Chucks

Earlier today I was doing a round of housecleaning-- sweeping, vacuuming, etc. I have to wear lace-up shoes while doing this -- not only for the psychological benefits of taking your housecleaning seriously, but mostly because I used to live in a part of the US in which the brown recluse spider was common. They are poisonous to nearly everyone, but some individuals are especially allergic to their venom. One year while I was in graduate school there was a horrible case in the news -- a woman had been vacuuming her home while barefoot and disturbed the spider, which bit her. She was really allergic and fell into a coma. By the time she woke up (I think several months later) all of her arms and legs had been amputated to save her life. So, ever since, I vacuum only while well-shod.

Anyway. My running shoes were caked with mud from taking the dogs to the park yesterday, so for some reason I pulled out my old hi-top Converse sneakers, which I haven't really worn in ages. They're splattered with paint from when we moved into this house -- but even long before that they weren't in my regular rotation. But wearing them as I cleaned made me feel pretty happy -- it's hard not to feel cool in Chucks. They were one of the few seriously symbolic pieces of clothing I've ever owned.

I got my first pair -- black, of course -- sometime during high school. I was mostly wearing boots all the time (a kind of elfen pair and a punkier suede with those fireman jacket buckles all the way up the side), but Chucks were cool for summer.

By the time I went to university, I had my old black pair and new yellow ones. This was the early/mid-80s, so they were perfect with mini-skirts, with brightly colored leggings, and the enormous wrinkly satin shirts that were really hip my freshman year. I went to school on the East Coast, at a place full of preppies -- serious old-money preppies, not the wanna-bes who just shopped JCrew. So the Converse were a kind of signal for those of us in the soon-to-be underground. All the freshmen were housed in dorms in one part of campus, and so I soon knew that there was a girl with red ones 2 buildings over. Somebody came up to me a few weeks into the term and said, "hey, you're the girl with the yellow Chucks, right?"

There were other signals we were all busy sending -- our haircuts, our t-shirts, our music -- but the Chucks were a big part of resisting the dominant style of the place (which tended towards khakis, perfect white t-shirts, those preppy jute(?) woven totebags, and loafers). They were a recognizable symbol of the margin -- a shared vocabulary that even the prepsters could read. (This was a seriously preppy place -- which made it really easy for us to be the cutting edge of alterna-fashion, 80s style. . . I was once stopped in the library by a guy who took a look at me and said "you like the Cure, right?" All of those signals were so important for us back then.)

Over the years since college I gradually stopped wearing Chucks -- partly because I was trying to look older, I guess -- and partly because my feet were finally protesting years of mistreatment. (Anybody else remember high-impact aerobics classes in the 80s?) I wore them sometimes in the summer, since summer clothes and shoes have always been so puzzling and problematic for me. (To this day, I wind up looking like a 12-year old boy or a camp counselor on the hottest days, if I'm not in my work clothes.) But the Chucks have been sitting in the corner of the closet for a long time.

Too long, I think. My best friend recently bought herself her first pair of Converse -- pink ones -- at the age of 40. She says it's one of the most happiness-generating purchases she's ever made. Wearing Chucks makes people respond to you differently, too, even if you are a nearing-middle-aged mom of 3. (her, not me.)

I might have to get a new pair -- not because of the paint, but because my aging feet seem to have spread out a bit. But I'm thinking it's time to regain some attitude for my feet.

a great class -- and miscellany from my day

Today is one of those days when I just feel so damn lucky to be able to do this for a living. I spent the morning rereading and thinking about poems from one of my favorite poets (Elizabeth Barrett Browning) and this afternoon discussing them with my students. My undergrads this semester are really sharp -- I'm so impressed and pleased. Last time I taught this course I had a much slower group. So discussion was lively and interesting, and I had a great time. The only problem is that we are already behind the syllabus. But good discussion is worth that, I think.

A joke that only Victorianists who listen to hip hop music or smoke weed might understand (maybe there's one of you out there?) . In a paper on Tennyson's poem "The Lotus Eaters," one of my students repeatedly mistyped "Choric Song" as "Chronic Song." Yup, those tranced-out sailors might just as well have been smokin the chronic...

