Over-involved self pity or catharsis? You decide!
ABSTRACT
I'm updating! I'm going curling. I hate parents. I am so fucked.
*****
I know that you're all thinking, OMGWTFBBQ?! (Like, totally verbatim. I can read minds in the future. It's a wonder that I'm not rich yet) Why is Nick updating a) twice in a week, and b) at O'dark AM? Because there's no way in hell he's going to get any comments at this time of night. I mean, not that I post only for comments, although I do like the whole "validate me" thing, but I also am actually known on occasion to talk about things that are important to me. You have to dig pretty hard, usually, since the amount of verbiage I dedicate to complete and total utter nonsense gibberish (that's a quote from Red Dwarf, y'all) is prodigious, but this is actually a chronicle of my life, as well as a place where I like to store my mental vomit. What a colorful image. You're welcome.
So anyway, yes I know I'm suck, but I'm going up to New Jersey this weekend for one last curling hurrah, which means I'm missing the party at the place with the people which I totally wish I could be attending, seriously, but I made a commitment to this back in February, and those of you I've talked to about this have been reasonably understanding, but I totally feel guilty that I'm not going to be there. Or, at least jealous. Anyway. I love you all, and I insist that you all have fun without me and that you all drink gin in my honor. Hahaha. Like any of you drink gin. You’re all missing out. Gin is what God drinks. And he eats porn-in-my-mouth. Except when He eats it it’s porn-in-His-mouth. It’s tasty. Like you’d expect porn to be. If it were in your mouth. Um. Take that videotape out of your mouth. It’s unseemly.
Listen to me stalling. Blah.
Today was pretty much a crappy day. Or, at least it was until about 6:00. I would have posted about it then, but if I had started then I’d still be typing, probably, and you’d never actually get to read it because I would have killed myself in my office before hitting “update!” Not really. I’m not suicidal. But I do love the melodrama. But it would have taken a thousand million years and I wouldn’t have had time in the meanwhile to go get alcohol which has considerably improved my mood. Also hanging out with friends. Primarily that, actually, but the alcohol lubricates things. Although please don’t use alcohol as any kind of lubricant other than a social one, because, ow.
WHY WAS IT A CRAPPY DAY, NICK?
I’m glad you asked.
I know I mentioned recently that I was grading papers? I might have even mentioned that I finished grading them and that they were pretty damn good, as a whole. Much to my own surprise. So I had classes as usual on Tuesday, and we had a discussion about Hitler and fascism, which was actually I think pretty informative for everyone, even though we did spend a lot of time talking about Hitler’s testicle (the one, singular) and his original last name “Schickelgruber”. I don’t remember offhand if that’s how it’s spelled, but that would have been his name if he hadn’t been legitimized. Imagine how much easier European history would have been if only Mr. Hitler, Sr. had been willing to lie to Ms. Schickelgruber. But, NOOOO, he had to go and do the honorable thing. Sucker. Anyway. So, class. And I handed back papers. The kid who wrote a 15-page paper which I later forced him to edit (and which benefitted greatly from it) got an earful in the form of 1-1/2 pages of comments (where most kids got 2-3 sentences), and gay/not-gay was totally excited about his grade, which I was actually quite pleased by. What was awesome was that I handed back every single paper. Every single one of my students was there on Tuesday. I don’t know when that has ever happened. They just all love me so! Is the story I tell myself. And on the whole, like I said, the grades were pretty good. I didn’t give out anything lower than a C-, and there were only two of those (I know I said one, earlier, but I lied like a liar). And as far as I can tell, everyone was pleased with their grades.
Except for one student.
ANNOYING THING #1
This student came up to me after class and started complaining about the grade right away. But I studied really hard and took a lot of notes! I don’t think you paid enough attention to my points! I think you didn’t look at my blah blah blah. You know. Okay, I said, I don’t really remember your paper. Write me a little thing about what you think I did wrong in grading your paper-what you think I missed and what you think you did right-and I’ll be happy to look at it again and get it back to you. Perfectly reasonable, yes? I thought so. I get an email from her that night saying, I think you underestimated my paper in a lot of ways, and rather than just leave my paper in your box, I’d like to be able to meet with you in person. Okay, I understand that. I got the email at about 6:00 that night-Tuesday. But see, the thing is, I had a 30-minute presentation about a paper I’m writing for one of my actual classes that I’m taking that I’m like learning things in due the next day. So I was busy, and didn’t get back to the student the next day.
