I can see the end in sight — tantalizingly close. But, to get there I have to first summit an epic mountain of work:

* Grade 120 essays (which are sitting at my elbow as I write this, and which I am clearly avoiding by writing this).

* Finish reading the novel that I am supposedly teaching.

* Complete & send in article review.

* Complete major departmental service work that has an inconvenient deadline in the middle of next week and that I have not even begun. Gulp.

* Research materials necessary for Xmas break writing project and submit ILL requests before ILL shuts down for the holidays (always just when I need them).

* Write, proctor, and grade 3 final exams.

* Calculate final grades.

* Deal with my students’ never-ending array of ornate end-0f-the-semester crises. Including the inevitable grade complaints.

* Try not to lose my mind.

My personal value is not determined by my professional achievements.

My personal value is not determined by my professional achievements.

My personal value is not determined by my professional achievements.

My personal value is not determined by my professional achievements.

My personal value is not determined by my professional achievements.

My personal value is not determined by my professional achievements.

My personal value is not determined by my professional achievements.

My personal value is not determined by my professional achievements.

From my email in-box this morning, edited for content:

Dear Ms. BSG,

My name is Stu Dent and I am a graduate student of Related Field at Random University in Major City. I am writing a research paper on Broad Historical Topic and came across your article on Jstor. I wanted to know if you could brief me on the Another Broad Historical Topic as well as Even Broader Topic. I know this is a lot to ask so if you are unable to answer these questions that’s fine.

Thank-you for considering,

Stu Dent

Shall I enumerate all the ways this email pisses me off?

1) “Ms. BSG.” You are going to write me an email that cites my scholarship and asks for me to freely dispense my knowledge, but not address me by my professional title?

2) “Your article.” Which one, you lazy little bastard? I’ve actually written many articles on this topic — indeed, it is the subject of my (maybe one day forthcoming) book. You have the time to look up my email address but not to look more closely at my CV and see that I have several publications that may be relevant to your research?

3) “You could brief me.” Sure! It’s super-duper easy to sum up this very complex historical issue — not to mention all the literary and cultural implications — in an email. And, I’m totally happy to do that for you, even though you are a complete stranger, I have my own students lined up outside my office door to get help on their papers, and a few hundred other responsibilities right now. I can’t wait to “brief” you!

4) “I know this is a lot to ask so if you are unable to answer these questions that’s fine.” Gee, thanks. I appreciate your understanding that this might be a completely inappropriate request. But, don’t let that stop you from making it!

I’m really tempted to do some research on Stu Dent, find out which professors s/he is working with, and drop them a friendly email about their student’s research methods.

How did we come to this, people?

• That all my efforts to coax, cajole, bully and bribe my students into doing the reading and participating in class discussion have ceased to have any effect in the face of an outright, collective refusal to work.

• Students who don’t even attempt to mask their contempt of me anymore.

• All the stupid “stepping stone” assignments I assigned back when I still believed in good pedagogy. (h/t Bardic)

• The student who is outrageously failing my class, hasn’t turned in any major assignments, and yet comes to class every day.

• The student who parrots whatever his classmates say in order to appear to have done the assigned reading, and thus “fool” me into thinking he’s a responsible student.

• The fact that the previous two statements describe the same student.

• Everyone who has asked me for a syllabus for classes I’m teaching next semester.

• Students who don’t buy the books.

• Dead grandparents, broken printers, car accidents, car breakdowns, traffic jams, emotional crises, breakups, swine flu, regular flu, generic colds, exotic illnesses, court dates, work obligations, assignments for other classes, sports trips, and every other excuse my students are digging out of their arsenal to explain late assignments, missed classes, poor quality essays or exams, and a general failure to perform at adequate levels.

• Grading. Endless piles of grading stretching from here to the horizon of time.

 

When I was growing up, the idea of paying someone to clean the house or do yard work was unthinkable. This was due, mostly, to the fact that my family was pretty poor – it was a luxury we couldn’t afford. But, there was also a cultural or psychological element – my parents were both of the “why would you pay for something that you can do yourself?” mindset. In my father, this was attributable to his general fix-it philosophy – he’s a man who actually likes to tinker with things. My mother’s situation was more complex: Raised in a traditional Southern family – but not a wealthy one – she inherited the idea that a real woman should be able to keep her house spotless, her children clean and well-dressed, put a full meal on the table every night, and keep everyone happy. But, being a twentieth-century woman, she wasn’t allowed to pay anyone to help her – that was a sign of weakness. These untenable standards had the effect on my mother that they had on so many women: depression, sense of failure, resentment, etc. Despite the fact that I closely observed how she suffered trying to do everything herself, I still absorbed the idea that domestic help was an indulgence reserved for the rich and spoiled – not for the likes of me.

Recently I found myself talking with a group of other female faculty, representing many different departments and disciplines from across Unnamed U. Somehow the topic of housekeepers* came up – and suddenly all of these women began to admit (there is no better word for it) that they had housekeepers and were so grateful for their labor but also incredibly guilty. The conversation took on a distinctly confessional tone, as they reassured each other that it was perfectly okay, that they are professionals with many responsibilities and duties, that they can’t be expected to do it all, etc. It was a little awkward when I said that I don’t have a housekeeper – but it was quickly explained by the fact that I don’t have children – all of these professors are also mothers, which was a major plank in their explanatory discourse.