A new low for students (not mine) paying attention in class: I received a very apologetic email from a student today explaining that she had missed the Blake quiz on Tues and could she make it up. The problem is that she's taking a class that I am not teaching. (Nor have I ever taught it.) I wrote her back and politely suggested that she consult her syllabus to discover the name of her professor.

my auto repair guys

My 11-year-old car is in the shop today. It was diagnosed 3 months ago with an incurable oil-burning engine problem, so at this point I'm simply adding oil to it regularly and trying to get as much life as I can out of it. Luckily, I don't have a very long commute, so it's possible that I can get a year or more out of it before having to buy a new car (and take on more debt). But today it's in the shop because I need new struts. There's other stuff too -- it needs a new axle, but that can wait a while. But the struts are a safety thing -- it had started to feel shaky on the freeway, and my Dour Crusty Mechanic said "I'd worry about you if we didn't do this now."

I don't like having my car in the shop -- who does? -- but I've come to really trust and like the people at this particular shop, who've been caring for my car for over five years now. It's run by a Greek family -- an older man and two brothers. Dour Crusty Mechanic is the head mechanic, and there's a slew of other guys who do various things. Brother #1 is the best at explaining things to the customers and setting the priorities for the day's work. The Brothers mostly manage the shop, I guess , rather than getting under the cars, but they know a heck of a lot.

The Bikram yoga studio I go to is only a few blocks away from the car place, so I try to schedule my oil changes around yoga class -- I'll drop the car off, go to class, and by the time I'm done they've finished the regular service. So one day Brother #1 asked me what I'd been doing, and I said I'd been at yoga. "Oh, the hot yoga place over on X street?" he said. Yes, I said, and I started chatting to him about the benefits of Bikram yoga. He sounded interested --he had a back injury he was rehabbing that was keeping him from running as much as he usually does. And he noted "A lot of our customers talk about the yoga -- men too."

But I was fairly surprised when he actually showed up in yoga class a few days later. He got really hooked on it -- he's about my age, in pretty good shape, and yoga practice helped him strengthen his spine and improve his flexibility.

One Saturday, after a particularly intense class, several of us were sitting on the benches in the front garden area, talking about the mental benefits of yoga practice. Brother #1 said "for me, it's a lot like going to church. There's certain things you have to do, certain rituals, they're talking in a foreign language -- it's really calming for the mind." (He attends a traditional Greek Orthodox church.) And I think he's absolutely right. That's part of what practice is all about.

He'd told me that he was keeping his yoga practice a secret from the guys at the shop, who would give him a hard time if they knew what he was doing. But as a manager, he can skip out for two hours without being noticed. (Although I would think the sweaty glow post-yoga might be a telltale sign.) I hadn't seen him in class for a while -- this morning he explained that he had injured his back again moving a washing machine, and hadn't been going to yoga. He's ready to sign up again this month, though, and sounded enthusiastic about returning to class. I like seeing him there -- it's a kind of weird overlapping of worlds that I enjoy.

Today I noticed that there was a stick of incense burning at the front desk where he was working. I wonder how long his yoga practice is going to remain a secret.

vent

It is a truth universally acknowledged that there are few things more annoying than a colleague who sends a 300-page PDF document to print on the one and only printer for the entire department 10 minutes before the main class hour for the afternoon starts.

Except for when he does it again later in the day, 10 minutes before my evening class started.

Guess who tends to print her lecture notes right before class time?

on procrastination

Well, I have just spent the last two hours simply hanging around, half-watching a movie with my gf, instead of getting right down to the class prep tasks that I ought to do tonight. Why is this?? Several possible answers:

1. I don't really need to do these tasks tonight -- I can do them in the morning before class tomorrow. (I teach afternoon and night classes.)
2. According to my favorite procrastination self-help book (Neil Fiore's The Now Habit), most procrastination stems from one of 3 core reasons: fear of success, fear of failure, or resentment of authority. It's the last one that usually gets me regarding teaching stuff. Not authority, per se, but resentment all the same. Resenting the intrusion of the institution and my students into my home, my weekend, my evening, whatever (this usually comes up when I have papers to grade). (Just because I'm admitting to my procrastination doesn't mean you shouldn't read this book -- it's actually been incredibly helpful to me at certain times. Maybe I'm due for a re-reading.)
3. I actually thrive on the adrenalin of doing it all tomorrow.
   
4. This is part of the transition into the new semester and its new schedule.
   
5. I'm tired.
6. I'm bored.

I think it's bits and pieces of all of the above. Obviously, this isn't career-threatening procrastination. Just incredibly irritating. And I am sitting at the computer now, so once I finish this I'll write up some new notes for tomorrow's first class, take care of administrivia, and reread the essays for my other class.

The worst problem about procrastinating, which Fiore is quite eloquent about, is that you don't fully enjoy whatever it is that you're doing while procrastinating, since you feel bad/guilty about it. So it is actually better just to start doing something.

