Toto, I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas any more.

I started a post last week (not this one) and have the rest of it laid out in my head just waiting for my fingers to start tap, tap, tapping away on the keyboard.  Apparently it’s common for bloggers, myself included, to start writing and leave it go, potentially forever, as lost film on a cutting room floor.

(Wavy lines; fade to monochrome to indicate dream sequence.)

I’m gone. (I’ll leave out the details of my imaginary demise.) WordPress decides, as a posthumous homage to my mad blogging skillz, they’re going to open my account to the public and see what gifts I’ve left behind.  To everyone’s thrill, there are uncut, unedited lost blogs.  We’ll call them…  The Lost Blogs.  My legions of fans will feel a fleeting sense of comfort at the prospect of being able to experience me one more time.  And they’ll take the time to sip my words knowing it’ll be the last drink of me they ever have.  They’ll say what I wrote was brilliant.  The hard core fans will maintain anyone who doesn’t think it was my best effort isn’t even a fan at all.  All this hullabaloo around something I didn’t even particularly care for.

(Wavy lines; back to “lotsa chrome.”)

I’ve been dying to finish that post but I couldn’t justify doing so not because I didn’t like it (I’d just press delete in that case), but because I had a different priority.

I was fortunate to get a heads up about a Mayor Bloomberg program to boost the NYC economy called JumpstartNYC.   Jumpstart was designed to “help unemployed, mid-career professionals looking for a career change (ME) apply their knowledge, skills, and abilities in opportunities at small, entrepreneurial companies.”  The next session, April 16 – 27, also focuses on New York City’s “budding green sector” with an emphasis on sustainability, something ME is interested in.  Since I got the email from my friend, who, in my opinion,  appropriately stated this program would be PERFECT for ME, I’ve been totally fired up about it.  I think I’ve already told the world, at least once you’ve read this I will have, and I can’t wait.   No, I haven’t been accepted into the program yet.  I went to the information session on January 27th and, aside from finding out details about the program which made it more enticing, I found out that the essay questions had been made available online.

Cue the theme from Jaws…

Yes, the application process includes essays.  I haven’t written essays for an application since the masterpiece I penned for admission to SUNY Binghamton over 20 years ago.  I’m tempted to say I’m being dramatic for effect, but I just can’t remember any more recent essays. But I wasn’t troubled at all.  Why should I be? I’ve been writing this blog and getting some pretty good reviews (I’m assuming some people don’t like my writing but I’m just not getting that feedback, which is perfectly fine with me).  I can do this.

But this, as I experienced, is COMPLETELY different than the creative writing I’ve been doing.  I didn’t particularly enjoy writing these essays.  I didn’t really care to be told what to write about.  But I did it.  And I’m proud of them.  And they’re getting a once over from an alumnus of the program before submission.  Wish me luck.  I really want in on this program and think it will do me a world of good.  I know when I do get accepted, this will be a wonderful experience and a great opportunity to get one step closer to where I want to be.  World… it’s on!