The day I revived this blog, or why grad school is like a rigorous swimming race run by pirates.

Hello! I apologize for my long absence. At the beginning of the summer, I had this quaint notion that I would keep up this blog while writing my MRP (Major Research Project, required for the completion of my MA). I remember reading somewhere that it's good to just be writing, regardless of what it is--the more you write, the more you write! So I thought that keeping up this blog would inspire me to write my MRP. That, clearly, did not work out this time. I have faith in future me--I think she will eventually figure out this whole working from home/coffee shops and writing and revising endlessly without the brain exploding thing. I have faith in her. I really do. But current me struggled a bit.

A lot of people seem to be under the impression that grad school is a lovely little stepping stone between undergrad and the "real world." (Granted, these people aren't usually grad students.) They think that it's a place for the undecided, those who aren't ready to leave the "student life" (read: binge drinking and watching full seasons of Mad Men in one sitting), those who aren't ready to grow up and accept responsibility for themselves. Well, if those are your reasons for doing a master's degree, you will be thoroughly disappointed. Grad student is no entry-level position. It's sink or swim, baby. I've learned that it's not so hard to deviate from your rigorous swimming, to stop for a moment to tread water and look around only to end up drifting away...slowly at first, so you don't even really notice, but eventually you get lost in the abyss and no helping hands or ropes appear to pull you back on track.

There are support networks, of course there are. There are your fellow students and your supervisor and  other faculty members. And they tell you what you need to do. Hand in your proposals by this day, present your ideas to your peers this day, have a first draft done this day, try and schedule in some time to have between 1-5 mental breakdowns. And for someone who likes deadlines (I really like deadlines...), this seems great. Until you realize that apparently academics are all a bunch of bloody pirates and the "code" you thought you were following is really just a bunch of guidelines and no one is actually penalized for missing deadlines and so you start to just not follow them and no one cares and you start to drift farther and farther away from your goals...

But as much as I'm learning that grad school is not a nice, refreshing, relaxing, safe dip in the kiddie pool before diving into the deep end of "real life," but instead is some sort of rigorous swimming race run by pirates (I think this metaphor got away from me...)*, I'm also learning that I'm learning a lot from it. I finished my MRP, and it passed, but I didn't love the finished product, and that's okay. I did what I could in the time that I had, and I got some really great stuff out of it--stuff I want to come back to later, once I've taken a break from that particular piece of writing and gotten a bit of perspective. I tried to do too much at once and I couldn't see the forest for the trees. The kernels of really good stuff, like my exploration of the homosocial relationship between Nick Carter and Brian Littrell of the Backstreet Boys or my reading of the Backstreet Boys' "Everybody (Backstreet's Back)" video alongside Michael Jackson's "Thriller" video, got lost in my attempt to weed through way too much theory that I was unfamiliar with. But I really learned a lot from that experience, and I'm excited to continue to work with that material.

And now that I've started my final year of coursework (!!!), I'm really starting to see how much I've learned in the past year, and how much I've unlearned. Doing readings for my first week of classes was SO MUCH EASIER this year than it was last year. When I started reading the articles for my first term courses last year, I was completely and utterly overwhelmed. I grasped maybe half of the readings--and I only grasped them, I couldn't make any sort of complex argument about them. I didn't know how to respond except to say, "Yes, I understand this one," or, "No, I have no idea what the fuck is going on." And by no means am I an expert this year, but at least I feel competent. I don't feel so lost. And that's an absolutely wonderful feeling. I've also "unlearned" quite a bit too, and I think I'm still in the process of letting go of some things. I'm unlearning some of my perfectionism--ideas do not need to be fully formed and perfect before you speak up in class or you share your writing with others. In a lot of cases, it's almost better that these ideas aren't perfect, so we can have the opportunity to help each other out. But that's something that the pirate-run swimming race can ruin a bit. It's hard on us, so we're hard on each other. Someone once crushed our spirits, so it's our turn to crush someone else's. And complaining about the harshness of academic culture just invites criticisms about "my generation" and how we're too  "soft" and we've been "coddled" and told we can be whatever we want and are never criticized and were hugged too much as children or something. I'm sorry, but if you are of an older generation, it was YOU who coddled us and told us we could do anything and hugged us, so stop whining about how soft we are. And also, what is so terrible about being nice to one another and expecting kindness in return?!?! Seriously, I thought the idea was that I was supposed to be holding onto my youthful optimism as long as possible before becoming jaded and bitter. I'm only 23. Give me a break and let me be idealistic for a little while longer.

I've gone off on a tangent here. I think the moral of this story is: "Just keep swimming."

Kinda puts things in perspective, doesn't it?

* I tried Google imaging "pirate swimming race" to see if I could find a silly picture to include. The first three images were of women's butts. I don't understand.

The day the nervous energy took hold, or why I'm telling my term papers to BRING IT.