Here I go.

Sunday list

Profgrrrrl is cleaning up and PowerProf has a long task list before her classes start. Myself, I'm torn between my professional responsibilities and dealing with the state of our house.

We (me, my partner, and 2 dogs) live in a TINY little house, which dates from a period when people didn't have closets built into their walls. Two very insufficient closets were added later on, but storage options are pretty limited. We've added wardrobes from IKEA that totally changed my life -- my clothes are all in one place, and actually in the bedroom! and I've been creative with bookshelves etc. But all of this means that we have to regularly purge stuff or we will be overwhelmed. I actually think this is a really good thing, since my genetic heritage and early childhood training was to keep everything.

So, it's the beginning of a new year AND we have a houseguest coming in 3 weeks. So I've got the clean & purge bug. Though some of those tasks are going to have to be spread out over the next couple weekends. What's actually possible/necessary for today:

Research/Teaching:

• Make work plan for the week
• Half an hour minimum reviewing and sorting materials for my current article
• Scan, scan, scan a zillion readings for my grad class
• Finish updating WebCT sites and my general university site (which I've been redoing in CSS) [made some good progress though not finished yet]

Life Maintenance Projects:

• Weed out my clothes again: just say no to faded black pants and anything from my first or second year of teaching. Jeez. I could really use some wardrobe updates...
• Hem my new black pants. This is a major stall in the updating process -- I bought them (2 pairs end of last spring, 2 pairs last week) but haven't been able to wear them yet.
• Sorting/filing/updating financial records, bills, flex medical account stuff, etc. Blech.
• gym
  

House projects:

• Laundry: clothes, towels, sheets, rugs, dog beds, dog blankets, dog towels
• Vacuuming: floors AND furniture (sigh) [nope, but I swept]
  
• Bathroom
• Kitchen surfaces/stove
  
• Deal with weird piles of stuff in our hallway/laundry-utility area

Actually that doesn't seem too bad. Tonight we'll have one of our favorite (and easy to make) meals and watch a movie together, which should stave off the Sunday grumps. I hope, anyway.

update: there's always tomorrow.

entertainments

I just finished reading Karen Joy Fowler's The Jane Austen Book Club -- I really enjoyed it, even though it has been several years since I last read any Austen. It follows six members of a book club as they meet each month to discuss a different JA novel. It helps if you love reading, and it helps if you know something about Austen -- but you don't have to be a JA fanatic to enjoy the book. I'm sure if you were, you'd get more "insider" references to JA texts -- but it's really about the love of reading, and how we use literature to help us make sense of our own lives. A line I especially liked:

What if you had a happy ending and didn't notice? Sylvia made a mental note. Don't miss the happy ending.

I also loved Fowler's first novel, Sarah Canary, which is a fabulous romp involving late-19thc feminism, Chinese immigrants working on the railways in the American West, circuses, and various other ingredients.

My gf and I went to see We Don't Live Here Anymore -- a stunning, grownup film with Mark Ruffalo, who I think is great, and Laura Dern, who gives an amazing performance. It's the kind of movie I tend to enjoy -- four characters, lots of talking -- the complexities of human relationships. In this case, two married couples whose relationships are in different states of disarray -- and which are tested by the affairs all members are having with each other. It's got a very literary feel to it, perhaps because it was adapted from two short stories by the late Andre Dubus. Also really interesting to me was the fact that the men are both supposed to be professors at a small college -- one of creative writing, the other of literature. That's not the focus of the film, exactly, but I thought they got the academic flavor pretty well -- the decoration of their respective houses -- the financial difficulties during the summer -- one couple is better off, but they get regular checks from the wife's mother to help them get by. And their flexible summertime schedules are perfect for adultery. The only off note in the film I thought was that neither wife seemed to have a job -- the gendered issues about family responsibilities & household chores are pretty relevant to many couples, but parts of the film felt kind of dated because of the "housewife" role. I don't know how old the short stories are -- maybe that would explain this.

