NOTE: I want to be a serious writer, and I
want to be taken seriously. I do. I really do.
I mean, I
think that I really do.
It’s just that the words
get away from me sometimes and take on a silly life of their own and go bucking
off across the page like rodeo broncos, making me sound like the mad woman of
Kissimmee Park Road when she’s tied to the back of a convulsing horse that’s got its doodads tied
in a knot.
That’s the problem with being
a writer, the words can be unruly and hard to tame.
For
example, it wasn’t until
after I sent this email in response to an invitation sent out by the head of
our English department that I questioned my own literary seriousness,
dedication, and bronc riding sanity.
Well Howdy Yourself,
While I will not be able to attend the counseling session this evening,
I would like to express a concern I have about the lack of a creative writing
major at Rollins/Hamilton Holt. As a writer of serious stuff or a serious
writer of stuff or a stuff writer of a serious nature, I openly mourn the lack
of such a degree. Perhaps "openly mourn" is overstated; more
correctly, I quietly grieve.
Seriously, it is something of a conundrum.
While the University of Central Florida, better known as UCF or U Can’t
Finish, may have a creative writing major, it is a factory—a soulless, heartless,
knowledge factory.
Rollins College, on the other hand, is a lovely brick strewn statement
of academic gentility that does not offer a degree in the fine art of the
writing of the words. Sheesh! Every assignment that drags me away from my
serious word writing is . . . mean . . . in my opinion, of course.
And yet I press on, because my children are nags, and I love walking by
the rose garden on my way to Orlando Hall and let’s not forget the bricks.
Sincerely,
Linda (Major-Minor) Zern
 |
| The Courtyard at Orland Hall |
Hamilton Holt Student and Thrill Seeker
