Hi!
It feels like I need to say “Hi!” again after being away. You look so good to me!! Hi!
First off, I want to say that I see the comments about the font needing to be a bigger and a darker, and I shall make it so. With the server migration, things got a little funky and I agree there are tweaks needed. Julie and I will work on it, I promise. Until then, you can always go up to “View” and click “Zoom” and you can make your screen bigger. Thank you for your patience.
As promised yesterday, I’m going to paste in the painstakingly crafted foreword to the thesis I worked on for so long. Before you read it, you should know what I’m foreword-ing, no?
My 1,512-page thesis was a compendium. It was everything I have published or otherwise officially submitted in two years of in graduate school.
I included all my essays, F Newsmagazine articles, Quiltfolk articles, Quilt Scout columns, other freelance writing, research projects, three lectures, one poem, the materials for the exhibit at the Chicago Design Museum next year, and … every blog post. That’s right: The past two years of PaperGirl is in my thesis. The whole way, May. And what’s really cool is that if you get a master’s at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, your thesis is bound and kept in the library of the Art Institute. We’re in there, guys. You and me. We’re in one of the best museums in the entire world.
It literally took three 18-hour days to make the two copies of my thesis, partly because each section had its own introduction and title page and also because I hand-stamped every page (of both copies) with a page number using one of those cool auto-advance number-stamper things I think they use in law offices? It was fun, but I still have a bruise on my hand. (Seriously.)
If you’re new to the blog, I promise, promise, promise: Entires are never this long. But most days I’m not writing to you in the week I finish my master’s degree. And to make sure you know I care about the eyes of my readers, I’m going to boldface the whole thing.
Thank You,
Mary
F O R E W O R D
Christmas Day, Chicago, 2015. Half-past two in the afternoon.
I was standing at the kitchen counter at my sister’s house, wearing a sweater, jeans, and busted-up fuzzy slippers. Like everyone else in the room, I was drinking prosecco. My younger sister and her husband were both absorbed in something online. My mom and stepdad were playing Scrabble at the big table, picking at pie. Hannah, my older sister, was scrolling through Instagram on her phone.
“So I have news,” I announced to the room, then paused for effect. “I have applied to graduate school at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.”
My sister Rebecca looked up at me. “Why?”
Hannah stayed glued to her phone but shifted in her seat and from where I stood I could see the rise of one penciled-in eyebrow. Mark tapped out the score on the calculator he and Mom keep in the Travel Scrabble box. Jack bumped the power cord on his laptop then clicked it back into place.
“I want to study writing,” I said.
It was as if I had announced I was going to the store for a gallon of milk. Except there was hostility in the air, too, like I had announced I was going to the store for a gallon of milk and I had a history of stealing groceries. There goes Mary with her same old dairy-aisle kleptomaniac crap — and on Christmas!
“Well, I think it’s fantastic,” my mom said, and took a sip from her champagne flute. “You’ll be so happy you did it, honey.” My stepfather raised his glass but didn’t actually cheers anything.
“Thank you, Mother,” I said. Then, curtly, to the room: “Am I missing something? Is there something wrong with me pursuing a master’s degree in writing at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago?”
I was the only one in my family without a postgraduate education, so the bad vibes were not based in any anti-school sentiment. Something else was going on that made me sad and I felt the ruthless sensation of being alone among my own people.
My throat closed up, but I pressed the issue: Why was me going to grad school not a happy occasion?
It came out that no one had faith in an MFA program for writers. They were a waste of time, Hannah said, and besides, I had been making a good deal of my living as a freelancer for some time. My blog had thousands of subscribers. Why spend all that time and money for a piece of paper?
Rebecca agreed. She pointed out that SAIC is one of the most expensive schools in the country and when she worked in the Loop, she’d have to dodge throngs of SAIC kids every day at lunch. “It’s obviously a good school, but there are a lot of stocking hats and sad paintings over there,” she said. “I don’t think you’d like it.”
For the few brief minutes we discussed it, it was clear that no one was impressed with my announcement because they weren’t impressed with the plan and also because my family was used to this particular family member (me) making splashy life changes every few years. My decision to go to grad school wasn’t earth-shattering; it was simply the latest solution to the problem of Mary getting bored. The tears that stung my eyes were the result of knowing they were half-right, but there was anger, too: The half they were wrong about they were really wrong about. To study writing for real was something I had wanted pretty much my whole life.
Christmas Day three years ago was the first time I would have to defend why I wanted a master’s degree; why I wanted to get that degree in writing; why I wanted to go to the School of the Art Institute of Chicago; and why I wanted to do all of this now.
Katherine Hepburn said, “Never complain, never explain,” but Katherine Hepburn never went to grad school. Explaining the reasons why I chose all this was something I would have a good deal of practice with over the next two years.
