20 Something and Sublime

Hello again! My name is Megan Lolley, and I am an English student with a Creative Writing minor at the University of Idaho. Last semester, I completed a thesis project titled “68 Seconds: The Power of Poetics Surrounding Sexual Assault.” This project was a creative research endeavor to look into collaborative voice and included 20 poems drafted by me and inspired by the voices of survivors of sexual assault. Since the project’s completion, it has become more than simply my senior thesis. I have received a grant to turn this initiative into a fundraising campaign to support Alternatives to Violence on the Palouse (ATVP) by developing my work into a pamphlet that be distributed via sales; all revenue will be donated back to ATVP to support their mission of empowering victims of sexual assault and domestic violence and creating a safe and equitable community through education and prevention.  One of the most important aspects of this project is the involvement of community; my thes...

Hello, all! My name is Megan Lolley, and I am an English student with a Creative Writing minor at the University of Idaho. Last semester, I completed a thesis project titled “68 Seconds: The Power of Poetics Surrounding Sexual Assault.” This project was a creative research endeavor to look into collaborative voice and included 20 poems drafted by me and inspired by the voices of survivors of sexual assault. Since the project’s completion, it has become more than simply my senior thesis. I have received a grant to turn this initiative into a fundraising campaign to support Alternatives to Violence on the Palouse (ATVP) by developing my work into a pamphlet that be distributed via sales; all revenue will be donated back to ATVP to support their mission of empowering victims of sexual assault and domestic violence and creating a safe and equitable community through education and prevention.  One of the most important aspects of this project is the involvement of community; my thesi...

 Hello, again! It's been a while since I've written one of these--seems my life has settled back into its normal boring routine again after getting back from Colorado. My mind has not, though: I can't shake the feeling of being cooped up, and it's starting to affect me. Thus, it was time to get out and away from the LC Valley for some fresh air and new mountains.  I didn't plan on this last weekend being anything exciting...and it really wasn't, which was perfect. I got sick on Thursday morning with some sort of stomach flu that I like to call the "stress bug," which appears without fail near the end of every semester. When I get very stressed and burnt out, my body harbors it pretty well until everything comes crashing down and I get sick. Though I haven't been nearly as stressed as I have been in the past by this point in the year, I have been struggling with finances and preparing for the next step in my adult life, which is grad school. Additio...

 Hello! Here are some of my favorite photos that I took on the Nikon while Megan, Griffen, Brendon, and I were exploring Boise. Enjoy! A little portrait shot of Megan  Climbing a hill to get to a big rock (which we also climbed) Rock chuck friend :) Lemmon Falls, Thousand Springs State Park, ID

Today was the last full day of conference! We didn’t even try to make the 8:00 AM sessions. Last night, I set my alarm for 9:00 AM. Conference burn-out is real. I got up reluctantly, having stayed up so late the night before. We went to an interesting 9:30 AM session with panelists discussing literature’s connection to music through different lenses and with varied artifacts of literature: The Muppets, Chinese film, a novel titled Arabian Jazz , and two of Hozier’s songs. I really liked the panelist that analyzed Hozier’s songs through the lenses of transnationalism and cosmopolitanism—it was super interesting and also relevant to popular culture today.   After this, my roommate, Alexandra, presented her piece. She read a nonfiction piece she had written alongside two other panelists that did the same. They were all fabulous readings and featured writing that was vulnerable and strong, calling out the systems and/or attitudes in modern-day America that are hurting rather than help...

Today was a long (ish) day. I woke up to a dehydrated start of the day because of our little cocktail escapade the night before. As expected, we did not make the 8:00 AM session. I promptly hushed my alarm and re-set it for 9:00 AM.  When I did finally emerge from sleep, I put my hair up, good clothes on, and did my makeup in preparation of the session I was serving as chair for. I was able to greet and talk to all the panelists beforehand, and they were all very interesting and talented people. The moderator for the session was a very relatable, bright, and quite jovial woman, so I felt relaxed being the chair for this session. I introduced all of the presenters before they spoke and then asked appropriate questions during the allotted time for Q & A. The panel was poetry-centered and titled “What’s Beyond.” All the panelists read work that critiqued or confronted traditional religions in new ways that allowed them to inversely examine their own identities and how they derive...

 Happy Hump Day! Today was the third day of my trip here in Denver, but the first day with actual presenter panel sessions taking place. This morning, I woke up at 7:52 AM before the first session at 8:00 AM. My time management skills may need some work.  The 8:00 AM session was wonderful! We enjoyed learning to make a mini zine out of cut-outs from magazines, wrote Shakespearean sonnets, practiced an exercise called "writing without actually writing," and made mad lib poetry into pantoum poems. It was a good time, and the early morning creativity was much needed to distract me from being nervous before my own presentation.  After this, I went to a session called Editing Professionally and took some notes about some steps I could take to develop myself as a freelance or professional editor within the work force. I was only able to stay for about half of this before I left so I could get ready for my panel. By "getting ready," I mean finishing what I couldn't dur...