We also recently watched The Barbarian Invasions, Denys Arcand's sequel to The Decline of the American Empire, which I remember really enjoying in 1986, but haven't rewatched since then. The recent film involves some of the same characters -- one man's terminal cancer is the pretext for gathering together his group of friends again. It's thoughtful, intelligent -- and also, coincidentally, involves academics and intellectuals. (why is it that intellectuals show up so much more frequently in Canadian, French, Spanish films...yeah, I know, duh, it's obvious). As depressing as it sounds, this film is part of a sub-genre I often really respond to -- the "gathering of friends before death." (It's My Party is another one, for example.) Because when done well, such films aren't about death so much as about the connections of our lives.

thoughts from the mat, part 2

One of my favorite yoga teachers frequently reminds us "it's yoga practice, not yoga perfect." The whole point of yoga practice is to learn to tune into your own body and figure out where you are -- physically, mentally, spiritually. The effects of yoga build day after day, as you return to the mat and attempt your postures again. Some days I'm flexible, other days my hamstrings are tight; some days I can quiet my mind, and other days my main challenge is trying to remain present in the moment of whatever breath or posture is my focus.

When I was much younger, I studied music, and continued to play up through college. I grew to really love my practice time -- something which as a young child was just a routine part of family life became my own as I grew older. Practicing a piece of music is a lot like practicing a yoga pose: you have an idea(l) in your mind of what it should eventually sound like -- but the daily act of sitting down to the instrument isn't just about getting somewhere, reaching a goal -- it's about the process. I would spend at least 30-45 minutes just with scales and etudes -- exercises that I think of now as sort of the equivalent of the Triangle and Eagle poses I do every day. A kind of focusing discipline which contributes towards some larger improvement: strength and flexibility in yoga, precision and technique in music.

I've been trying to think about ways to understand what an equivalent kind of practice might be in my professional life. One of the things I've always liked about academic work is that you're always starting fresh every few months. New students, new materials to teach. And certainly each research project involves new ideas, texts, or arguments. But all that newness can also be overwhelming -- or, in my case at least, lead to perfectionism. When my yoga teacher reminds us that our class is practice, she's trying to get us to stop the litany of self-criticism that so many of us have running in the background like some hypnosis tape. So I've been wondering about what I can designate as my academic practice time -- what are the repeated actions that are part of my work and which could let me focus and build strength, flexibility, or balance.

This might be a way to reconceive what sometimes has felt to me like "wasted time" in my research and writing process. I read a text, mark key passages and take some notes as I'm reading, but then have to go back to transcribe quotes from those key passages. It's too disruptive to transcribe them while I'm reading -- and, when I can make myself sit down to do it at some later time, it often affords me a chance to review (and re-view) the text in useful ways. But often I put it off -- and then while I'm writing an essay I have to flip through the source texts to locate passages and type them in. Not efficient in terms of time or mental acuity to be doing that during the writing process.

All of this is in part an attempt to think about (and hopefully redefine) what "counts" as work for me. Several other people have also been talking about these issues in ways that suggest it's a shared concern, at least for humanities scholars. In graduate school, I had some good friends in the sciences -- I used to envy their regular trips to the lab to collect or enter or process their data (during some phases of their work). A few hours collecting data, however tedious it might be, definitely counted as work. But my sitting on the couch thinking hard about an argument for my dissertation seemed so much more nebulous.

I don't entirely know what the relationship between practice and work might be. But it seems worth pursuing.

first day report

I can't believe I'm still awake -- I'm in that tired & wired state. It was a really long day, but being around so many people, and so "on" (especially compared with my summertime existence) is taking a while to process out of my system. My undergrad class felt good -- though I have 4 Jennifers, 2 Ashleys, and 3 Jessicas. It's going to take me a little longer than usual to learn their names. I suspect 5 or 6 of the students were only there for the day/time slot -- maybe I've scared them off to take an easier class somewhere else.

I'm undecided about the grad students -- it wasn't an ordinary seminar meeting, since they hadn't had any reading assignment beforehand. Will reserve judgment until next week. But I think I really prefer teaching undergrads -- even though I know we're not supposed to admit that. I had a couple of really top-notch seminars a few years ago that were pretty energizing -- but lately I've been doing our MA-level courses (part of the rotation) which are frustrating in various ways. I'm pleased with this new course, though -- I was still tweaking it right up until the last minute.

I have several really intense students this semester -- and you have to be pretty intense for it to be noticeable on the first day! Intense not in an intellectually serious way -- but more in the awkward "make myself known to the teacher" kind of way. (Behavior that we don't often get in our student population -- a nontraditional bunch by and large.) I don't really know what to do with such obvious suck-ups. Especially since one of them is already irritating the heck out of me -- my ever-frostier responses to her didn't seem to sink in. I'm sure things will settle down a bit once they realize that having a nose ring and a sense of style doesn't mean I'm not demanding.

