I have this theory.
I believe that grad school is designed to break the human spirit.
And, frankly, I'm not okay with that. Not even a little.
So. In order to stay human, to stay sane, and to stay me, I do things.
I go to campus on a Saturday and I sit on the northwest wall of McKee and look at the trees that are half green and half gold. I listen to the buzz of bicycles on the sidewalk. I grade a few papers or read some 19th century American poetry. I welcome the spiders and ladybugs that seem to gravitate to my spot and I don't mind that they like to watch the world from my right shoulder--I think we each understand that this is the ideal spot to be in when the sun sinks into the trees, where the cement is still warm when the best and quietest part of autumn starts to settle around us. When my hand gets so cold that I have to sit on it between underlining pages I know it's time to go. I swill the lukewarm grit in the bottom of my Starbucks cup and consider swallowing, but think better of it. I gather my pens and pencils and books and papers and stuff them in my bag. I dismount the wall, wondering if the ladybug will miss the red sweater that she looked so good on, and decide to take the long way around the building, walking in the sunny patches between the shadows cast by aspens and maples and street-lamps.
As I walk home I run through my to-do list in my head. I think about student drafts and proposal edits and midterm reports and library book due dates. I consider laundry, broiled chicken, and unloading the dishwasher. I reject each idea in turn, opting for sixteen pages of Hemingway next to my open window, the sound of raised voices and slamming car doors a fitting soundtrack to the words that live only on the page. Distracted, I fetch Dylan from the closet--I've neglected him and he reminds me of it by being out of tune on purpose, raising purple and blue streaks on my fingers in minutes. I play on despite him, and in time we remember each other and the stains of Tom Petty and Leonard Cohen reverberate around the thin walls of the room. I consider keeping my voice low and my plucking quiet--I do have neighbors. But then I remember that my neighbors are college students and I forgive myself. Again and again I forgive myself for the missed fret and the bent chord. I play on. Badly, poorly, and with abandon. I strum the same chords again and again like I want to hear the track on repeat. Calm seeps in through the open window like the darkening sky and my fingers begin to relax. I let the music fade.
I think about obligations and e-mails, highlighters and post-it notes.
And so I let myself dream.
I dream about Libby's face when she laughs, and how she can make me laugh with the squint of her eyes and the twitch of her nose. I think about my student who calls me "Ma'am" because I call him "Sir" and about his progress this semester, and how, in spite of everything, I am proud of my students. I dream about how much I love my dog, and how I know a golden looks most noble in the light that bounces off of fallen leaves. I consider the black bananas in my kitchen and how my love of cooking and my need to write could be two sides of the same coin of passion. I think about how watching YouTube clips of the 1980 Olympic hockey team is a kind of salve for the soul, and that, for me, a few hours "lost" to old footage of Charlie Chaplin or Fry and Laurie is not loss, but gain of the healthiest kind. I think about how lucky and blessed I am to have the parents and teachers and friends that I have, to know them and to like them as people, and to know that they like me too. I visualize the experience of eating an apple, and how biting it and hearing it be bitten are pleasures that need each other, and about how so many of my best memories revolve around apples. There is something dangerous and vulnerable and comforting and terribly, beautifully domestic about cutting apples. Something about slicing and coring and peeling an apple feels like surgery. It is creation, and the most organic kind of prayer.
Tonight, to keep myself sane, to keep the dream of a life with more guitar chord than letter grades, more paperback novels than client forms, and more nourishment than deprivation, I type these words while eating apples. The words and the flesh of the fruit bring a peace that surpasses understanding. And as night crosses over into day, I washing my dishes, content to read the lines on my hands through the rushing water.
I believe that grad school is designed to break the human spirit.
And, frankly, I'm not okay with that. Not even a little.
So. In order to stay human, to stay sane, and to stay me, I do things.
I go to campus on a Saturday and I sit on the northwest wall of McKee and look at the trees that are half green and half gold. I listen to the buzz of bicycles on the sidewalk. I grade a few papers or read some 19th century American poetry. I welcome the spiders and ladybugs that seem to gravitate to my spot and I don't mind that they like to watch the world from my right shoulder--I think we each understand that this is the ideal spot to be in when the sun sinks into the trees, where the cement is still warm when the best and quietest part of autumn starts to settle around us. When my hand gets so cold that I have to sit on it between underlining pages I know it's time to go. I swill the lukewarm grit in the bottom of my Starbucks cup and consider swallowing, but think better of it. I gather my pens and pencils and books and papers and stuff them in my bag. I dismount the wall, wondering if the ladybug will miss the red sweater that she looked so good on, and decide to take the long way around the building, walking in the sunny patches between the shadows cast by aspens and maples and street-lamps.
As I walk home I run through my to-do list in my head. I think about student drafts and proposal edits and midterm reports and library book due dates. I consider laundry, broiled chicken, and unloading the dishwasher. I reject each idea in turn, opting for sixteen pages of Hemingway next to my open window, the sound of raised voices and slamming car doors a fitting soundtrack to the words that live only on the page. Distracted, I fetch Dylan from the closet--I've neglected him and he reminds me of it by being out of tune on purpose, raising purple and blue streaks on my fingers in minutes. I play on despite him, and in time we remember each other and the stains of Tom Petty and Leonard Cohen reverberate around the thin walls of the room. I consider keeping my voice low and my plucking quiet--I do have neighbors. But then I remember that my neighbors are college students and I forgive myself. Again and again I forgive myself for the missed fret and the bent chord. I play on. Badly, poorly, and with abandon. I strum the same chords again and again like I want to hear the track on repeat. Calm seeps in through the open window like the darkening sky and my fingers begin to relax. I let the music fade.
I think about obligations and e-mails, highlighters and post-it notes.
And so I let myself dream.
I dream about Libby's face when she laughs, and how she can make me laugh with the squint of her eyes and the twitch of her nose. I think about my student who calls me "Ma'am" because I call him "Sir" and about his progress this semester, and how, in spite of everything, I am proud of my students. I dream about how much I love my dog, and how I know a golden looks most noble in the light that bounces off of fallen leaves. I consider the black bananas in my kitchen and how my love of cooking and my need to write could be two sides of the same coin of passion. I think about how watching YouTube clips of the 1980 Olympic hockey team is a kind of salve for the soul, and that, for me, a few hours "lost" to old footage of Charlie Chaplin or Fry and Laurie is not loss, but gain of the healthiest kind. I think about how lucky and blessed I am to have the parents and teachers and friends that I have, to know them and to like them as people, and to know that they like me too. I visualize the experience of eating an apple, and how biting it and hearing it be bitten are pleasures that need each other, and about how so many of my best memories revolve around apples. There is something dangerous and vulnerable and comforting and terribly, beautifully domestic about cutting apples. Something about slicing and coring and peeling an apple feels like surgery. It is creation, and the most organic kind of prayer.
Tonight, to keep myself sane, to keep the dream of a life with more guitar chord than letter grades, more paperback novels than client forms, and more nourishment than deprivation, I type these words while eating apples. The words and the flesh of the fruit bring a peace that surpasses understanding. And as night crosses over into day, I washing my dishes, content to read the lines on my hands through the rushing water.
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