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Even though the new semester starts today, I have found myself with a little extra time the past few days. I finished my syllabuses last week. There is a lull in my new project. I don’t have much course prep for the week ahead.
Frankly, I exhausted just about every conceivable excuse to put off facing my manuscript revisions. So, over the weekend, I worked up the courage to spend some time closely reading over the readers’ reports, trying to identify common concerns/problems — which, let me tell you, was not easy, considering how divided the two readers were. I also started trying to work my mind around the process of revising the whole book — a huge mental adjustment.
I haven’t really had to think about the ms. since November 2007, when it went out the first press. In other words, I’ve had a nice long mental break from it — and those of you who have worked for years on a project know how invaluable it is to NOT have to think about it, even for a little while. In my case, having almost a year in which I could rest upon the laurels of having a “manuscript under revision” — which seemed at the time like it was merely one small step away from being a “forthcoming book” — was blissful.
However, I am discovering that the ten month break has not made me any fonder of my work, or any better able to think about it dispassionately. Rather, I am thrown back into the emotional stress that this project always awakens in me. Naturally, the circumstances of the mixed readers’ reports doesn’t help matters, as I keep having this niggling feeling that I might be setting myself up for disaster. My darkest fear is that I will make the revisions recommended by the Wonderful and Insightful Reviewer — perhaps spending months on the work, because they are not incidental revisions — only to be told that the press won’t publish it. BIG SHUDDER.
I am trying to simply get to work — but even that is hard. I’m not a Get Things Done devotee like some, but I have read enough about it to value the idea that you break down your To Do list into discrete parts, identify “next actions,” and free your mind of the bigger picture. So I have been attempting to not think, “Revise Manuscript,” which simply throws me into a panic. But, my efforts to break that monumental task down into manageable pieces isn’t going very well either.
Today, I made a list of five Next Actions … just the tip of the iceburg but, hopefully, doing SOMETHING as compared to sitting in frozen apathy will start me moving in the right direction.
I would be grateful for any suggestions: How do you start a BIG PROJECT? How do you break it down? What do you do to make yourself work on something when you’d rather do just about anything else?
I’ve never been particularly good at self-promotion. As my last post indicated, I think of myself as someone who is an academic despite my intellectual limitations and professional failures — which makes for poor spin. Plus, I’ve always hated the fact that so much of academia seems to be about puffing up your accomplishments, padding the ol’ CV, making sure everyone knows about your latest coup … there is just so much bad behavior that centers around this desperate need to one-up the next guy.
One area in which I am bad at marketing myself is in my syllabuses. I tend to choose familiar and boring course titles like:
[Name of Nation] Poetry
Women Writers in [Specific Historical Period]
[Major Theme] in [National Literature]
I know, I know … very uninspired. And, they often don’t reflect the creativity or innovation that I bring to the materials we’re going to cover.
I was thinking about the fact that I need to spiff up my course titles after attending the first back-to-school event in my department last week, at which I was reminded once again how far a good topic and catchy class title can go.
A few years ago — before I even started teaching at State U. — a colleague taught a class that was organized around a thought-provoking topic. I give her credit for really coming up with something interesting and novel. But, let’s get serious: she taught the course once and over five years ago. Yet, it never fails to get resurrected at departmental functions. Inevitably, someone brings it up, everyone nods sagely as they reflect upon the brilliance of this course, everyone looks at said colleague who gets to look humble, and then we move on.
At this most recent function, I discovered that another colleague’s class has entered into the same lexicon of Amazing Classes. Everyone was talking about how innovative it had been, how creative, etc. Once again, he has taught this class once, two years ago.
Okay, so there’s probably some sour grapes here but what I realized is that these two colleagues had done something I hadn’t which is: promote themselves. They had talked their classes up, come up with really clever and memorable course topics and titles, and generally made sure that everyone knew what they were up to. I am much more likely to downplay my classes, self-deprecate about the work/effort/insight I have put into them, and generally assume that it only matters to my students what I do in the classroom.
One thing I noticed about the two classes mentioned above is that they both took a well-known, canonical subject or author and put a little spin on it/him/her. In other words, one element was familiar while the other element was new, unlikely, and exciting. So, these classes were likely to appeal to everyone in the department, from the fuddy duddy geezer profs to the incoming fresh-from-grad-school hires.
Again, what’s frustrating to me is that I feel like I have taught some amazing classes that took a new approach, dealt with cutting-edge materials or issues, involved creative outings/field trips, assignments, etc. — but no one seems to know about them.
I’ve got to get in that syllabus game.
