Today, I met up with my friend R. at the university where I did my undergraduate education -and where I latter lectured-. I hadn't been there since I started my PhD and I wasn't sure how I felt about going.
Driving up there I noticed how much things have changed: you need to give your ID at the door due to recent burglaries on campus, the old coffee and book store is gone and new, chain ones, have opened. Most things, however, are still the same: the kids looking just the same as they did when I started school there ten years ago, the quiet atmosphere and the brisk air of zone 15 have not changed one bit.
And I also ran into some of my former students (I'm still surprised as just how many kiddies were either in the classes I lectured or TA-ed). I laughed so much, and they still remembered so many of the silly things we would pull in class. And they seem so happy to see me that I cant' help but to want to have to go there every day again. Sure, the pay was shitty, I don't really like (aka, I detest) the head of my department now, and I have to go to Sweden (and I want to go to Sweden)... but for a few hours, it was like being back home.
Friday, January 29, 2010
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Same as I've always been
Over the years, I've grown quite fond of finding patterns in the way I cope with things or continuity in the way I carry out my life and deal with what's important to me. Sometimes, these mechanisms are good and they have helped me get to where I am today. Sometimes, they are bad and have also helped me get to where I am today...
So today, my mom and I went through all her papers to try and find either my Guatemalan ID, or my Guatemalan birth certificate. We were unsuccessful in both accounts. However, we did find a lot of old and cool stuff. For example, I found out that as a little girl, I had terrible allergies that kept me from going to school a lot. That happened again when I was a little older, and starting high school. I didn't have allergies, but I stayed out of school most of eight grade because I was sick. I always thought I exaggerated to get to miss class, but I also discovered I didn't. Like when I was a little preschooler, I had legitimate reasons to be away from the classroom. I just downplayed them in my head so that most of the burden of missing school would fall on me, and not my health.
I also found a lot of my old report cards. I was very much surprised with the fact I had straight A's. Over the (very) many years I've been in school, I've always thought of my self as a more or less average student that just so happened to end up doing a PhD. I've never really considered myself very intelligent, although I freely admit I am not a complete moron. Tonight, as I went through the papers with my mom, I told her that I never realized that I kept getting good grades. I only recall not being as good as I thought I could be (something I still feel today).
As I hone in on my last year as a twenty-something, its nice to see some connecting dots to all that I've been doing: I was getting good grades and enjoying school, despite being sick and having problems coping with being back in Guatemala after our small stint abroad. My teachers described me (in my report cards) with many of the same character traits that I have today, and as I was going through my stuff I realized that I didn't stumble into school, I worked for it over the course of many years. A life project, if you will. And I was doing it without noticing that I was working so hard, or that I enjoyed it so much. I guess its those little tricks we play on ourselves...
Could it be I actually had a plan behind my madness? Your guess is as good as mine. For now though, I will just entertain myself with the memories of the very willful little girl that taught herself how to read so she could program the VCR to tape her cartoons :)
So today, my mom and I went through all her papers to try and find either my Guatemalan ID, or my Guatemalan birth certificate. We were unsuccessful in both accounts. However, we did find a lot of old and cool stuff. For example, I found out that as a little girl, I had terrible allergies that kept me from going to school a lot. That happened again when I was a little older, and starting high school. I didn't have allergies, but I stayed out of school most of eight grade because I was sick. I always thought I exaggerated to get to miss class, but I also discovered I didn't. Like when I was a little preschooler, I had legitimate reasons to be away from the classroom. I just downplayed them in my head so that most of the burden of missing school would fall on me, and not my health.
I also found a lot of my old report cards. I was very much surprised with the fact I had straight A's. Over the (very) many years I've been in school, I've always thought of my self as a more or less average student that just so happened to end up doing a PhD. I've never really considered myself very intelligent, although I freely admit I am not a complete moron. Tonight, as I went through the papers with my mom, I told her that I never realized that I kept getting good grades. I only recall not being as good as I thought I could be (something I still feel today).
As I hone in on my last year as a twenty-something, its nice to see some connecting dots to all that I've been doing: I was getting good grades and enjoying school, despite being sick and having problems coping with being back in Guatemala after our small stint abroad. My teachers described me (in my report cards) with many of the same character traits that I have today, and as I was going through my stuff I realized that I didn't stumble into school, I worked for it over the course of many years. A life project, if you will. And I was doing it without noticing that I was working so hard, or that I enjoyed it so much. I guess its those little tricks we play on ourselves...
Could it be I actually had a plan behind my madness? Your guess is as good as mine. For now though, I will just entertain myself with the memories of the very willful little girl that taught herself how to read so she could program the VCR to tape her cartoons :)
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Word count: zero
I don't know why, but I'm just not in the mood to write. Maybe its because I just handed in (what I hope is) a final version of manuscript 1/4. Maybe its because being in Guatemala is not conducive to academic writing. Maybe its because I can't read two paragraphs without wanting to do something else.
*sigh
I need to work.
*sigh
I need to work.
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