Day 33, 9 Feb: Writing A Love Letter--And the Day I Attempted Snowrunning

Norfolk Terrace, Day 33. Writing A Love Letter—And the Day I Attempted Snowrunning

            There is a certain quality to writing a love letter that makes it one of the most easy-going and natural forms of writing in the world—in a very amazing way, it becomes a freewriting exercise, stream of consciousness, a profession of love that does not need grammatical anxiety or intense proofreading to edit the sincere message.

            Yes, I start with the last item of the night, writing my Valentine’s Day love letter to Katya. The last thing I do in a day seems to become the first thing I write when I begin an entry these days. I keep causing you to reframe the events of my day differently from how I present them. I apologize. Moving on:

            I awoke today seeing two burly men clamber into the room with a full set of tools and gear at hand. They were here to reinstall Vinnie’s radiator and put in the patch of carpet that had to be taken out last week. I swear, despite the knock, these wake-up calls with people in my room is something I have yet to get used to. The cleaning lady for the flat comes in weekly to empty the trash bins and I always manage to sit up, give a sleepy smile, say hello, and then drift back to sleep.

            The nineteenth-century seminar on Balzac’s Old Man Goriot was fun—with every week, the novel for discussion is more interesting. The Romanticism lecture on William Hazlitt and the nature of the essay was intriguing, despite the lecturer’s unintentionally harsh, overaccented speech. Apparently, the essay form (barring John Locke as a notable exception) in the late 1700s and into the1800s was a casual form of written expression. I say casual in the sense that books were hardbound and part of private family libraries (there were no paperbacks), but essays came in a more disposable form, on cheaper material. Additionally, the essay was an attempt at something to be judged by others (a definition for “essay” we go by today), but the attempt was casual in its delivery, not requiring substantial proof or evidence to back claims. In fact, as I read the long pages of three of Hazlitt’s essays tonight, the subject matter was quite abstract (the nature of poetry, for instance; a fight scene, as another one). It’s interesting that it falls under the category of Romanticism, defying the stereotype of poetry as the only written form of this literary movement.

            The track was closed (little did I know that there was an Athletics Club session on the grass, but I found out hours later from Stef whose roommate Kate does the sessions too). I basically ran around campus, dodging people, and then I decided to attempt something adventurous and risky that was worthy to write on the blog (okay, definitely was more curious than vain, for the record): snowrunning. Yes, it’s just as it sounds. Running in the snow. The reality is less glamorous, though. In being cautious, I sacrificed my pace to a considerably slower one than I would normally go at after not running outside for almost a week. I cannot express enough how frustrating this melting-but-still-present snow is.

            After slipping in through the kitchen window and scarring a studious Jen, I transitioned into cooking mode. Vinnie and I made a damn good chicken curry, if I do say so. The chopped carrots were bigger than Gemma (and Vinnie) would usually associate with a curry, but I just remember the carrots in the yellow curry at the Thai place on Broadway in Sacramento being that big.

After an hour, complete with cooking, eating, and cleaning, I made my way to the library to join Stef in our quest to finish the Hazlitt essays (we’re both in Romanticism and Nineteenth-Century Writing). I think there were two highlights to that adventure: 1. There was a bottle of “Hand Food” on her desk space that definitely made me laugh. Her friend Josh later would attempt to eat some, claim it’s tasty, and then try to persuade me to go to pub tonight. If this was Friday, I would’ve said yes. But no, study mode had to continue. Oh, btw, “Hand Food” is just lotion. 2. After suggesting that she was just me (Fight Club moment), she mentioned how we were both English majors and said “Coincidence?” Then we both said “I think not” at the same time. It’s true after all!

Then came the hours of writing the love letter, half in the library, half back in the dorm room. I decided to use sketch paper, so without the lines of typical binder paper, I wrote much smaller and still wanted to complete the whole paper, front and back. It’s beautiful. *sniff* But actually.

You may wonder why this picture...you'll
find out soon enough...

I thought about writing this tomorrow, but inspired by the readership (flatmates, family, friends back home—do you know that there have been 1,093 views total? And an average of 30-40 per day), I wrote this entry now. INSTANT GRATIFICATION. Ha, okay, I’m silly with post-midnight exhaustion. Night.