It’s one of those truisms that you can learn a lot by failing. That’s certainly been my experience throughout my academic career — I’ve failed at almost everything at one time or another and it’s been a learning experience. I’ve made numerous bad decisions: worked with the wrong people, valued the wrong things, pursued frivolous ambitious, put my time into unfruitful projects. I’ve also failed in just about every arena of academic life: job interviews, job searches, fellowship/grant applications, article/book submissions, you name it. I’ve taught some terrible classes and dealt badly with students. I’ve made enemies of colleagues and neglected my professional reputation. It is safe to say that my career has been more defined by my failures than by my successes — and I have what many would consider a successful career.
I have previously blogged about a recent failure of mine — the kerfuffle surrounding my graduate student Esmerelda’s attempts to defend her thesis. There’s a lot of blame to be spread around but I do feel that the situation has a great deal to do with poor choices on my part. I could certainly have done things better.
Well, last night Esmerelda graduated, having defended her thesis for a second and final time. It took some herculean effort but she was able to pull the revisions together and get it past the other members of the committee. In the spirit of productive reflection upon what I learned through this stressful, distressing, and unnecessary situation …
What I learned is: IT IS ALWAYS BETTER TO INCONVENIENCE, ANNOY, AND CREATE STRESS FOR A GRADUATE STUDENT THAN TO INCONVENIENCE, ANNOY, AND CREATE STRESS FOR THE FACULTY MEMBERS ON HIS/HER COMMITTEE.
I’ve realized that I was so invested in Esmerelda, going out of my way to praise her, support her choices, and get her through the process as quickly as possible, that I neglected the other faculty involved … ultimately to Esmerelda’s detriment. It would have been far better for her if I had put my foot down, told her she couldn’t finish that semester, and she’d have to just accept that fact. She probably would have been angry with me but she would not have had to go through the trauma of not passing her defense.
In other words, I actually needed to DIRECT her thesis not merely serve as her cheerleader and therapist.
The good news — and I’ve gotten very good at focusing on the positives despite all my stumbles — is that now I know for the next time.
Or, The Economics of Academia Post #705
Yesterday I went back-to-school shopping — another of the fruitless strategies undertaken to deal with the Personal Appearance Crisis provoked by the the new semester starting next week.
Clothes shopping is one of those activities that invariably causes my mind to turn to money and specifically to my total lack of money. I am always forced to admit to myself that the clothes being sold at large department stores are obviously not meant for me — they are meant for people who can afford to spend $100 on a shirt. Since my usual rule of thumb for clothes is “nothing over $20,” I am not left with many options.
I don’t spend $20 on an item of clothing because I want to — it’s a state of necessity. As I have previously confessed, my financial state is a precarious one, due to the unfortunate combination of being shockingly underpaid and deeply in debt. There’s something about shopping for clothes so that I can dress appropriately and professionally for a job that pays me so little that I can’t get out of the debt I acquired getting the degree I needed to be hired into said job that really gets me steaming.
So, it was with particular irony yesterday that I read the story about Elvis Mitchell, the former NY Times film critic who now hosts an interview show on TCM — a critic that I used to admire but who I now fear has gone a little nuts. The story goes that Mitchell was returning to Detroit from Toronto, having hired a taxi to drive him across the border. At the border, Mitchell declared $80 but when he was searched it was discovered that he was carrying $12,000. His explanation? He brought the wrong box of cash.
Quote “…he told Page Six yesterday he ‘grabbed the wrong box’ from his apartment. ‘I have a fear of banks, so I keep cash in my house and I grabbed the wrong box,’ Mitchell said …”
I’m sorry? He’s got a box of $12,000 cash in his house? And it’s only ONE of his boxes of cash?
I think Mitchell is probably right when he says that the search was racially motivated (Quote: “Apparently a black man with dreads can’t carry that much cash”) but I just can’t get past the image of the box of cash.
Or, I should say, BOXES of cash …
A little closer to home — driving home the point that I’m poor while the rest of the world seems to operate on a separate level of economic excess — I recently learned that a friend of mine, someone I went to high school with and who now has a staff position at the university where I teach, makes more money than I do. While I am pretty much resigned to my poverty, information like this — comparing his BA to my PhD, comparing the supposed “clout” or “cultural cache” of my professor position to his cubicle job — creates in me a powerful hostility. I indulge is all kind of petty thoughts about the people who seem to be doing better than I (damn you, Elvis Mitchell!).
And, underneath it all is a terrible fear that my money problems are so deep that I will never be able to pull myself out of them …
I need to go looking for my other box of cash.
You know there are less than two weeks before the Fall semester begins when you are awake at 4 a.m., staring at the ceiling and mentally writing your yearly review narrative, trying to figure out how you will represent the fact that your book manuscript received two contradictory reviews. (Note: the yearly review isn’t due for MONTHS — but try telling that to your monkey mind when it latches onto an anxiety in the middle of the night.)
Or, that you are still awake at 5 a.m. because you finally got out of bed and read blogs for an hour in the vain hope that either you would wake up completely and just start your day, or get tired enough to go back to bed.