I've been practicing my "very relaxing" response to the inevitable summer questions (as have other people!) with good results. I got to hear several great stories about dogs. We could practically have a dog park just for my department, if only it were allowed. It was only my chair who persisted (rather rudely I thought) in saying "well, did you get a lot of things done?" I simply said "yes, I got a lot done." He doesn't need to know what, exactly.

to follow the crowd

yup, another Wildean among us:


Oscar Wilde: The Portrait of Dorian Gray. You are a
horror novel from the world of dandies, rich
pretty boys, art and aesthetics, and
intellectual debates between ethical people and
decadent pleasure-seekers. You value beauty and
pleasure but realize their dangers, as well.


Which literature classic are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

first day

Here we are: the first day! I'm pumped up with adrenaline but not well rested -- I thought that was just because I stayed up late last night talking with an old friend who's going through tough times -- and because my brain is buzzing with all the things I have to do today in order to be fully prepared. But then I remembered that I nearly always feel this way. Except usually my "first days" don't involve a whole lot of teaching. But grad classes are tricky -- you have 3 hours, but they haven't done any reading. So I've got a lecture/activity that still needs preparing.

I've got a whole list full of stuff I wish I could have done by today -- loading everything into WebCT, etc. But I'll have the necessary minimum ready: a xeroxed syllabus and my ideas.

Sometimes I feel like teaching days are endurance events: I have to manage my caffeine and food intake properly to keep my energy up -- my last class ends 11 hours from now. I know, it's nothing like dragging a canoe through the woods on your head (not my sort of game at all) but there are physical as well as mental components to succesfully completing the day.

And I miss reading everyone's blogs! I've been so busy I haven't been able to read or write. But tomorrow I'll get to catch up.

composing a course

I spent most of the afternoon at the office today, pulling together my graduate course. It's been a different process for me than my past few new preps, because it's an entirely different kind of course from what I've mostly been teaching the past couple of years. Many of my courses have a similar basic structure, and the differences come from the content. But this one could be organized in several different ways. The process of figuring it out really has felt very much like writing an essay. At the end of the afternoon, I finally looked at what I'd outlined on screen and felt that magic a-ha! just like when you've been writing and rewriting for a while and then finally see the kernel of real argument. It all makes sense now -- it reveals its concerns in its shape -- just like some kinds of poems. Not that a syllabus is a poem -- but there can be creativity involved in both.

I still have a lot to do -- final revisions, proofing, and a lot of drudge work (copying/scanning etc). Plus there's my undergrad class -- but that's a familiar prep, so its syllabus just needs some fine-tuning.

No matter when I start thinking about my syllabi, I usually wind up writing them only 1 or 2 days ahead of time. I guess I just need that adrenaline. And I've got it - - I'm feeling pretty pumped up about the semester. What a relief. Last year was such a blur, with tenure review, and various personal events, that I don't think I ever really got that rush. But right now I do -- looking forward to new rhythms, new students.

signage

Over the last few days I've noticed the following signs on storefronts around the city:

Loose 25 pounds this month!

Gold Jewlry and more

All Jewelerey Cheap!

and, at a fast food place: Try Our New Smok Bugr

Now, the first few are egregious errors but not disgusting. But smoked buggers can't possibly sound appealing even to diehard fast food eaters, right?

are you the teacher you would have wanted?

I've been thinking a lot today about my undergrad course, a course I've taught at least 5 or 6 times before at Large Urban. I've made a variety of changes over the years -- in readings, in assignments, in my general approach to the material. I'm still not entirely satisfied with it -- which is probably a good thing, as it keeps me reviewing the materials and asking myself how I can make it better.

As part of my planning process, I took a 2nd look at my student evaluations from the last iteration of the course. They were about what I always get: some people say it's too much work, others say there's not enough (?). Some students love the way I run the class, others complain that they hate discussion. I always teach with a mixture of lecture and discussion -- for all kinds of reasons:

• after about 20-30 minutes of even the most exciting lecture, most undergrads start to tune out. So if you mix in other types of activities -- discussion, group work, in-class writing -- then you can re-engage their minds and attention.
• I believe in a student-centered model of pedagogy -- if I don't know what it is that my students understand or don't understand, how can I teach them? I can only learn where they are in the material by hearing them discuss it.
• Students come to understand the concepts of the course, and begin to learn/practice analytical skills, only by engaging in dialogue (both written and oral) about the texts. Passively receiving a lecture from me about the material doesn't ask them to synthesize or apply any of what they are supposed to be learning.
  

