tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-88748376362178331002023-11-15T09:42:57.696-08:00Tales of a Third Year NothingHelen Adlamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17353192045682933601noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8874837636217833100.post-25968148120014025912011-03-19T09:03:00.001-07:002011-03-19T09:03:45.338-07:00Tales of a Third Year Nothing<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Back when it all began ....</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">All that stands between me and finally getting a degree is one FYP, one rationale and a four thousand word portfolio.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I can’t quite believe it. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But then what? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Back when it all began all I cared about was getting the degree, I didn’t think about the whys and wherefores.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Still, that’s a problem for another day (a day that’s coming up fast, I know that).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To start off this blog off I’m going to turn the clock back to that first day back at school - I've given up my job and it's twenty odd years since I last gave in an essay. It's hard to describe how I feel. Scared? Lost? Like I'm making a big mistake? What’s worse, I’m starting in Year 2, so not only have I taken a massive leap of faith, I have to hit the ground running.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I ask anyone and everyone for advice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>‘Consider a pathway’ Im told, then you’ll have a clear idea of where you’re going. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ok. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Steep and thorny? </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Primrose?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Or perhaps the one less travelled?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Turns out to be none of the above.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>More like, do I fancy myself as a screenwriter?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A poet?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A novelist?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mull over the options and come up with this: <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Anything In The Morning Avoiding Poetry</i> (1. Because I have to pick the kids up from school and; 2. because I only know two poems, one is Three Cheers for Pooh and the other title I’ve forgotten).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>‘Mornings Avoiding Poetry’ is not a pathway many people opt for, but it works for me. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">And so this is how come I find myself on my first day in a screenwriting class.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I sit at the back and hope no one notices me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not long before I realise everyone else has already done a first year module on screenwriting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Oh dear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I start to wish I’d started in year one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then I wish I knew just one other person in the room. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, more than anything else, I wish I wasn’t old enough to be everyone’s mum.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I bet they wonder what I’ doing here. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But things take a turn for the better.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We watch a film called Gare du Nord and I relax a bit and think, this is okay.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I get the story.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I imagine myself on a university version of ScreenTest (!) and note down a few observations for good measure. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">When the movie’s over its discussion time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Here is where I hope to fade into the background, but Nick has other ideas.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He runs a finger down the register and picks a name at random.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He picks on me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First lesson.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First victim.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Can you tell me how many scenes were in that piece of film?’</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Er... well now .... let’s see.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>About twenty, may be twenty five?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Six..</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Okay, so I’m not probably not going to be the next Nora Ephron. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Next up is Textual Intervention II.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now if this means trying to read a book while someone calls ‘mum’ at you every five minutes, then we’re in business.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It doesn’t.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But things aren’t too bad.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Frankenstein, Jekyll and Hyde, Wuthering Heights.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hey, I know those.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I can do this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For homework I write an intervention on Jekyll and Hyde that I’m pretty pleased with.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All week I keep going back – adding bits, editing, taking bits out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ta dah!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">At the next session it sits proudly on the desk in front of me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Volunteers to read?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well... I wouldn’t like to be too bold.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No one says anything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Looking round the room, I get the idea that may be not everyone has written something.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I get twitchy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I want to, but I don’t.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I want to be part of the class, but I don’t want anyone to notice me.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">You go – says the girl next to me, spying my page of beautifully typed prose.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She has all the confidence of not only being half my age, but having lovely, long curly blonde hair and arms shielded in swathes of silver bangles that jangle as she points at the paper in front of me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Dare I say she reminds me of myself at that age?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or, rather, how, in my fantasies, I have come to think I looked when I was her age. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Go on, she says.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I go for it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I stand up and I read my piece.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My hands are shaking and I’m sure everyone can hear the paper rustling. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It comes out okay and I get some positive comments.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I also get a few suggestions for improvement, but that’s fine too. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But then I get one comment that sets me up for the rest of the degree. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Something that sustains me through my darkest hours.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Something I will never, ever forget.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It comes from the girl with the silver bangles and lovely, curly hair.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Can I ask you something?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She says when I sit down.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Sure.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ask away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What was my inspiration?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How did I manage to interweave extracts from the original so seamlessly?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Where did I do my additional research? </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Where did you get your cardigan?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Huh?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Your cardigan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’d love one like that.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I’m glowing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m on cloud nine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nothing else matters.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s going to be alright.</span></div>Helen Adlamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17353192045682933601noreply@blogger.com0