Sigh. Insomnia sucks.
Flavia and Mean Something have recently blogged their dreams, so here’s my contribution:
Last night I dreamt that I was enrolled for a summer course and it was the last day of class, the day of the final exam. I was trying to make it to the exam but I couldn’t find my car in a vast, crowded parking lot. I kept walking around with an increasing anxiety, convinced that my car was somewhere, if I could just find it. I would push the buttons on my key fob to unlock the car doors and I would see the familiar flash of the lights and the click as the doors unlocked — but when I walked towards these sounds/sights, my car wouldn’t be there. To condense a wearisome episode, I finally figured out that my car — or at least, the car that would respond to my key fob — was a huge black military-style jeep, nothing like my real car. I was so confused and worried that I decided I should drive this strange vehicle even if it wasn’t my own car, because I so desperately needed to get to my exam.
By this time, I was an hour late for the exam but I finally (somehow) got to the classroom only to discover/remember that the class was being taught by my mom. But, in the dream, my mom was sometimes my mom and sometimes one of my senior colleagues who is a lot like my mom — there was some weird morphing going on between them. At any rate, I was particularly mortified to be showing up an hour late and have to answer to my mom/colleague. In my head, I concocted an elaborate excuse about my car breaking down so I wouldn’t have to admit that I hadn’t been able to find my car.
But, when I went into the classroom, all the other students were finished with the exam and they were eating snacks and joking around, like an end of the semester party. And my mom/colleague was getting ready to leave because she had to participate in some important campus ceremony, so she was distracted and didn’t really notice me. I was completely frozen, unsure how to get her attention, not wanting to admit my stupidity, but really, really desperate to take the final exam.
And then I woke up.
How’s that for a exam-anxiety + lost-in-a-parking-lot + parental-colleague-authority + back-to-school dream? My subconscious was working overtime to weld all those pieces together.
I think it’s fair to say that I’m really stressed out.
Near my house is large, run-down mall. Once upon a time it may have been a nice mall but it’s hit hard times: lots of empty stores, very few customers, a general air of decay and neglect. Basically, it doesn’t have much to offer by way of shopping.
But, it does have a great big empty parking lot. A couple times a year the parking lot gets taken over by traveling fairs — you know, the kind that seem to have Death Trap spelled out in neon lights? I’m always amazed that there are still such fairs and that people still go to them — at least enough to keep them in business.
Also, there is a yearly circus that unfolds its tents in the mall parking lot.
I know that the circus is in town because, as I drive on the highway right by the mall, I look over and there, standing in the parking lot, are two elephants. They are underneath a small tent but it’s open on all sides so the elephants are plainly viewable.
I can’t even express the heart-pain it gives me to see these creatures in this environment. The image is burned into the retinas of my eyes: the small space of the tent, the way they just stand there, their heads bent, the blue plastic tarp over their heads, the asphalt beneath their feet.
The absolute wrongness of their location is maddening to me — and, I suspect, to them.
Animal rights activists are always accused of over sentimentalizing animals — so I won’t talk about the fact that elephants are incredibly intelligent creatures, that they have demonstrated a capacity for deep emotion and memory. I won’t mention that their ability to implement their circus “routines” might be further evidence of their ability to not just learn but to think and feel.
No matter what, they don’t deserve to be standing in the mall parking lot. Surely we can all agree?
My heart is broken for them.
Elephants as they should be.
Working at my local Starbucks this morning (which hasn’t closed yet, thankfully) … and this guy breezes in through the door:
Okay, not Will Smith but a slacker, white boy version of Hancock, complete with scruffy beard, knit cap, and wrap around shades (which he wore the entire time he was inside the store — what a primadonna).
Anyhow, “Hancock” sees some of his pals sitting at a table near me and comes over while throwing out some dramatic “Whattssuuuppp”’s. I manage to ignore him and his slacker chat for a while but suddenly my ears were perked up by this exchange:
HANCOCK (to young woman): You’ve got penis envy.
YOUNG WOMAN: What?
HANCOCK: Yeah, I’ve been learning about penis envy in my philosophy class.
YW: (Silence.)
H: Yeah, there was this woman who started a feminist movement to challenge penis envy, against Freud, ya know. Luce Irigaray [pronounced: Lucy Ir-gu-ray]. Or something, she’s French.
YW: (Silence.)
H: Yeah, I learned all about misogyny [pronounced: mis-SOG-o-nee], ya know, the hatred of women.
YW: Oh, I didn’t know that’s how you pronounced it.
H: Yeah, misogyny [once again pronounced: mis-SOG-o-nee]. You learn this type of crap in college.