FOOLISH ME.
The next day-the day of the presentation, and less than 24 hours after the initial conversation, and less than 18 hours after the initial email from the student, I get an email from the Office of Parent Services. The fact that the university has an Office of Parent Services should really tell you something about the school. Anyway. Here’s what the email said:
>Mr Datlowe,
>I am from the Office of Parent Services and I just received a call from
>Mrs. [Student’s Last Name] who wanted to speak with you in reference to her daughter,
>[Student]. [Student] is in one of your classes. Mrs. [Student’s Last Name] says
>that she and her daughter has been trying to reach you by email but
>have been unable to do so. There is no number listed in the directory
>and the operator was unable to assist with a number as well. Can you
>give this parent a call? Her work number is xxx-xxx-xxxx, home number
>is xxx-xxx-xxxx.
Oh no she dit’n. snap
Okay, a) Mrs. Student’s last name never tried to contact me at all; b) the student in question tried to contact me exactly ONCE (which does NOT count as “several” in my world), and that less than a day before the parent phone calls; c) maybe the mother should, I don’t know, butt the fuck out and let her student handle her own problems like an adult?; oh, yeah, and d) I WAS BUSY WITH MY OWN GODDAMN WORK AND EXCUSE ME FOR NOT DROPPING EVERYTHING TO GET RIGHT THE FUCK BACK TO YOU.
Of course, instead of saying any of this, I calmly email the student back and say I’m sorry that I didn’t get back to you right away; here are the times I can meet-what works for you?
THIRTY-SIX HOURS LATER I get a response from the student. THIRTY SIX. After she was on my ass in less than half that.
THE KICKER: The grade in question? Is a B-.
Mom used to talk about how she loved teaching-dealing with the students was great-but dealing with the parents was an unmitigated pain in the ass. Those weren’t the words she used, but that was the sense. And while I intellectually understood where she was coming from, I never got it. And now I do.
It occurs to me now that’s it’s about 2:00 AM, and that I have the parent’s home phone number. Not that I would ever do anything with it, but you know. It’s there. I could. If I wanted to.
Anyway. All of this is foreplay. I spent an inordinate amount of time being annoyed about it this morning. This, and another thing which it turns out isn’t nearly as trivial as I thought it was initially, and which has caused me pause. A lot of it.
ANNOYING THING #2
Except in this case, by “annoying” I mean “holy shit depressing and scary”. In case after the next sentence you think that’s at all in doubt.
I might lose-might already have lost-my funding for next year.
A bit of background: I know you all (well, maybe not all of you, but perhaps some of you) remember me bitching about this stupid TA class I had to take in order to certify me for TAing. There was like the 9-hour class in August and then a bunch of assignments that we had to do throughout the semester. And I’ll admit it: I didn’t finish the course. The assignments, starting in October or so, started to fall due at the same time as the assignments for the actual classes I was taking for actual credit. So I put them off-and eventually completely forgot about them. October turned, eventually, into late April, and I still hadn’t-haven’t-completed the assignments. In the meantime, of course, I’d found my sea legs as a TA, gotten a recommendation from the department and my previous professor that I be refunded for next year, and thought I was all clear. Oh, no.
Having spent 30 minutes on the phone today with the department’s Mr. Funding Man, who gave me grief about not contacting him after several attempts on his part (again with the “several” equaling “one”-is there some new definition of “several” I don’t know about?), I was not only taken to task about the TA class, but also about:
1) I graded the final exams late last semester!
2) People were annoyed with the grades I gave them last semester!
3) I’m not enthusiastic enough about the classes I’m taking!
4) I have a part-time job!
I could go into detailed descriptions about all of this, but the upshot is that it’s bullshit. For the most part.
Here’s the thing: I know I’m smart. I’ve never been the smartest kid in class-I wasn’t at any point throughout my schooling, and certainly wasn’t once I got to college-but I’ve always known that I’m pretty damn bright. But I also know that I’m lazy, and I know that in unstructured environments that laziness takes over. I frankly wonder sometimes how I’ve gotten as far as I have. And this has nagged at me ever since the possibility of my going back for the Ph.D. came up, whenever the hell that was. Last year some time. I wondered if I had the drive or the determination to actually buckle down and not only write a dissertation, but do the preliminary work for it.
