Katiaesque

  • Happy New Year! Off to Graduate!

    Happy 2015 my dear readers! May it bring you love and joy and beauty (not to mention, lots and lots of writing, of course)! The year 2014 has been pretty exciting. I completed the second half of my studies at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. Learned up to my ears. Wrote a critical thesis delving into novels in verse. Finished a draft…

    Katia Raina

  • In Honor of Breaks: A Totally Rambling Summertime Post

    “Summertime, and the living is ea-ea-ea-zy, fish are jumpin’ and the cotton is high….” Fun fact: Once upon a time, at age 14, I sang this song,  silly accent and all, and played it on the piano, on national Russian television. 🙂 Since then both the video and the audio of this little milestone had…

    Katia Raina

  • I’m Back!

    The latest residency expanded my mind, filled my writing soul with new color. I have learned so much once more, both about writing and about myself. Much of the residency dealt with the inner life of an artist. So, in a way, it wasn’t just Montpelier, VT that I have  traveled to. I visited my own inner landscape. Some…

    Katia Raina

  • Off to Hogwarts!

    Hey guys, Just letting you know it’s almost time. Two days, to be precise. Time to launch the third semester. Time to pack up my wand — um, I mean pen — my numerous notebooks, my thickest of sweaters. (Brrrrr!!!) Time to take the plane to Vermont College of Fine Arts– the secret snowy north place, where they teach magic.…

    Katia Raina

  • Happy 2014! A Rambling New Year’s Post

    Just back from New York City, on the heels of the craziest night of the year. My family’s New Year’s eve was made of stars, the windy Big Dipper shining over the Hudson River, while fireworks broke the night above our heads. On the cruise boat’s lower deck my husband and I took over the dance floor. Our…

    Katia Raina

  • Mid-Semester Progress Report

    So, the whole slowing down and letting go thing? It took just under a month, both a hard-work month and a vacation of a month. Letting go meant songs on the piano, meant Friday night candles, movies, nothing grand. Slowing down meant looking up, looking left and right, too, just paying attention. Playing meant new rituals (and some old ones too),…

    Katia Raina

  • The Hardest Homework

    I am smack in the middle of my second VCFA semester, and, along with a new essay, and the usual reading and writing, my wise teacher gave me the hardest, most impossible homework of all. She told me to stop working. 🙂         Not to stop writing, to stop working. So damn hard. She told me…

    Katia Raina

  • My Ideal Reader

    One of our VCFA teachers has her students write an essay about who their ideal reader is. She isn’t my teacher (I swear I wish I could have them all!), but I want to do this little exercise anyway. Just for fun. My ideal reader is 15 years old. Medium build, medium height, and she…

    Katia Raina

  • Hanging A Shingle

    Hi all, A couple of things this week. First, I would like to welcome the new subscribers. Every time someone new joins the small but beloved audience of this blog, I get nervous. I feel like going, “what me? What would they want to hear from good old me for, when there are so many other great,…

    Katia Raina

  • Childhood Fear: A Door In A Dead-End Hallway

    A huge part of being a writer, of being an artist of any kind, of making or doing anything worthwhile, is facing your fear. Sometimes it means digging in, far and deep, all the way back to the root of who you are, back to your childhood. Last month, fear was a big theme in my…

    Katia Raina