So, for every 15 or 20 students who say they learn a lot from the way I blend discussion and group work with lectures, there is always 1 or sometimes 2 who write in their evaluations things like: "the professor should lecture more. I don't care what my peers have to say." Sometimes I can guess who these students were, other times I have no idea. Not that it matters. But I'm concerned about them. Not simply because it's too easy to focus on the negative evaluations and ignore the positive ones (after all, what do they tell me to work on?) -- but because I sometimes wonder what my old student self would have thought of my class.

I very rarely participated in class discussion when I was at university -- except for two or three memorable classes that really changed my life. It's in part my experience in those courses that keeps me convinced that getting students to actively engage in the material is crucial. But I spent a lot of my time sitting in the back row, taking notes, and not really entering into the ideas of the course until I was on my own in the library with my book. To be fair, not many of my university professors even attempted to run discussions.

Also, to be fair -- most of my students at Large Urban are nothing like the person I was -- they have very different goals, background, and assumptions about the educational process. And it's those assumptions that drive most of the dissatisfied ones -- a kind of consumerist model of the university -- "I paid tuition for this class, so I just want to hear the professor speak." Every so often I get junk mail advertising Lectures by the Greatest Professors on CDs -- and there's nothing wrong with people who want that sort of thing: bits of cultural capital nicely packaged and expensively priced -- here's your little taste of Harvard. But that's not my idea of the best possible use of classroom time.

So: are you the teacher you would have wanted when you were a student? I hope I am. I suspect my old self would have sat silent in the back row for the first few days -- but gradually figured out what was going on and joined in. But remembering my history of silence is useful in helping me try to figure out ways to reach all of my students. And, in fact, I usually get everyone to participate one way or another. But they don't all like it. And that's OK too. I'm a big girl and I can take it if 2 or 3 out of 35 say I don't lecture enough. But I guess part of what I'm teaching them, beyond the specifics of subject matter and skills, is that growth is an active process -- the more you engage, the more you gain. But that kind of engagement -- in discourse, in dialogue, in the world of ideas -- runs counter to so many other tendencies in our culture that it, in itself, is pretty alien to my students.

lists

Cindy's post about list-making resonated with me today, since I'd been puzzling a bit over why I sometimes post my lists, why I like to read other people's , what the motivational or support factor might be. Because mostly I do find it helpful -- it makes my tasks seem real but manageable once I've posted them -- and it's great to be reminded that other people also have to clean the kitchen or go to the bank or whatever. It's all that pesky life maintenance stuff that always seems to be dragging me down these days. (where's my robot housekeeper? too bad I'll be aged and decrepit by the time we can all have robots to do our chores).

But there are also days when I've looked at other people's lists (I'm not naming any names here) and felt a really junior-high-ish wave of anxiety: I'm not working as hard, or getting as many things crossed off, or being as serious as this other person. And then I feel much worse, rather than better. Even though I know that it's just that pernicious internalized guilt of academia (the categorical imperative: you should be working -- all the time -- and only on things that are Serious Work, not all the prep work, teaching work, job work, life work).

Some of my favorite books as a very young child were the Frog and Toad books by Arnold Lobel -- in Frog and Toad Together , there's a story called "A List." Toad (who I nearly always identify with) starts off sitting in bed making a list (I do this sometimes). His list begins with Wake Up, which he promptly crosses out, and then writes other stuff. (I love Toad's life: eat breakfast, get dressed, go to Frog's house, take walk with Frog, eat lunch, take nap...). (Btw I'm referring to a well-worn copy as I write this, it's not all entirely from memory, although it probably could be.)

Frog and Toad are really good friends. I suspect they formed my first subconscious model of a same-gender romantic relationship -- because somehow they're both boys (they wear pants and little Britishy tweed jackets, except when they go swimming) but they really love each other, they hug and sing songs and are always hanging out. And there are no girl amphibs to get in the way of their affection for each other. Toad is mildly depressive and kind of self-deprecating; Frog advocates will power and activity, but doesn't mind getting sidetracked to comfort Toad. Their relationship is all about mutuality and equality -- Toad has a nighmare once when he's really successful and Frog just keeps shrinking away: the message always comes down to the importance of their love and respect for each other.

So Toad goes over to Frog's house, where Frog admires his list, and they set off on their walk. But the wind blows the list out of Toad's hand:

"Hurry!" said Frog. "We will run and catch it." "No!" shouted Toad. "I cannot do that." "Why not?" asked Frog. "Because," wailed Toad, "running after my list is not one of the things that I wrote on my list of things to do!"