You could say I’m explaining right now.
* * *
I went to high school in the mid-90s in a small Midwestern town. College prep courses may have been a thing on the East Coast by then, but in Winterset, Iowa, “advanced placement” classes were a novelty. The first one they ever offered, AP English, was offered my senior year. For the first time in high school, I was not dogged by my homework but exhilarated by it.
The teacher taught from one book: the fifth edition of a college-level composition textbook called The Bedford Reader. I loved its tissue-thin pages, how they felt like pages of a Bible or the Shakespeare anthology Mom had on the bookshelf at home. I devoured the readings Mrs. Chase assigned and as I did, I put myself in a kind of conversation with the book, scribbling notes in the margins, drawing goofy doodles and inside jokes for my friends on the front and back covers.
After 20 years of moves, boyfriends, a marriage and divorce, and countless cleaning purges that dispensed with plenty of other books, I’ve still got that Bedford Reader. Flipping through its pages now, seeing all those proclamations and exclamations, is an exercise in facial expressions: I see myself and my brow furrows; my eyes get wide; I wince. The sheer spunkiness of me at sixteen is excruciating. “I love Matthew McConaughey!!!” I write, and when I like something, I draw a happy face saying “YES!!!” When I don’t, there in green ink is, “What does the author MEAN??? Don’t KNOW don’t CARE!!!”
Two years ago, just before grad school began, I purchased a thick, black Leuchtturm notebook. A German-designed notebook of consequence, it was big enough to last through two years of note-taking in writing department classes, workshops, seminars, and advising sessions. I thumbed through it the other day, not long after I had pulled out my Bedford Reader, to reference the bibliography.
Then came the shock: The content of my notes and doodles in my grad school notebook are virtually the same today as they were 20 years ago. It was all right there. The exclamations and proclamations with the same liberal use of exclamation points, the same rhetorical questions to myself, the same conversations with an audience of one … The only difference, really, is a subtle weariness creeping in; as a 38-year-old, I write, now in black ink: “What does the author mean? Don’t know. Don’t care.”
Shocking as it was to see myself so plainly after all this time, there exists a sense of satisfaction in the continuity from one book to the other. I might be an enthusiastic idiot, but I’ve always had a strong sense of self.
But the apparently indelible blueprint brings with it a terrible weight, too. Can a person change? Can she learn? Can she become a better writer or is it predetermined how good she’ll get? We know that women are born with a set number of eggs; is a woman’s portion of writing ability also set at birth? Does studying it allow only for cosmetic changes and nothing deeper? Why, indeed, sisters, did I pursue a master’s degree in writing if, from notebook to notebook, year to year, I’m still holding my pen the same way?
* * *
Oh, please. Two years in a MFAW program has made me way better at writing.
You can’t really chart it. You can’t quantify it. You, the reader, or I may or may not be able to read from one end of this manuscript to the other and see that from August 2016 to May 2018 my sentences get tighter, my references more nuanced, my verbs more precise. You may or may not perceive how I got better at editing my own writing and the writing of others. You’ll see a lot of published work that didn’t exist before, but there’s no way to show beyond a shadow of a doubt that in grad school, the Mary Fons motherboard was rewired and has become vastly more complex (and definitely more expensive.)
Then again, I’m also two years older. That counts for something. This 1,500-page thesis may not be a lot of things, but it’s undeniable proof a girl’s been practicing.
Most of my cohort came seeking an MFAW because they want to teach. Many hoped to assemble an agent-ready manuscript. Some succeeded, and those novels and poetry collections will serve as their thesis, pages polished to gleaming (or gleaming enough) in advising meeting after advising meeting, over two years of workshops and critiques. I, too, took work through that laundering process. When I arrived, I thought that writing and polishing the essays included here was the point of all this. My colleague’s goals were the same as mine.
But as I rode my bike up the street to MacClean in the heat of September; as icy water mixed with street salt seeped through my shoes through two long winters, what I was getting from graduate school and what I’d been seeking changed. I started out making a quilt with someone else’s fabric, you could say, and then I remembered I had this huge basket of my own gorgeous scraps.
More than mastering a single essay — or a dozen of them — I discovered that my task was to understand the kind of writer I am, not the kind of writer I wish I was. My sisters were correct: Grad school can’t teach you how to write. But I learned that grad school can offer the chance to discover how you write. And if you care enough, work ceaselessly, and accept the way you hold your pen, then you can improve. Maybe you can improve a lot. That’s the real — and somewhat hidden — lesson. It was certainly the knowledge I came for, and after I learned it, it was the reason I stayed.
* * *
My family has heartily congratulated me on my accomplishment. Getting a master’s degree — even in writing — is way harder than stealing a gallon of milk. They’re proud of me.
