The Laursonian Institute

Boo goes colloquially by Jingles around these parts some times.  Sometimes I also feel like those jingles are the perfect pick-me-up to a tanking day.  It’s funny how endearing the tinyness of Boo’s existence can be.  But I guess sometimes you just need something that simple to pluck you from the theoretical storm cloud brewing in your head.

It’s silly that my days feel like they’re tanking lately.  Classes are going pretty well.  I’m really worried about Sociolinguistics, but the material is interesting and the challenge, though great, seems surmountable in my moments of optimism.  Bed time is never a moment of optimism.  This is the time of night this stuff sinks in.   I look at my day tomorrow and all I see is myself one moment closer to what must be inevitable TAing mediocrity, and one day closer to the deadline of my Socioling initial research proposal which I am completely floundering about.  This is a little over-dramatic.  After reading all day, this is what happens.  It’s ridiculous to say I’m working too hard when it feels like all I’m going is leisurely reading research papers about subjects I like.  It’s not even hard reading.  And all it is is reading.  But when I crash right about 9:00, like I do most nights, it seems, I wonder if I work too hard.

It’s true I got up at 6, and was busy getting us ready to go to school.  I had class till 11:30 and did a little of what I’m going to call “grad student stuff” for a bit.  Had lunch with Lewis, which is definitely quantifiable as a break, though we were talking about class.  Was home by 1, went straight to TA work and reading.  Read till 5.  Helped Lewis study for Latin test tomorrow.  Turned on the debate at 6, and watched it while simultaneously skim-reading another paper.  Had a brain storming conversation about research proposals with Lewis again.  Finished said paper after debate ended.  Eyes glazed over, doom descended, and a general aversion to bed set in.  I blogged.

And now here we are.  Blogging and dreading again.  But the somewhat meta-frustrating reality of it is that tomorrow I’ll wake up, it will only seem 3/4th as hard, I’ll go through the motions, getting up, making breakfast, studying, class, studying, class… and by 6:00 my weekend will be upon me.  My day will culminate in drinking and festivities with the grad students in the department.  And that’ll be it.  I’ll have fun, some things will go well, some things will discourage me, and I’ll start it all over again.  And with this washing-machine-like emotional cycle in mind, I’ll say one thing definitively that I stupidly had never bothered to anticipate:  grad school is hard.  Now, to sleep on it.

October 2nd, 2008 | Tags: dread, kitty, pensiveness | Category: life, school | Comments Off