And it’s become clear to me that not only do I not really care all that much, but that people within the department have noticed that I don’t care all that much. And that’s not good. I mean, I do care, in the sense that this is something I know that I can do, but beyond that I can’t even muster the give-a-shit to sit my ass down this weekend and work on my papers. No, I’m still going curling. And I don’t feel the slightest bit guilty about it.
Whatever happened to the kid that used to have panic attacks when he forgot his homework assignments? The kid that would get depressed about getting Bs? The kid who was so embarrassed about a 0/10 on a minor minor assignment in high school that he couldn’t even admit it to his friends...ever? (The irony is that this grade is what made me into a liberal. Thanks Lambro & Sanchez!) I don’t know. Here I am, teetering on the edge of losing my funding-essentially being kicked out of school-and all I can think is, Huh. Well, that happened.
I know that this isn’t the time to make any decisions about this kind of thing. Basically my course of action from this point is pretty obvious: 1) finish the fucking TA course (when I mentioned that I might lose my funding for not having finished this course, one of my fellow TAs was aghast that they would cut me off for not doing something so unspeakably lame); 2) Beg. Beg beg beg for my funding back. Even once I’ve finished the TA thing I don’t expect this to be more than a 50/50 chance. I’ve already sent appropriately-and honestly-groveling emails about this. 3) Decide if this-meaning school-is really what I want to do.
I don’t know.
So at about 4:00 this afternoon I was in serious doldrums. I came >this< close to crying at work, which would have been the first time since I was dumped by my then-boyfriend over IM. While I was working late. He was quite a piece of work, he was. I didn’t know what I was doing; I didn’t know if the thing that I’d planned on doing since I was old enough to understand the concept of college was actually what I wanted to do. And I still don’t. But I did get an email from my advisor. He had asked me how the semester was going, trying to get me to get in touch with Mr. Funding Man about next year and the TA class and blah blah. And normally in this situation I would have responded, All under control, thanks for the concern, will see you at the final. But instead I opened up. I told him that I’m behind the 8-ball this semester, and that I’m in serious trouble, and that I don’t know if I’ll be back next year, even if my funding does get renewed.
And he came back with something that amounted to, I wish I had known this. We should talk-I don’t want you to go, and maybe there’s something we can do.
It made me feel a little better. No, I’m not convinced yet, but I’m a little better. In any event, I’m not on the verge of tears just thinking about it. Which is a total step up from where I was about, oh, six hours ago.
So when, at the wine and cheese social that my firm had after work hours today, people would ask me how school was going, I had a hard time not, you know. Jamming a wad of bleu cheese down their throats. But I didn’t, and I’m dealing. I’m not happy about any of this. I know that it’s my fault that I’m in the situation I’m in. I simply haven’t done the work I need to. And for once I’m actually interested in getting myself out of this situation. I just don’t know if that’s me wanting to solve a problem, or if that’s me actually fighting for something I think is important to me. I really don’t know. But I do know that I can’t make any decisions about it now. First things first.
This really has been an existential crisis. Those of you who don’t know me really well-basically, those of you who aren’t my brother and sister-probably can’t understand how deeply this whole episode has rocked me to my core. I don’t know who I am or what I’ll do if I don’t have this...whatever it is. And I’m scared. I’m scared in a way I’ve never been before, and which I hope never to be again. Because it sucks.
And yet.
You know, I still have a roof over my head. At least for now. I have a job that pays the bills, even if I don’t have funding from school. And things could certainly be worse-someone I would consider a good friend of mine got news recently that is far more earth-shattering than my, essentially petty, drama. And you know what? He’s handling it. He’s still kicking ass. He’s still using phrases like “nuclear ghetto” in complete sentences.
So I’m going to pick my stupid lazy ass up and do my shit.
In other news, I had a dream last night (now the night before last, for most of you) that I was really really thirsty, so I got up and got a drink of water. Then I woke up, and was really really thirsty, so I got up and got a drink of water. Freud was right: Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
I'm updating! I'm going curling. I hate parents. I am so fucked.
