The past week has been rough going. For some reason I am not dealing well with the transition from summer to back-to-school this year. Everything was annoying me. Here's the short list of people I temporarily wanted to throttle last week:
1. The other members of the editorial team for the website I kindly help to edit for a professional organization. Please don't launch the website unless you're relatively positive you really have gotten all of the kinks out, especially when one of the kinks is all of the e-mail sent to any contact on the site--ALL OF IT--coming to my inbox instead. Also, if you have told me that the deadline for finishing a particular project is "Immediately once the website is launched," then I would like some warning about when it's actually going to launch, as opposed to just receiving the same e-mail that the rest of the 2,000 members in the organization received the day it went live. That took some scrambling.
2. Students registering for my fall class. There are two sections of the exact same class. I'm so glad that 20 of you decided to register for my section, leaving my colleague with only 5 students. And I'm sorry, but if my class fills up before the first day of school you are out of luck. Why in the world would I let you oversubscribe my course and become my 26th student when the exact same course is being held a mere three hours earlier and only has 5 students in it?
3. My friend's 4-year-old. Aw hell no, child, you do not throw a food wrapper on the floor and respond to my polite request to put it in the trashcan with, "YOU do it." Count your blessings that I am only the baby-sitter so all I could do was give you my meanest look and my sternest, "No, YOU opened it so YOU do it."
Other things were annoying me, too, but I've actually been in a good mood for the past couple of days and rehashing the list will just remind me of why I was so annoyed in the first place last week. I think I'd rather just let it all go and move on. I was so obnoxious last week. I cried out of frustration two nights in a row recently, both times over absurd things. The one night I was sobbing on Penn's shoulder because I was worried about how having a baby might make us the kind of dreary, hopeless, dragging-through-life-with-just-the-bare-necessities-never-trying-new-things-or-having-fun kind of people I never want to be, and suddenly in the back of my mind I was like, "Wow, this is a really irrational thing to be worrying about. Crap, what if this is a hormone thing and I'm already pregnant?!?!" Luckily that fear was averted the next day (but, um, yes, I guess it was a hormone thing!). Anyway, I think the brief bout with moodiness has passed.
Now I just need to convince myself that I'm excited about the school year starting. For the most part, that's true. I'm excited to teach my fall class (hooray for teaching my own course two terms in a row!), I'm excited about having time to devote to my dissertation instead of to summer projects, I'm excited about all the fall activities coming up and the fact that every week brings me closer to the wedding and a three-week honeymoon.
I also need to convince myself that, even though I'm not as on-track with my dissertation as I hoped to be at this point, I have done a lot of other important, career-building things. I think part of my grumpiness lately comes from the fact that it has been almost a year since I took my comprehensive exams and I feel like I haven't advanced at all since that time. That's not true at all, though. In the past year I went to London to do research for my department and helped to lay the foundation for a study abroad program, I completed a bunch of the requirements toward a university teacher certification that's going to look awesome on the resume, I wrote a book review that is being published next month (!), I wrote and defended my dissertation prospectus, I directed a show, I created and taught a summer course, I was invited to present a paper at an upcoming conference, I became the assistant editor of two publications and a website. That's not bad for a year's work, and that's not including the fact that I've been planning a wedding and holding down my part-time tutoring job in addition to my university job.
I need to stop comparing myself to other academics. I need to start giving myself more credit for the things I have accomplished so far. I need to give myself permission to work at a reasonable pace and give myself credit for each step I take in the right direction, knowing that I will finish this degree eventually. And I need to remind myself that the goals I initially thought I had when I started this degree have changed. It's not just me in the picture anymore. I'm not discounting the importance of finishing the program, but I'm factoring different priorities now, too. But that's a whole 'nother post.
P.S.-In all the frustration of last week I did have one really big highlight: my wedding dress was delivered to the bridal shop and I had my first fitting! I hadn't seen the dress in the shade I ordered (I tried it on in true white and ordered it in "pearl"), so it was so exciting getting to see and try on my actual dress. I love it! And it doesn't even need alterations, just hemming and a bustle. While I was there I also bought my veil. It was the second one I put on and the instant I did I was like, "Yes, that's it! That's exactly how I want to look." I get to go for another fitting in two months and I already can't wait for that, much less wait for the day I get to put it on and walk down the aisle.
3. My friend's 4-year-old. Aw hell no, child, you do not throw a food wrapper on the floor and respond to my polite request to put it in the trashcan with, "YOU do it." Count your blessings that I am only the baby-sitter so all I could do was give you my meanest look and my sternest, "No, YOU opened it so YOU do it."
Other things were annoying me, too, but I've actually been in a good mood for the past couple of days and rehashing the list will just remind me of why I was so annoyed in the first place last week. I think I'd rather just let it all go and move on. I was so obnoxious last week. I cried out of frustration two nights in a row recently, both times over absurd things. The one night I was sobbing on Penn's shoulder because I was worried about how having a baby might make us the kind of dreary, hopeless, dragging-through-life-with-just-the-bare-necessities-never-trying-new-things-or-having-fun kind of people I never want to be, and suddenly in the back of my mind I was like, "Wow, this is a really irrational thing to be worrying about. Crap, what if this is a hormone thing and I'm already pregnant?!?!" Luckily that fear was averted the next day (but, um, yes, I guess it was a hormone thing!). Anyway, I think the brief bout with moodiness has passed.
Now I just need to convince myself that I'm excited about the school year starting. For the most part, that's true. I'm excited to teach my fall class (hooray for teaching my own course two terms in a row!), I'm excited about having time to devote to my dissertation instead of to summer projects, I'm excited about all the fall activities coming up and the fact that every week brings me closer to the wedding and a three-week honeymoon.
I also need to convince myself that, even though I'm not as on-track with my dissertation as I hoped to be at this point, I have done a lot of other important, career-building things. I think part of my grumpiness lately comes from the fact that it has been almost a year since I took my comprehensive exams and I feel like I haven't advanced at all since that time. That's not true at all, though. In the past year I went to London to do research for my department and helped to lay the foundation for a study abroad program, I completed a bunch of the requirements toward a university teacher certification that's going to look awesome on the resume, I wrote a book review that is being published next month (!), I wrote and defended my dissertation prospectus, I directed a show, I created and taught a summer course, I was invited to present a paper at an upcoming conference, I became the assistant editor of two publications and a website. That's not bad for a year's work, and that's not including the fact that I've been planning a wedding and holding down my part-time tutoring job in addition to my university job.
I need to stop comparing myself to other academics. I need to start giving myself more credit for the things I have accomplished so far. I need to give myself permission to work at a reasonable pace and give myself credit for each step I take in the right direction, knowing that I will finish this degree eventually. And I need to remind myself that the goals I initially thought I had when I started this degree have changed. It's not just me in the picture anymore. I'm not discounting the importance of finishing the program, but I'm factoring different priorities now, too. But that's a whole 'nother post.
P.S.-In all the frustration of last week I did have one really big highlight: my wedding dress was delivered to the bridal shop and I had my first fitting! I hadn't seen the dress in the shade I ordered (I tried it on in true white and ordered it in "pearl"), so it was so exciting getting to see and try on my actual dress. I love it! And it doesn't even need alterations, just hemming and a bustle. While I was there I also bought my veil. It was the second one I put on and the instant I did I was like, "Yes, that's it! That's exactly how I want to look." I get to go for another fitting in two months and I already can't wait for that, much less wait for the day I get to put it on and walk down the aisle.
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