September 22 means the official beginning of my favorite season: autumn. Even its very name sounds lovely, I think, suggesting a pensive maturity to the year. (Let's not even acknowledge its shorter, less-elegant sounding alias.)
I could write a whole new post about what it means to me, but I did so last year in a post that may not have generated any feedback but pleased me. Instead, a couple/few goals:
- Get out more to play in the leaves.
- Get out more, period. Gotta get back into that grading groove and get it out of the way. There are places I haven't explored in their full autumnal splendor.
- Get moving on grad school apps. (Slightly daunting)
And for the more immediate time:
- Get to bed. Long day tomorrow, long week ahead.
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Now playing: Modest Mouse - Satin in a Coffin
via FoxyTunes
Showing posts with label goals. Show all posts
Showing posts with label goals. Show all posts
Monday, September 22, 2008
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Movin' on
The university I teach at is my alma mater. I haunted their job postings for a time and pounced as soon as they listed a search for adjunct faculty in the department I now teach in.
The chance to return to my old stomping grounds excited me. I thought, even, before they told me I'd only get two courses and wouldn't be needed for the spring semester, that it might even entail a move to the town that I had become attached to in four years.
I realize now my attachment was not to the town, or even the university in particular--it was to a handful of people--some of whom the connection with has grown tenuous--and to the comfort of being in a department where I knew almost everybody. I don't actively dislike the job now, or the department, or the campus for that matter. But I'm no longer so infatuated with it all.
I think this job is good for me, giving me the closure I need to move on. I couldn't/didn't move on after my bachelor's, and after my master's, I gazed wistfully back. I'm back now, and the hallways aren't so high, the atmosphere no longer so glossy. I think I grew up in the intervening time.
My future's ahead, and I'm planning on doing what I need to blast my potential wide open. This involves ogling of graduate programs and dreading the math component of the GRE and dreaming of the possibilities a new degree will bring in terms of career and knowledge gained and new experiences.
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Now playing: Hot Water Music - Another Way
via FoxyTunes
The chance to return to my old stomping grounds excited me. I thought, even, before they told me I'd only get two courses and wouldn't be needed for the spring semester, that it might even entail a move to the town that I had become attached to in four years.
I realize now my attachment was not to the town, or even the university in particular--it was to a handful of people--some of whom the connection with has grown tenuous--and to the comfort of being in a department where I knew almost everybody. I don't actively dislike the job now, or the department, or the campus for that matter. But I'm no longer so infatuated with it all.
I think this job is good for me, giving me the closure I need to move on. I couldn't/didn't move on after my bachelor's, and after my master's, I gazed wistfully back. I'm back now, and the hallways aren't so high, the atmosphere no longer so glossy. I think I grew up in the intervening time.
My future's ahead, and I'm planning on doing what I need to blast my potential wide open. This involves ogling of graduate programs and dreading the math component of the GRE and dreaming of the possibilities a new degree will bring in terms of career and knowledge gained and new experiences.
----------------
Now playing: Hot Water Music - Another Way
via FoxyTunes
Monday, December 31, 2007
Bidding farewell to 2007
I feel like I should write something to commemorate the end of the year, something that both acknowledges what transpired and looks forward to what comes next. My previous attempts to write that post over the last few days have ended up deleted. They felt too "emo," and strangely, too personal. For a blog. Yeah, go figure.
I tried coming up with one word to sum up the year and couldn't. 2007 was strange, I said. Draining. Overwhelming. Unsettling. Sobering. Exciting. None fit quite right, and to say it's been an ineffable year is a semantic cop-out. So I'll settle for this: 2007 was a year of massive change, both in terms of my professional and personal lives.
If I could have seen myself last year as I sit here, now, at the end of 2007, I'm... not sure what I'd have thought. Some changes I could have foreseen, like graduating. Others, the internal changes, not so much. Most days, I'm not even sure which is true: that I have changed in massive ways, or that I haven't changed much at all.
2007 seems like the year I turned a hell of a lot of energy inward, too much probably. I feel like I've had the strongest sense of who I am, where I've grown, and an all-too-keen awareness of where my defects still lie.
And in the midst of that existential mess, 2007 gave me a stronger appreciation of my friends. They've come through for me for so many ways, through their support and encouragement, even though I spent so much time caught up in a mess of negativity and had little to offer in return.
So, to rescue this post from the negativity that pervaded the previous attempts, I'm going to state, in vague terms, my new year's resolution: if I can't learn to embrace change, I need to come to grips with it and stop running the other way. I've already started moving in that direction, but keeping up the impetus is the challenge. This time 'round, it's one I think I'm up to.