Frog ran after the list. He ran over hills and swamps, but the list blew on and on. At last Frog came back to Toad. "I am sorry," gasped Frog, "but I could not catch your list."

"Blah," said Toad.

I so know what Toad means. I love having a list, but if I get off-track then sometimes I can wind up feeling pretty Blah.

In the story, Toad says that since he can't remember anything that was on his list, he has to just sit and do nothing. Frog sits with him (ah, love). Finally Frog says they should sleep:

"Go to sleep!" shouted Toad. "That was the last thing on my list!" Toad wrote on the ground with a stick: Go to sleep. Then he crossed out: Go to sleep. "There," said Toad. "Now my day is all crossed out!" "I am glad," said Frog. Then Frog and Toad went right to sleep.

And in the picture they are smiling and snuggled up together. As I see it, posting lists on our blogs lets us play Frog for one another: supportive for the things that get crossed off and liking Toad despite all the things that didn't get crossed off. And we can play Toad, too: full of good intentions, and squeezing whatever satisfaction we can from the process.

b4 tues

Definitely time for another list. My first teaching day will be Tuesday -- which, since my grad class is that day, will actually require real teaching, and not just "hi, this is how the course works, etc."
So what is absolutely crucial?

• finish drafting reading schedule for the new grad class [well, I chose the readings today but haven't finished arranging them]
  
• decide on assignments for the new class
• Update syllabus for my repeat undergrad class and squeeze it into this term's calendar (big mystery to me why sometimes we have 14 weeks, sometimes 15...)
• proofread and photocopy syllabi (probably over the weekend, since the copier will surely be broken down by Monday)
• update my web site (and move it to my new account on a better server)
• meet with librarian about class visit
  
• scan and create PDFs of supplemental readings [did three of them]
  
• upload files into WebCT (which is down until Friday, thanks to whoever decided a system upgrade would be a great activity in the week before classes start)
• prepare first day lecture/activity for grad class
• Haircut! I hate to go into the first week all shaggy
• Go to stupid overpriced watch shop and get new battery (since the clerks at Target couldn't manage to open the back of my watch today)
• get leaking tire patched
  
• do a lot of yoga and maybe see a couple movies?

I have a zillion other things on the wish list, but these are the absolute requirements. Whew. Guess I'd better get some sleep.

Update: I did a lot of work today but I haven't been able to cross off that many things. But my new prep is pulling together.

getting ready

Well, the countdown to the new semester has begun: newly arrived grad students are in the hallways for orientation; I've seen 5 or 6 of my colleagues for the first time in months; the city's construction project on the main avenue into campus has ramped up, which will give us only one lane in each direction next week when thousands of commuter students drive in for class; and when I went to the library I had to zigzag around tons of yellow Danger Do Not Cross tape to get to the circulation desk. No, it's not a terror site -- they've decided to replace some carpet. Everything's kind of chaotic, but also full of promise. New beginnings.

I've been working a lot on putting together my new graduate course. I've got about 3 semesters' worth of possible goals that have to be whittled down to 1 manageable term. But I've been enjoying skimming through a bunch of essays that may make it onto the reading list. Today's big task is to actually start plugging readings and assignments into the calendar for the class: it's in part a methods course, and could be organized in several different ways.

I agreed to put one of my courses into WebCT this year. In the past, I've always just put my syllabi and other course materials (handouts, link lists, etc) up on my university site. Since I'm comfortable with HTML and actually enjoy tweaking my site, that's always seemed sufficient. But the university is really pushing WebCT on us -- I expect that it will be mandatory in a couple of years. This is part of a larger plan to encourage more distance ed & hybrid teaching. But WebCT does make certain kinds of things easy, or easier -- particularly since it's password-protected so that only students enrolled in the course can have access. (And that all gets done at an institutional level--I don't have to worry about handing out passwords.) I can thus post images from my lectures that I'm not comfortable putting on a freely-accessible page for copyright reasons, and craft assignments around those materials.

Yet I'm still going to post my syllabus on my university site, along with other basic info about the course and my other activities. Why? Partly because it's useful for students to see what the course looks like before enrolling. But mostly because at heart I really believe in the open-access philosophy of the web, and specifically in its capacity to transform pedagogy. So many of the common practices in academic departments encourage a kind of secrecy about what we actually do behind the closed doors of our classrooms: once you're not a grad student TA, how often does anyone actually see you teach? I was observed only 2 or 3 times -- twice for my 3rd-year review, and once for my tenure review. Now, my student evals are really strong, and so there was no concern from the department's standpoint about how I was teaching-- but I'm not sure my experience was that unusual.

