mentioned it before, but I’ll mention it again now that I’m seeing this ploy come to fruition.  In each application that you mail in, include a post card, thank you note, some small, free-standing, pre-stamped, self-addressed piece of mail that thanks the program and then asks them to mail it back to you to confirm that they’ve received everything for your application.  It provides you with some peace of mind when you get it back in the mail and keeps you from clogging the program’s in-box with paranoid e-mails about the status of your application.  It’s also a nice gesture that shows the program that you care and sets your app apart form others—maybe the biggest obstacle to achieve with any application. 

I also paper clipped a few photos that I took while in Joplin, MO to my article about the tornado that struck the city last spring.  A little showy and glammy?  You bet, but it's an attention-grabber.  No matter how good your stuff is, if the reviewer is indifferent or comatose when reading your app, your stuff is going to be perceived as mediocre, or maybe not even looked at.  It sucks and is unfair, but that's life and thems the breaks. 

I still have six more apps to submit and miles to go before I sleep.  Robert Frost must have been applying to grad school to when he wrote that little poem.  

In the Midst

Four out of my eleven applications have been submitted.  Seven more to go.  Based on past experiences, I know it’s way too early to pull out the champagne and light the cigars, but still, damn.  Woot.

Some apps are submitted online, and though clicking ‘submit’ is sort of satisfying, it’s the ones that require physical copies, the ones that you package up and drop off at the post office that truly offer that sense of accomplishment.  It’s like dropping off a letter to Santa, letting it slip through the mailbox slot, turning away and knowing that you’ve written your best list and most convincing letter of appeal.  Now it’s all in Big Red’s hands and out of yours.

Dear Santa Grad School, please love me.

With multiple applications—particularly with eleven—it’s easy for the whole process to become chaotic.  I’ve already hashed and rehashed—painfully—all of the minor and not so minor differences that run from one application to another; length of statements of purpose, inclusions of curriculum vitas, etc.  And though completing these sundry items is rough, keeping them organized can be worse. 

Throughout my entire application process I’ve kept a separate document detailing the requirements of each program’s application—a checklist with phone numbers and e-mails I can use for help.  Without it, I’d just be toggling back in forth between admission guidelines pages and probably absolutely getting things mixed up.

Then when it comes time to actually submit an application—if it requires a hard copy mailed in—you can print off this checklist and label it as a “Table of Contents” listing all of the items that are included in your package (writing samples, statements) and all the required items that the program should receive separately (GRE scores, academic transcripts, letters of rec). As confusing as it is for applicants dealing with 5 to 10 to 20 applications, each school has to deal with 100 to 200 to more applications and when they mix an application, that applicant is simply dropped without remorse.  So the more organized and reviewer-convenient you can make your app, the better—for you and them. 


I still have seven more apps to go and hopefully I’ll get in another two this week.  If I do that then the remaining five aren’t due until January and I'll have some breathing room, not that I’ll be using it. 

SAMPLE TABLE OF CONTENTS:

Table of Contents: Launchpad McQuack

List of application items included in this package

1.)  English Department Applicant Form

2.)  Statement of Purpose

3.)  Curriculum Vitae

4.)  Writing Sample (26 pages total)

a.      My Drugged-out American Dreams (personal essay, 13 pages)

b.     Storms of Humanity (article, 13 pages)

5.)  Letters of Recommendation (signed and sealed before I received them), from;

a.      Writey McWriterson

b.     Recommedra St. Recommenderton

6.)  Pre-stamped, self-addressed Thank You card to be mailed back to applicant to verify that all materials were successfully received

 List of application items that should have been received separately from this package

1.)  Online application

2.)   (2) Letters of Recommendation mailed from:

a.      Dr. Sues

b.     Bill Shakespeare

3.)  Official academic transcripts from State University sent to:

a.      Department of English

b.     Graduate School

4.)  Official academic transcripts from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizzardry sent to:

a.      Department of English

b.     Graduate School

5.)  GRE scores

Please let me know if I’ve omitted anything that is required—thanks!

Application Armageddon

My first deadline is now less than a week away—Thursday, December 1.  Dum, dum, dum!  But behind all of my lazy blogging this month, I’ve actually been catching up with my applications and I’m in pretty good shape currently.  After this one, I have due dates of December 5, 9, 15, and 31 before the January onslaught hits.  Hopefully, once I get this first app in the rest will follow in streamline fashion—hopefully.

This is actually a pretty good impression of me... after moving in with Joe Pesci and Daniel Stern when they got locked out.

And though I hate this and all other upcoming applications, the schools I’m applying to, and their dastardly deadlines, I can’t help appreciate the appropriate timing of these deadlines.  Now that Thanksgiving is officially over and the Christian, commercial, and secular worlds can finally sink their collective teeth into Christmas, what better time to introduce a ticking clock?  Think of any Christmas movie that you’ve ever seen—from Rudolph to Home Alone—there’s always some kind of countdown to Christmas where the characters need to accomplish something by Christmas morn, or at least hold on until then.  All I need now is a cartoony colander laden with black ‘X’’s to count the days down to the respective doom days—application Armageddon.  Hmm, really too many religious references in this post me thinks.

What does any of this mean?  It means I’m sitting around trying to clean up my writing pieces and struggling to put on the final tinsley touches on my statements of purposes, so instead I’m writing this post—sweet distraction.  But I shall return to my stupid work—some time, soonish—with a ticking clock in my head and thoughts of Macaulay Culkin throwing paint cans at Joe Pesci.  ‘Tis the season.