Sadly, the young woman’s comment did not have the air of irony and contempt that I wanted it to have. I hate to say that I think she actually believed him. I considered shouting “misogyny” (pronounced correctly) at them, but I draw the line at shouting “misogyny” at anything other than a blatant example of misogyny …
Oh, wait …
Time again for my bi-annual Personal Appearance Crisis.
Ten months out of the year I couldn’t care less about how I look. I’m a pretty poor dresser, always choosing convenience and comfort over fashion. I’m a few wee pounds overweight. I’m going very slowly grey but I can’t be bothered to do more to my hair than wash it, squish a little gel into it, and let it dry. I’ve pretty much stopped wearing cosmetics because, as I’ve said before, they’re evil. Yes, I think it is fair to say that I look terrible but most of the time I just don’t notice.
To borrow this catchy phrase from Clio Bluestocking, I am an “aging nerd girl.” Say it proud, sister.
However, twice a year I take a closer look at myself and feel an urgent need to spiff up. Because I’ve been a student or teacher for basically my whole life, those two times of the year coincide with the start of the Fall semester and the start of the Winter semester.** I have a whole “back to school” anxiety that strikes me as I think about going into new classrooms with new students, into new meetings with new administrators, etc. I am suddenly thrown out of my usual appearance complacence into a desperate desire to be fashionable and look stunning.
(The fact that I know that this P.A.C. will pass as quickly as it comes, because once classes start I will be too harried and exhausted to even think about something as trivial as clothes, doesn’t serve as a comfort … so bear with me.)
The immediate cause for this year’s P.A.C. are my new glasses. Despite what I’ve just said about my fashion complacence, I actually do take buying new glasses seriously. After all, I’ll wear them all day long. On. My. Face. So, I do try to pick glasses that are flattering and fashionable.
Last week, I bought new glasses and spent about 24 hours walking around feeling really pretty. But ever since then I’ve been looking at myself in the mirror and saying: Oh shit. What was I thinking? I’m afraid they’re TOO stylish, too much, an overload of personality on my rather unprepossessing face. What do you do when your glasses are too cool for you?
Basically, I’ve been feeling like I need to upgrade EVERYTHING in order to get away with these glasses: new wardrobe, new body, new attitude. A whole new me.
Either that or take them back to the store.
A bad sign: Today I had lunch with a long-time friend and she didn’t say anything about my new glasses. I think we all know what that means. Sigh.
Once upon a time I worked harder on my personal appearance but a couple of things have happened in the intervening years: I’m getting older and, kids, it just starts to seem really silly after a certain point. Also, I’ve become more committed to an environmental and anti-consumerist lifestyle — which makes it very hard to justify things like 300 pairs of shoes or lots of cool eyeshadow. And, the more I learn about and embrace yogic philosophies, the more I believe that this body is merely temporary — the soul is eternal — so who’s gonna get worked up over something as fleeting as how this body looks today?
Even so, I been studying my face in the mirror, fluffing my hair into new (and, frankly, terrifying) shapes, pawing through the clothes in my closet, and generally feeling that I need to devote a lot of time and money to my appearence.
Don’t worry. It won’t last. But, stay tuned for January!
** Sometimes I have a mini-P.A.C., brought about by a conference that suddenly reminds me that people in the audience will be looking at me. I usually forget that this is the case with my students.
The Bitternsweet Blog got some love over at Squadratomagico. I’m blushing. (I know I’m supposed to, like, nominate some other blogs but seriously I think they’ve all been nominated several times over already.)
***
I have finally taken the time to update my blogroll. I have reluctantly retired some blogs that have gone (hopefully temporarily) dormant: alas, Cheeky Prof and Notes of a Neophyte, I miss you both.
I’ve also decided to omit bloggers that have annoying rules limiting who can post comments on their sites. Note to Blogger bloggers … not everyone has or wants to have a Google account just so they can leave you comments. UPDATE: Okay, I’m kinda slow. It took me a while to catch on to that whole “Open ID” gismo. So, I take back all the curses I’ve been throwing at Blogger. And, I’m reinstating a couple of folks to the ol’ blogroll.
But, I’ve happily added a few new faces that I’ve been reading recently and enjoying immensely, like Maude, PhD featuring the newly minted Dr. Maude, Scattered and Random and Academic Cog. UPDATED: Also, Disenchanted Youth and Clio Bluestocking Tales. More fabulous blogging than I can keep up with!
It’s curious to note that, at this point, the only male blogger I read regularly is Chutry and he’s also one of the few I read who’s not pseudonymous. What’s up with that?
**
With some trepidation, I am putting up an email address. I never posted one because, frankly, I knew I’d never check yet another email. But, as I get a bit deeper into this curious blogging culture, I realize that there are actually folks out there I’d LOVE to get email from. (Just not you, Mr. I Can Make Your Penis Bigger In Ten Easy Payments.)
