Vade mecem (noun) is from the Latin (in case you couldn't tell) for "go with me" (or "come hither", as I'd say). It is a book or manual for easy reference, or an item regularly carried about by a person. Sometimes both, I'd imagine.
I'd like to think the blog (and perhaps Twitter) is the vade mecem of the internet age. Now that many of us (not myself, however) have smarty-pants phones that connect to the internet and convey updates on our friends' thoughts, the latest celebrity melodrama or the weather. We google from where we're standing. We search and follow directions from these devices. From an intellectual standpoint, the blog is a public journal, a different kind of vade mecem. Depending on your subject matter, you're inviting your readers along for an adventure - not necessarily plotting directions but experiences. I'd like to think that Daedalus is helpful - perhaps not a manual, but a source of encouragement to be carried about through the year. This isn't my or Michelle's personal-minutia blog, but I'd hope we can share our challenges as writers.
Honestly, this Autumn might be a tough one for me. I might have mentioned it before, but I'm currently drafting a query letter for my novel. I hope to get the first query sent to a literary agency in the next couple of weeks. I've never done so before, and the more I think about it, the more it's like standing on the edge of an abyss. The only way to know what lies beyond is take a leap of faith. As that unfolds, I'm considering applying to a graduate creative writing program again. I hope that through Daedalus you can come along with me on this journey in the dark, and we can figure out the world that is literary agents and publishing and graduate school applications together. Who knows where we might end up?
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