My thesis doesn’t just double as a doorstop: It’s proof of concept. I am this person. I am this writer. If you’re interested in getting to know her, I suggest you get comfortable. You’re gonna be here awhile.
Mary Fons
May 7, 2018, Chicago
Karen
Wow! Congratulations and thank you for bringing us along on your journey!
Laurie
Congrats
Kathleen
It’s a gift to be strong enough to be who you really are. Good for you!
Mary Maloni
I am always impressed by your insight and enjoy thoroughly your way of writing. Bravo on graduating.
What feels to me like a lifetime ago I graduated with an MBA from Loyola of Chicago attending graduation with a one year old in tow (now in his mid 30’s). When he was born a considerable number of people said why finish, you won’t need this for being a mom. My very own mother, who had been widowed young, kept saying “do not be deterred” and “education is never wasted”. She was right!
You are an amazing writer. even if you were not being published (I am grateful you are) your education will serve you well for the rest of your days, sometimes in unexpected ways.
MK
Congrats, Mar!
Darlene
Congratulations!
Kat Butler
Congrats! And job well done.
Joyce
Well Done!!!
Linda Corgiat
That was simply lovely!
Deena Pech
I’m in awe. Good for you. Congratulations!
Pat Hicks
Congratulations Mary, so proud of all you do. All that you accomplish with the other distractions you have is beyond amazing! Exciting things are ahead for you so take us along.
Nancy Kursewicz
Congratulations! All your hard work paid off!!!
Colleen
Congratulations on your MFA but kudos to you for following your heart and making your dreams come true!
Jana
Congratulations!
Cathy
Excellent!!! I enjoyed reading it and could picture you saying it all! Congrats again on this accomplishment!
Judy Forkner
Great forward! Congratulations, Mary!
Penny
Congrats! You deserve it. You are inspiring. Your writing is awesome. Your quilts are awesome. Thank you.
Ingrid White
I’ve always enjoyed your prose Ma. Congratulations on your achievement.
Carol Bank
You made it, my dear. I, and all of P.E.O. are thrilled for you and excited about what comes next.
Kathy K-H
Always grateful for your openness. Congratulations with much respect and admiration!!!
Cindy Marnin-Borcherding
Congratulations!!! I hope to see you sometime in Winterset at the Iowa Quilt Museum.
Debbie
Congratulations Mary! It’s been fun sharing your journey.
Jennifer R.
I am so proud of you! Thank you for sharing this and allowing us a glimpse into your journey. Congratulations
Maria
Congrats Mary.
Lisa Floyd
Oh, Mary, I am so proud of you. I remember when you first told us you eere going back to school. Congrats! You deserve this and more. Keep writing.
Pat
Congratulations to you Mary!!
Marianne Fons
Always proud of you, my dear!
Liz Flaherty
Wonderful! Congratulations.
Jo
Mary! Congratulations. “No pressure, no diamonds” You are now a diamond, continue to sparkle.
Mary Ann
Quilt your writing! Congrats, hard work pays off.
Kelly Ashton
Oh, Mary! Congratulations on this substantial and glorious accomplishment! ❤️
Jan Patterson
Well done!!!
liz
We love you Mary, thank you so much for sharing your journey.
I’m someone who writing is very difficult for me. I almost didn’t make it though (through or threw??)
because of it!) But one thing I’m good at is reading and I love reading what you write!
Thank you
Maudericcar
Congrats Mary!
Anita Brayton
Wow! Congratulations! I’ve enjoyed getting to know you through your writing Papergirl. I look forward to many more years reading about your life adventures. xoxo
Patty Stagl
Congratulations! It’s been a pleasure following your adventures. Thank you for keeping us in your “loop”.
Jeanne Brinkman
Great job to pursue your degree!!!
Mary, to actually solidify that dream that seems for many of us……….to just stay a dream…….is fantastic!!!!!!
Also harsh reality, our families keep us humble.
No matter how passionate we feel about something.
Lukewarm isn’t so bad.
Just makes us to want to work that much harder to prove to ourselves and others……..I’ve got this!!!!!
Connie
Your work is paying off and your passion for writing is evident in every post, blog, article and story. Enjoy this “mastering” of your goal!
Deb Pentek
Congratulations Mary! What a wonderful and amazing accomplishment! Your writing style is beautiful to read. We look forward to more.
Deb Hanahan
Congratulations! We are the lucky beneficiaries of all your hard work!
Mary Saxon
Congratulations. If I ever go to SAIC’s library, your thesis will be the first thing I read. All of it.
Mary
lol — careful, Mary … xoxooxoxo!!!!
Cindy
Enjoyed reading……Congratulations!
Grammy Judy
Looking forward to reading more. Congratulations and be proud of yourself.
Betty
Having only had one chance meeting in an elevator in Savanna, I find you to be a very interesting person. I look forward to hearing more from you.
