random bullets of crap: existential edition

--> the worst loneliness I've ever experienced was being lonely together with someone. It created a fundamental alienation from the very possibility of relationship.

--> I'm having that pressing feeling that higher education is a sham, that my job is not to impart wisdom, strength, self-reliance, or critical skills. Rather, I'm starting to think that my job is to teach people to endure that which is uninteresting.

--> I recently had a realization that academic careers can easily turn into abusive relationships (this is a "psychological analogy," Flight of the Conchords fans). The twin message, if you grant the "calling" of the academic life any power is (a) that you are never good enough, but (b) that no one else will ever love you the way I do. I want to get out of this abusive cycle.

--> the first way I started to break this cycle has been to unapologetically take weekends for myself. If it isn't done on Friday, it won't get looked at again until Monday. This has left me feeling empowered, but has temporarily left a void that used to filled with guilt, worry, and pacing.

--> another thing I'll need to do is restructure my relationship to writing. It has to be either targeted formulaic disciplinary stuff that accomplishes "just doing the job" or transdiciplinary creative work that targets broader readerships.

--> I have the sinking feeling that all of my clutter reveals an avoidance of happiness. Could making my space happy and neat help me actually be happy and neat?

--> I want to laugh more, create more, take more chances, learn new things, force myself out of my comfort zones, follow my desires, and become irresistible.

lessons in temporality

I had a student who emailed all exasperated and annoyed about going to her section of my class at 4:00 today only to find the room empty. I explained that there is not a 4:00 section today or any day. Oh, bless their little hearts.

OMG moment!

I don't want this space to be about bitching, but I just received an email form a student asking for a reminder of the room location for the class he is enrolled in. Perhaps I should offer to swing by later and pick him up for class?

reduce, reuse, recycle

Earlier this week was the four year anniversary of this blog. For that entire period, the blog was mainly pseudonymous [Dr. M, dr. m(mmmmm), m(mmm), among other variations]. I've been an infrequent poster for quite some time. I thought about bringing it to a close, but I like the title and several of my posts. I have decided to become less anonymous and to focus this blog on academic-type musing, minus the whining and angst provided by anonymity. For photos and more whimsical things, I will use the space of my 2008 daily photo project, opportunistic body language. I decided to keep the posts from my first month (January 2005) and several other posts, many with photos, from the past four years. I think I sent about 450 posts to the ether.

headlines

Favorite local headline of the week: "Officer Tasers Agitated Lawyer."

Funniest ambiguity: "Piece of the Past Returns: Through an Unlikely Series of Events, Her Grandmother's Fur is Found."

by special request: (p)update!

Fanny Lou (aka Monkey Paw, Fan Fan, Fanners); Louie Atlas (aka Boop, Little Louie, The Boy); and Roxy Brown (aka Squid Eye, Rox, The Little One). Taken this afternoon in the back yard.

dreamy

Since I usually do not remember my dreams, I like to jot them down here in case someone wishes to hazard an interpretation. The dreams I remember are usually of two kinds: either I am being chased by something like a large alligator and I feel like I'm running waist-deep in tar or the setting is utterly mundane with some random weird element. This dream was of the latter sort. What I remember is the imagery. I am at some kind of social event because it is a crowded setting. People are milling around, chatting, walking by. Then I start to see that every time I stop to look at someone, I see they are wearing an article of my clothing. At first I think it's a coincidence, but soon I realize that everyone is wearing my clothes. No one seems to recognize me, or to express any shame or discomfort that they have been found out. Oddly, I recognize most of the people, but I do not know any of them. These are people I see around campus, the gym, the neighborhood, or the pub--but whom I have no relationship with at all.

lazy, hazy, and dozing