This is all to say that I’ve been thinking a lot about hiring someone to clean my house, but it’s a fraught issue for me.

On the one hand, I can muster a number of arguments against it:

The Marxist in me recoils at the very idea of participating in an exploitative practice in which I would use my economic privilege to have someone perform labor that I could totally do myself, but I just don’t want to do.

The new age-y/ yogic / Buddhist in me questions whether I am letting my possessions define me to the extent of paying someone else to take care of them – and instructs me to scale back my life if it has become that complicated and over-burdened.

The Feminist in me is practically not even speaking to me, because she knows that domestic labor is unfairly distributed not just on women, but on immigrant women or women of color, the working poor whose lack of opportunities are intrinsically linked to my own class and race privilege.

And, the completely shy and socially embarrassed part cannot imagine letting a stranger into my house to see my dirty, slovenly ways.

All really good reasons for NOT hiring a housekeeper.

On the other hand, I’ve become increasingly frustrated and impatient with cleaning my own house. It’s so time consuming that I usually do a shoddy job – just good enough to get by – so the house is rarely clean enough to invite anyone over, we generally don’t have guests over and, when we do, we have to do a marathon cleaning first. Meanwhile, Golden Boy and I snip at each other about the necessary duties, and get outright surly on the days we set aside to clean. (I should mention, for the record, that GB is really great about do his part – often picking up my slack when I’m particularly harried.)

The Marxist in me says: why not redistribute the wealth in a very direct and immediate way by hiring someone to do certain labor, but treating them with respect and paying them a living wage?

The new age-y/ yogic / Buddhist says: maybe you’d actually have time to do yoga if you didn’t feel obligated to make time to scoop cat boxes, do laundry, and other tasks everyday.

The Feminist says: You should not be enslaved to some oppressive ideal of womanhood that expects you to do it all and well. Admit to yourself that you have made certain lifestyle choices such as putting your career before other things, and one of the costs of that is that you cannot keep your house spotless. And, if you pay another woman well and treat her with respect, why shouldn’t she clean it for you?

The shy part of me says: Fuck it! Who cares? At least the kitchen floor will get mopped every once in a while.

As always, I am a divided subject.

So, I appeal to the wisdom of the interwebs – and particularly to you, professional women who are also caught in the family/work bind: Do you pay someone to clean your house? How do you explain the choice to yourself? Are you guilty about it? What do you recommend that I do?

* I’m not entirely sure what the appropriate terminology is — that’s how alien this whole thing is to me. Is it housekeeper, maid, domestic help, or something else? I dunno.

This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below:


I know I’m prickly these days about my competence as a scholar, and riddled with anxiety about my soon-to-devour-me tenure case but … this just doesn’t seem appropriate.

Email from student I’ve never heard of:

“Hi! My name is X and I am a student in Dr. Y’s class. We are attempting to [do something that you know a little bit about]. She suggested emailing you, as you might have information on how we can get started. We were wondering if you could tell us [list of questions].

We understand that you may be too busy to answer all of our questions due to your tenure coming up. If that is the case, would you please give us the contact information of someone who may be able to do so? Thank you for your time.”

I’ve indicated the part that’s making me steam. What’s up with my colleague Dr. Y discussing my tenure case with undergrad students? Sure, Dr. Y was probably trying to be respectful about my heavy work load — but … but … it still pisses me off.

Grrr …

In which our intrepid young professor, who has suffered some major professional setbacks recently, questioned herself as a scholar, and struggled to keep her chin up in the midst of a bonanza of grading and depressing faculty meetings, opens her email and discovers that she has been given an unexpected, un-hoped-for, and startlingly large raise.

I know. I was surprised too.

We’ll return to our regularly scheduled complain-a-thon soon.

 

 

clouds

This picture captures my mood today.

I’m in that all-too-familiar state of mind, one I’ve complained about many times on this blog — and yet, here I am again.

It’s Sunday afternoon. I’ve been working pretty much non-stop since I finished my Thursday afternoon classes. I’ve been grading and writing and revising and prepping and there is no goddamn end in sight.

I have not been raking the leaves piling up in my backyard, doing yoga, running errands, cleaning my house, making good meals, or taking any kind of a break.

It’s been a fucking weekend of work and I’m pissed about it.

Once again I am asking myself how I have allowed this scenario to unfold — what choices I have made (including the one to become a professor) to create such a flat, unsatisfying, exhausting life for myself.

In a few weeks, when this awful semester finally ends, I will feel differently, of course. I’ll applaud myself for being a teacher and therefore getting a month off between semesters. I think kindly about my students and look forward to the next semester. I will allow myself to forget how unbelievably hellish it can get, and how shallow my life is most of the time because I’m working so hard I cannot even think about anything, let alone be creative, spontaneous, curious, or alive.

But right now I’m like a raging storm cloud. Watch out for the lightning.

Public Service Announcement to Students Everywhere:

The term you are searching for is feminist, not feministic. In fact, feministic is not a word, which your computer may have been trying to alert you to when it kept underlining it with a red line.

It’s great that you are making an effort to utilize appropriate terminology in your essays, but it’s a writing strategy that will be even more effective if you get the terminology correct.

Feminism is …

Fantastic.

Realistic.

Dynamic.

Strategic.

Democratic.

Anti-chauvinistic.

Down with it.

The fucking shit.

But it is not feministic.

 

Word.