*****
I know that you're all thinking, OMGWTFBBQ?! (Like, totally verbatim. I can read minds in the future. It's a wonder that I'm not rich yet) Why is Nick updating a) twice in a week, and b) at O'dark AM? Because there's no way in hell he's going to get any comments at this time of night. I mean, not that I post only for comments, although I do like the whole "validate me" thing, but I also am actually known on occasion to talk about things that are important to me. You have to dig pretty hard, usually, since the amount of verbiage I dedicate to complete and total utter nonsense gibberish (that's a quote from Red Dwarf, y'all) is prodigious, but this is actually a chronicle of my life, as well as a place where I like to store my mental vomit. What a colorful image. You're welcome.
So anyway, yes I know I'm suck, but I'm going up to New Jersey this weekend for one last curling hurrah, which means I'm missing the party at the place with the people which I totally wish I could be attending, seriously, but I made a commitment to this back in February, and those of you I've talked to about this have been reasonably understanding, but I totally feel guilty that I'm not going to be there. Or, at least jealous. Anyway. I love you all, and I insist that you all have fun without me and that you all drink gin in my honor. Hahaha. Like any of you drink gin. You’re all missing out. Gin is what God drinks. And he eats porn-in-my-mouth. Except when He eats it it’s porn-in-His-mouth. It’s tasty. Like you’d expect porn to be. If it were in your mouth. Um. Take that videotape out of your mouth. It’s unseemly.
Listen to me stalling. Blah.
Today was pretty much a crappy day. Or, at least it was until about 6:00. I would have posted about it then, but if I had started then I’d still be typing, probably, and you’d never actually get to read it because I would have killed myself in my office before hitting “update!” Not really. I’m not suicidal. But I do love the melodrama. But it would have taken a thousand million years and I wouldn’t have had time in the meanwhile to go get alcohol which has considerably improved my mood. Also hanging out with friends. Primarily that, actually, but the alcohol lubricates things. Although please don’t use alcohol as any kind of lubricant other than a social one, because, ow.
WHY WAS IT A CRAPPY DAY, NICK?
I’m glad you asked.
I know I mentioned recently that I was grading papers? I might have even mentioned that I finished grading them and that they were pretty damn good, as a whole. Much to my own surprise. So I had classes as usual on Tuesday, and we had a discussion about Hitler and fascism, which was actually I think pretty informative for everyone, even though we did spend a lot of time talking about Hitler’s testicle (the one, singular) and his original last name “Schickelgruber”. I don’t remember offhand if that’s how it’s spelled, but that would have been his name if he hadn’t been legitimized. Imagine how much easier European history would have been if only Mr. Hitler, Sr. had been willing to lie to Ms. Schickelgruber. But, NOOOO, he had to go and do the honorable thing. Sucker. Anyway. So, class. And I handed back papers. The kid who wrote a 15-page paper which I later forced him to edit (and which benefitted greatly from it) got an earful in the form of 1-1/2 pages of comments (where most kids got 2-3 sentences), and gay/not-gay was totally excited about his grade, which I was actually quite pleased by. What was awesome was that I handed back every single paper. Every single one of my students was there on Tuesday. I don’t know when that has ever happened. They just all love me so! Is the story I tell myself. And on the whole, like I said, the grades were pretty good. I didn’t give out anything lower than a C-, and there were only two of those (I know I said one, earlier, but I lied like a liar). And as far as I can tell, everyone was pleased with their grades.
Except for one student.
ANNOYING THING #1
This student came up to me after class and started complaining about the grade right away. But I studied really hard and took a lot of notes! I don’t think you paid enough attention to my points! I think you didn’t look at my blah blah blah. You know. Okay, I said, I don’t really remember your paper. Write me a little thing about what you think I did wrong in grading your paper-what you think I missed and what you think you did right-and I’ll be happy to look at it again and get it back to you. Perfectly reasonable, yes? I thought so. I get an email from her that night saying, I think you underestimated my paper in a lot of ways, and rather than just leave my paper in your box, I’d like to be able to meet with you in person. Okay, I understand that. I got the email at about 6:00 that night-Tuesday. But see, the thing is, I had a 30-minute presentation about a paper I’m writing for one of my actual classes that I’m taking that I’m like learning things in due the next day. So I was busy, and didn’t get back to the student the next day.