And lastly, I think Scrivener put it best: "Happy New Year! And 2007? Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out." Cheers!
I tried coming up with one word to sum up the year and couldn't. 2007 was strange, I said. Draining. Overwhelming. Unsettling. Sobering. Exciting. None fit quite right, and to say it's been an ineffable year is a semantic cop-out. So I'll settle for this: 2007 was a year of massive change, both in terms of my professional and personal lives.
If I could have seen myself last year as I sit here, now, at the end of 2007, I'm... not sure what I'd have thought. Some changes I could have foreseen, like graduating. Others, the internal changes, not so much. Most days, I'm not even sure which is true: that I have changed in massive ways, or that I haven't changed much at all.
2007 seems like the year I turned a hell of a lot of energy inward, too much probably. I feel like I've had the strongest sense of who I am, where I've grown, and an all-too-keen awareness of where my defects still lie.
And in the midst of that existential mess, 2007 gave me a stronger appreciation of my friends. They've come through for me for so many ways, through their support and encouragement, even though I spent so much time caught up in a mess of negativity and had little to offer in return.
So, to rescue this post from the negativity that pervaded the previous attempts, I'm going to state, in vague terms, my new year's resolution: if I can't learn to embrace change, I need to come to grips with it and stop running the other way. I've already started moving in that direction, but keeping up the impetus is the challenge. This time 'round, it's one I think I'm up to.
And lastly, I think Scrivener put it best: "Happy New Year! And 2007? Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out." Cheers!
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Beginning of the end
I don't know how it is in other industries, but December's a crazy busy time in academia, for students and faculty alike.
In spite of that, I love it. Sure, I'm usually stressed, sleep-deprived, and cranky, but there's an underlying eagerness to have it all done with. No matter how much I like a given set of classes, I thrive on novelty and the prospect of an upcoming new set of classes. I loved the prospect of new books, new material, new professors, and even a fresh batch of classmates as a student; now I look forward to the beautiful honeymoon period of a new semester, where students do their reading and assignments, but I also like having fresh slates to work with (even if the first set of writing I get always startles me with its... uh... roughness around the edges).
But I also like December for the same reason I love autumn--the end of a year and the prospect of a new one. I go through the motions of new year's resolutions, and like most, rarely accomplish them. I think they're just too ambitious. One of last year's ambitions was to find a balance between work and personal life; clearly, I haven't accomplished it. I thought I'd come to terms with God, but that relationship's still on the rocks. I thought I'd stop looking back at the what-ifs, and clearly, I haven't.
Such is life.
But I'm formulating next year's ambition. And it's simple. Oh, there are accompanying, unspoken goals that I would like to accomplish, and those are certainly bolder and more ambitious. But I think if I carry through with the relatively minor act I've been pondering for over three years, something that most people would probably do with little thought, the other things might just fall into place. It's a small act, but, I hope, a symbolic one. If--no, when I carry through, I'll blog about it ;).
---
I've heard it said that once you do something regularly for about two weeks, it becomes habit. After a month of blogging every day, I actually started twitching to write this morning. I may become a more regular blogger after all.
In spite of that, I love it. Sure, I'm usually stressed, sleep-deprived, and cranky, but there's an underlying eagerness to have it all done with. No matter how much I like a given set of classes, I thrive on novelty and the prospect of an upcoming new set of classes. I loved the prospect of new books, new material, new professors, and even a fresh batch of classmates as a student; now I look forward to the beautiful honeymoon period of a new semester, where students do their reading and assignments, but I also like having fresh slates to work with (even if the first set of writing I get always startles me with its... uh... roughness around the edges).
But I also like December for the same reason I love autumn--the end of a year and the prospect of a new one. I go through the motions of new year's resolutions, and like most, rarely accomplish them. I think they're just too ambitious. One of last year's ambitions was to find a balance between work and personal life; clearly, I haven't accomplished it. I thought I'd come to terms with God, but that relationship's still on the rocks. I thought I'd stop looking back at the what-ifs, and clearly, I haven't.
Such is life.
But I'm formulating next year's ambition. And it's simple. Oh, there are accompanying, unspoken goals that I would like to accomplish, and those are certainly bolder and more ambitious. But I think if I carry through with the relatively minor act I've been pondering for over three years, something that most people would probably do with little thought, the other things might just fall into place. It's a small act, but, I hope, a symbolic one. If--no, when I carry through, I'll blog about it ;).
---
I've heard it said that once you do something regularly for about two weeks, it becomes habit. After a month of blogging every day, I actually started twitching to write this morning. I may become a more regular blogger after all.
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