Anna
You go girl! Getting your MFA is now off your bucket list. Wonderful accomplishment!
Mary Dusenberry
Happy to be able to read your work. Our families often don’t understand our passions, but that does not make the passions wrong.
Jane
What a wonderful accomplishment! As another woman wrote, education is never a waste of time or effort! All the best as you move forward! You are the bomb!
Mary Ann
I stumbled on your blog from some link or another many years ago. I stayed because of the writing and because I have always felt at home here. Congratulations, truly something to brag about Mary.
Georgeanna Couldry
That is a GREAT foreward! It kept me wanting to read to the end. That is what I look for when I’m reading something. Wonderful job and CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!!!!!!!
Betsy
No matter what others say, you kept your dream alive and that’s rare!!!
Congratulations on finishing such an important step!!!!
Nancy Pederson
Congratulations Mary!!! I admire you for sticking it out. And know you have reason to be proud of yourself.
Verna Buchanan
Congratulations, Mary! I am so happy for you and what you have accomplished, as well as what you have discovered about yourself and your writing.
Jan
Congratulations! You’ve accomplished a personal goal. I love that.
I see you charging off, fountain pen raised, entertaining, elucidating, and educating all of us who are excitedly waiting your next missive.
My favorite part of your writing is that it’s like we, the readers, are having a personal visit, just the two of us. Girlfriends chatting over tea after a busy day.
Oh, and that you use sounds and exclamation words. Plop. Gad-zukes!
Theresa
Congratulations! I want to read more!
Annie
Congrats! I so enjoy reading what you write and share!
My friend is a prolific writer and sends me “a visit” of many many pages that she usually hand writes. I get a cup of tea and sit and read and enjoy her visit. Poor her has to content herself with my short email or text.
I’m amazed at how she loves to write and she says she “ has to write!”
Looking forward to all you have to say!
Kathy H
Well done, Mary! I love the fact that we’ve been able to kibbitz your grad school work and now get to read the intro to your thesis. Celebrate yourself!
Linda
SO happy for you, Miss Mary!! One of your dreams has come true! (Does the SAIC share a loan/lend agreement with the Winterset Public Library?!?! Just a thought!)
Congratulations, dear Paper Girl. Looking forward to reading more of your work, and perhaps seeing your smiling self when you’re back in town!
Hugs…..Linda D
Nan R
Congratulations. And thank you for inviting us along on your journey.
JUDITH C BEARD
It’s okay to do it for yourself! In my early 40’s I decided to get my master’s. My daytime job was working as a certified home economics teacher in the public schools going on 20 years. My nighttime, weekend, and summer job was to work on a master of science in organizational leadership and management. It took 4 years. Done. All for myself!
Teagan
!!!! Yes!!!!
Cheryl Emanuel
Congratulations, Mary!! I love reading your words!! You truly have mastered your writing and have come out on top, considering all that you have been through. You have much to be proud of!!
Sue
Study is never wasted. It feeds the soul.
Susan Buckingham
Congrats, Mary. My DH is an English teacher of the highest degree. I will pass this along for his perusal. I’m happy you have fulfilled your desire for your Masters degree. One more feather in your cap…a BIG ONE! 🙂
Susan Macy
Congratulations, Mary, on completing your thesis and getting your Master’s Degree. You are to be commended!! It was such fun to meet you recently at IQSCM and see what spunk, creativity, ability, and many other qualities you have in your possession. You will go far in this world!!! Love this blog!
Kitty
Well done, brave girl. Well done.
LisaE
Wow, so impressive! Bravo!
Charlotte
Big fat hearts and congratulations to you! That was a sublime introduction.
Donna Glade-Tau
Congratulations on this huge accomplishment!!!!
Sarah
Brava, Mary! What you have accomplished took spunk. And a lot of energy. I hope you are now able to breathe deeply and can take a bit of time to rest and to savor your success. I look forward to reading more of your writing — lots of it. Excelsior!
jain
Love your writing Mary!
Summer
Several things I love about your foreword – 1) the use of family dialogue, much as appeared on your blog previously, 2) the lovely and apt metaphor about quilting, 3) the description of your travels around campus in all weathers, and 4) how the background of your realization of the purpose of your graduate school journey ties so perfectly into the conclusion. Beautiful writing. I think if I were to read this foreward, in my dream job of reading Mary Fons’ theses, I would settle comfortably into my padded chair, sunlight filtering through the trees into my cozy office, and prepare to enjoy the next 1,512 pages of thoughtful, fun, and quite creative writing! (I might be there until sunrise the next day, but such is the life of a Mary Fons’ thesis reader!)
Barbara
You persevered Mary, and it certainly paid off. I had no doubt you would accomplish what you set out to do.
Congratulations!!!! Now, write on!!
Look Homeward, Seagull - Mary Fons
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