FOOLISH ME.
The next day-the day of the presentation, and less than 24 hours after the initial conversation, and less than 18 hours after the initial email from the student, I get an email from the Office of Parent Services. The fact that the university has an Office of Parent Services should really tell you something about the school. Anyway. Here’s what the email said:
>Mr Datlowe,
>I am from the Office of Parent Services and I just received a call from
>Mrs. [Student’s Last Name] who wanted to speak with you in reference to her daughter,
>[Student]. [Student] is in one of your classes. Mrs. [Student’s Last Name] says
>that she and her daughter has been trying to reach you by email but
>have been unable to do so. There is no number listed in the directory
>and the operator was unable to assist with a number as well. Can you
>give this parent a call? Her work number is xxx-xxx-xxxx, home number
>is xxx-xxx-xxxx.
Oh no she dit’n. snap
Okay, a) Mrs. Student’s last name never tried to contact me at all; b) the student in question tried to contact me exactly ONCE (which does NOT count as “several” in my world), and that less than a day before the parent phone calls; c) maybe the mother should, I don’t know, butt the fuck out and let her student handle her own problems like an adult?; oh, yeah, and d) I WAS BUSY WITH MY OWN GODDAMN WORK AND EXCUSE ME FOR NOT DROPPING EVERYTHING TO GET RIGHT THE FUCK BACK TO YOU.
Of course, instead of saying any of this, I calmly email the student back and say I’m sorry that I didn’t get back to you right away; here are the times I can meet-what works for you?
THIRTY-SIX HOURS LATER I get a response from the student. THIRTY SIX. After she was on my ass in less than half that.
THE KICKER: The grade in question? Is a B-.
Mom used to talk about how she loved teaching-dealing with the students was great-but dealing with the parents was an unmitigated pain in the ass. Those weren’t the words she used, but that was the sense. And while I intellectually understood where she was coming from, I never got it. And now I do.
It occurs to me now that’s it’s about 2:00 AM, and that I have the parent’s home phone number. Not that I would ever do anything with it, but you know. It’s there. I could. If I wanted to.
Anyway. All of this is foreplay. I spent an inordinate amount of time being annoyed about it this morning. This, and another thing which it turns out isn’t nearly as trivial as I thought it was initially, and which has caused me pause. A lot of it.
ANNOYING THING #2
Except in this case, by “annoying” I mean “holy shit depressing and scary”. In case after the next sentence you think that’s at all in doubt.
I might lose-might already have lost-my funding for next year.
A bit of background: I know you all (well, maybe not all of you, but perhaps some of you) remember me bitching about this stupid TA class I had to take in order to certify me for TAing. There was like the 9-hour class in August and then a bunch of assignments that we had to do throughout the semester. And I’ll admit it: I didn’t finish the course. The assignments, starting in October or so, started to fall due at the same time as the assignments for the actual classes I was taking for actual credit. So I put them off-and eventually completely forgot about them. October turned, eventually, into late April, and I still hadn’t-haven’t-completed the assignments. In the meantime, of course, I’d found my sea legs as a TA, gotten a recommendation from the department and my previous professor that I be refunded for next year, and thought I was all clear. Oh, no.
Having spent 30 minutes on the phone today with the department’s Mr. Funding Man, who gave me grief about not contacting him after several attempts on his part (again with the “several” equaling “one”-is there some new definition of “several” I don’t know about?), I was not only taken to task about the TA class, but also about:
1) I graded the final exams late last semester!
2) People were annoyed with the grades I gave them last semester!
3) I’m not enthusiastic enough about the classes I’m taking!
4) I have a part-time job!
I could go into detailed descriptions about all of this, but the upshot is that it’s bullshit. For the most part.
Here’s the thing: I know I’m smart. I’ve never been the smartest kid in class-I wasn’t at any point throughout my schooling, and certainly wasn’t once I got to college-but I’ve always known that I’m pretty damn bright. But I also know that I’m lazy, and I know that in unstructured environments that laziness takes over. I frankly wonder sometimes how I’ve gotten as far as I have. And this has nagged at me ever since the possibility of my going back for the Ph.D. came up, whenever the hell that was. Last year some time. I wondered if I had the drive or the determination to actually buckle down and not only write a dissertation, but do the preliminary work for it.