In a couple of my classes over the past few weeks, we've been discussing the idea of "happiness" as something that cannot be understood as a neutral, obvious "good." Happiness is inevitably tied up in ideas of what it means to be the "right kind" of happy, the "right kind" of person. We've been discussing how unhappiness, melancholia, stress and fear can be productive feelings, and perhaps not always so "bad" that they must be done away with as soon as possible and replaced with happiness. Sometimes that is not possible. Sometimes that is not desirable. Sometimes that involves forgetting "bad" things that should not be forgotten. Sometimes that involves anaesthetizing one's self, checking out from a situation or a life that needs to be paid attention to.

This morning I took a good, hard look at my calendar. Today is April 10. Between now and April 25, there are three term paper due dates written in bright blue marker. Despite the fact that I hadn't had my coffee yet, I felt a little more awake and my heart started to beat a little faster. I went online and read my professor's feedback on an essay proposal I submitted last week. She suggested about nine thousand other amazing sources I should look up. This essay, at approximately 20 pages, will be the longest essay I've ever written. I want to make it good enough that it will also be the first essay I ever try and submit to a journal. My heart started thumping... I could feel the blood moving through my veins, warming up my limbs. I felt the adrenaline. Suddenly I felt the urge to do something, anything, to be productive and get 'er done.

Am I relaxed? Hell no. Am I at peace, am I smiling, am I displaying all those usual signs of happiness? Not at all. Will the faint wrinkles that are developing under my eyes and between my eyebrows be a little bit deeper by April 25? You bet. (Side note: The media would have you believe that there are a good ten years or so between acne and wrinkles. NOT TRUE. Apparently there's this lovely period in your early- to mid-twenties--and perhaps beyond, I haven't gotten there yet--when you notice you have both pimples and little wrinkles. Oh joy.) But is this a "bad" feeling? Do I want to trade in this stress and fear and nervous energy for a life of no worries and eternal "good feelings"? Fuck no! As I said in my last post, my life is fucking awesome--stress, fear and all.

Term papers, BRING IT ON.

Time for an academic smackdown, Courtney and Whitney stylez.

The day it was "that time of year," or why life is awesome and I love you all.

I apologize for being MIA for the past month. I would say, "It's that time of year," but isn't that always the excuse academics give for, well, everything? And I mean, seriously, what exactly is "that time of year"? Yes, March was hectic, it always is--courses are really in full swing, there are presentations and response papers to do, term paper proposals to do, major research project proposals to hand in, marking to do, etc., etc., etc. But April is bad too--marking to finish up and term papers to write. And then there's a conference in May, and research to do for my MRP, and then there's my MRP to write and I'm moving in June (a two bedroom!! My computer won't have to be in the living room! And we get a washing machine!! And a deck!!) and I want to spend some time at the cottage and visit friends and maybe go to Halifax in August and then I start coursework for my PhD in September (I got in!! Yay!)... And September's always hectic, because there's so much to organize and you have to settle in, and then October is busy because you're getting into the swing of things and things start to be due and if you're applying for OGS and SSHRC your applications are due and you probably have your first batch of marking and November is just like March and December is like April and January comes much too soon and it's kind of like September except Christmas break was way too short and way too busy with family and friends and in February you are so ready for a break but reading week is way too short and there's marking to be done and....so it goes.

So yeah. It's that time of year! It's always that time of year. So no excuses. I just had other things I was doing and this fell to the side. But that's okay. I'm tired of complaining about how busy things are at "this time of year" or in "this day and age"--yes, it's true, life is stressful and there is tons going on and we never get a break because we're always plugged in and there's no jobs so we have to stay plugged in or fall behind. But I find it hard to believe that this is the first time in the history of the world that people have been stressed and things haven't been absolutely relaxed and perfect and easy. So I've decided to refuse to embrace the negativity. Too many of my conversations with my friends and colleagues end up being about how busy and stressed and sleep-deprived we are--never about how excited we are about something, or about anything positive or fun. We're breeding anxiety and negativity and it's bumming me out!

But you know what? I think things are going pretty fucking wonderfully. I'm in the process of building a life right now, and I'm pretty pleased with the way things are turning out. I've built a home with Jimmifer, a man I love very, very much (mostly because he lets me call him Jimmifer), and we're upgrading to a home where I hopefully will not get attacked by the soap dish, and we live close enough to our families that we get to see them on a regular basis, which is important to me. I have wonderful old friends that I still keep in touch with, and I've made wonderful new friends this year and I'm excited to spend the summer hanging out with them. I'm almost finished my master's coursework, and I feel like I've developed a strong theoretical foundation, which makes me confident that I can pull off this whole PhD thing. I'm finishing up TAing for the first time, and as much as marking is painful, it is awesome to see how much my students have grown over the year. And my students were just absolutely lovely, and I got wonderful feedback from them, and it feels SO GOOD. I get to spend my summer writing about queer theory and boy bands, which is awesome, and it turns out that apparently boy bands are making a comeback, so hopefully someone will find my work relevant and I can get published. I'm going to my first conference in May. I'm staring my DOCTORATE, which is pretty much all I've ever dreamed of since I started my undergrad. And I'm going to get a kitty at the end of the summer, which is pretty much all I've ever dreamed of since I was four. So yeah. Life is fucking AWESOME.

Like this awesome. For realz.