But beyond observations (which often are, or at least feel, hierarchical and potentially threatening) there are few things that encourage real conversations about teaching at an institutional or department level. Sure, I might talk about teaching with a friend, but I have no idea what the vast majority of my colleagues actually do in their classes. Because we don't have a culture of openness, when pedagogical issues come up in dept discussions about curriculum reform etc, then there tends to be a lot of defensiveness, etc.

So, why post syllabi on the web for anyone to see? Because it's one simple way to begin transforming basic practices. I've learned so much from looking at syllabi posted by colleagues at other institutions -- not just learning which anthology is being used, or which novels get taught most frequently, but also how other people are representing and shaping the field and the discipline in their classes. I hope mine are useful in some similar way to someone else. So, I'll be putting my syllabi up on my site and in WebCT this year. A little extra effort is I think well worth it in principle.

have you noticed

...the new Blogger bar at the top? it's a google search box for whichever blog you're on. Very handy, since Blogger doesn't let us categorize posts the way MT users do.

And, last night I just discovered All Consuming, which tracks mentions of books on blogs (if they're linked to amazon or B&N) and maintains lists of various sorts. Looks like you can sign up and have it generate a list of books you're currently reading for your blog, which is feature I've admired in several MT style blogs. (I love what I learn from occasionally looking at my referrer list).

Update: look down to the right... not only a list, but also lets you comment on them.

more on Ed

Thanks, everyone, for the supportive comments. I'm feeling better now, six+ hours later. Coffee and a change of scenery helped me focus and actually get some work done.

I'm still figuring out what it means to identify myself as someone with depression -- it was actually a big deal for me to write the last post. I've been depressed probably most of my life, at one level or another (like most of the intellectual types I know). It's better in my 30s than in my 20s, and certainly better than my teens. But overall I'm mostly pretty high-functioning. And also fairly good at concealing it from anyone outside my closest circle.

I did a couple of years in therapy with good results maybe 4-5 years ago, when I was mostly concerned with relationship issues and their connection to my past. Good work in therapy and then entering into a healthy, supportive relationship really kept me on a more even keel for a while. Then over the past year and a half, I experienced a number of significant traumas/stressful situations involving me or my immediate family (illness, accidental injury, cancer), plus a death in my birth family and many related family difficulties. And of course I was undergoing tenure review all of last year, which in itself bumps you to the top of the stress chart. Somehow I muddled through the academic year. And then, the summer arrived, and my mind and body finally had time to deal with all that stuff. It hasn't been pretty.

I started back with seeing Dr Shrinky maybe 4 or 5 weeks ago now, which was the first step in admitting that this was harder than previous visits from Ed had ever been. She basically thinks that I have no serotonin left after the events of the past year. So I've started taking 5-HTP, an amino acid supplement that works on the serotonin system -- it's amazing stuff, and the first week or so I was on I was deleriously happy with how much better I felt. But I've been trying to finetune the dosage so that I don't get any side effects, and sometimes I go too long without it, and Ed glumps onto my shoulders. But I'm still depressed, of course, even with the supplement. It just helps me function and converse normally.

One of the hardest things for me, as someone whose work depends upon careful communicating, is that depression makes it really hard for me to talk to anyone. Which is why this blog community has been really important over this summer. I could still feel like myself, having you guys to talk to about academic politics or pirate quizzes or whatever. Part of me still has her shit together, and it's good to be in touch with that. But part of me doesn't. And the depression makes me feel ashamed and irritated with the fact that I am depressed.

I've been learning from so many of you, and have been so impressed with your honesty about deeply personal things, that I felt like I needed to try to overcome my wish to keep up good appearances. So now you know.

Ed

Hi. Have you met my depression? Allow me to introduce you. My depression is a 70-pound blob of green mucus named Ed. Sometimes he disappears for a while but then when I least expect it, Ed's back, just lounging on my shoulder and blobbing around and taking over all my brain space when in fact I REALLY NEED my brain cells today, thank you very much.

You know those ads that used to run on tv for some anti-depressant (paxil?) that would show this really cute little sad blob who had social anxiety? and then blob takes pills and hops around with the flowers. Well, my depression blob ain't half so cute. He's made of green mucus, after all.

I just looked up the difference between mucus and mucous. One's the noun and the other is mostly used as an adjective (i.e., mucous membrane). In case anyone else cares.

Rrggh. I'm going to go drink coffee in the hopes of scaring Ed away so I can get some reading done.