And it’s become clear to me that not only do I not really care all that much, but that people within the department have noticed that I don’t care all that much. And that’s not good. I mean, I do care, in the sense that this is something I know that I can do, but beyond that I can’t even muster the give-a-shit to sit my ass down this weekend and work on my papers. No, I’m still going curling. And I don’t feel the slightest bit guilty about it.
Whatever happened to the kid that used to have panic attacks when he forgot his homework assignments? The kid that would get depressed about getting Bs? The kid who was so embarrassed about a 0/10 on a minor minor assignment in high school that he couldn’t even admit it to his friends...ever? (The irony is that this grade is what made me into a liberal. Thanks Lambro & Sanchez!) I don’t know. Here I am, teetering on the edge of losing my funding-essentially being kicked out of school-and all I can think is, Huh. Well, that happened.
I know that this isn’t the time to make any decisions about this kind of thing. Basically my course of action from this point is pretty obvious: 1) finish the fucking TA course (when I mentioned that I might lose my funding for not having finished this course, one of my fellow TAs was aghast that they would cut me off for not doing something so unspeakably lame); 2) Beg. Beg beg beg for my funding back. Even once I’ve finished the TA thing I don’t expect this to be more than a 50/50 chance. I’ve already sent appropriately-and honestly-groveling emails about this. 3) Decide if this-meaning school-is really what I want to do.
I don’t know.
So at about 4:00 this afternoon I was in serious doldrums. I came >this< close to crying at work, which would have been the first time since I was dumped by my then-boyfriend over IM. While I was working late. He was quite a piece of work, he was. I didn’t know what I was doing; I didn’t know if the thing that I’d planned on doing since I was old enough to understand the concept of college was actually what I wanted to do. And I still don’t. But I did get an email from my advisor. He had asked me how the semester was going, trying to get me to get in touch with Mr. Funding Man about next year and the TA class and blah blah. And normally in this situation I would have responded, All under control, thanks for the concern, will see you at the final. But instead I opened up. I told him that I’m behind the 8-ball this semester, and that I’m in serious trouble, and that I don’t know if I’ll be back next year, even if my funding does get renewed.
And he came back with something that amounted to, I wish I had known this. We should talk-I don’t want you to go, and maybe there’s something we can do.
It made me feel a little better. No, I’m not convinced yet, but I’m a little better. In any event, I’m not on the verge of tears just thinking about it. Which is a total step up from where I was about, oh, six hours ago.
So when, at the wine and cheese social that my firm had after work hours today, people would ask me how school was going, I had a hard time not, you know. Jamming a wad of bleu cheese down their throats. But I didn’t, and I’m dealing. I’m not happy about any of this. I know that it’s my fault that I’m in the situation I’m in. I simply haven’t done the work I need to. And for once I’m actually interested in getting myself out of this situation. I just don’t know if that’s me wanting to solve a problem, or if that’s me actually fighting for something I think is important to me. I really don’t know. But I do know that I can’t make any decisions about it now. First things first.
This really has been an existential crisis. Those of you who don’t know me really well-basically, those of you who aren’t my brother and sister-probably can’t understand how deeply this whole episode has rocked me to my core. I don’t know who I am or what I’ll do if I don’t have this...whatever it is. And I’m scared. I’m scared in a way I’ve never been before, and which I hope never to be again. Because it sucks.
And yet.
You know, I still have a roof over my head. At least for now. I have a job that pays the bills, even if I don’t have funding from school. And things could certainly be worse-someone I would consider a good friend of mine got news recently that is far more earth-shattering than my, essentially petty, drama. And you know what? He’s handling it. He’s still kicking ass. He’s still using phrases like “nuclear ghetto” in complete sentences.
So I’m going to pick my stupid lazy ass up and do my shit.
In other news, I had a dream last night (now the night before last, for most of you) that I was really really thirsty, so I got up and got a drink of water. Then I woke up, and was really really thirsty, so I got up and got a drink of water. Freud was right: Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.