Snatches and Trimming

Hey Annie,
Vaginal cream??? Oh man, that sucks. My question, though, is whether you bought the vaginal cream thinking it was the anti-itch cream for your skin, or whether you mistakenly grabbed your pre-existing vag cream... Or perhaps some things are better left unsaid.

Anyway, I am trying my best to plow through as much work as possible before the weekend! Morgan is coming to town (WHOOP WHOOP!), and we are going to have brunch with Sydney and possibly the newly married Christine. I've spent the past two days sitting in classes taught by my classmates, taking notes so I can be all prepped for next semester, when I teach a class of undergrads all by myself! Exciting. At the same time, I hope I don't get really annoying students who come to ALL of my office hours, etc etc.

I spent the past 7 hours cutting 9 pages of my writing. I have a story that's 33 pages, and my instructor Allegra tells me she not only wants me to add scenes between the dad and the uncle, but she wants me to cut the whole thing down to 20 pages. I've heard the expression "Kill your darlings" and I know you have to do that as a writer, but (now I'm about to say something extremely writerly and pretentious) I feel like my narrative voice is being squelched! Why CAN'T I use the second person, addressing the reader? Why can't I "anthropologize" the Korean culture, saying things like "All Korean women suffered from the same affliction--a flat butt" or "The Korean language could be relied on for such hyperbolic turns of phrase..."? Doesn't David Sedaris do it? Why the heck not? Okay, it's not the most stellar of writing, but I'm feeling extremely suppressed. And I don't understand why it's going to take me the better part of a week to trim my work. This is supposed to be the easy part!

$#&*@!$*!!!