Ride the River

There are so many, many things to do.

Il y a si beaucoup de choses de faire!

Bahuut chizen karne hain!



I have been puzzled the last few days, trying to figure out a few things.

One: I am feeling quite good about many things, like my friends here and the way that my social life has become, once again, a force to be reckoned with. I find myself talking to people and enjoying it thoroughly, once again wondering: what on earth are they doing here talking to me? Only, I realize now, they're enjoying it a lot too.

TWO: Am I a horrible academic/scholar/writer? I keep meeting with this one person who tells me over and over again that I need to focus, but he finally helped me understand what he meant. I am not unfocused; I just tend to cut out step 2 of 3 and then my thoughts get confused. It's not that I need to use theory to lobotomize my ideas, but that I need to make my own voice stronger. The only way I can do that is to explain everything clearly and to recognize people don't think about stuff as much as I do (least not the same stuff).

THREE: Why am I on edge lately? With multiple fronts actually coming together (cool research, cool friends, cool students to teach), what is up with me? And then I remember that there is a whole big world out there. WHile some people can just block it out, it's always in the back of my mind, just moving along, a river of thoughts and important things. My dad does not have another set of tumors (yet); he is not unemployed but not gainfully employed either; my mom is doing okay, at least she says she is (but that's no way of knowing); sisters and brother are all going through rough spots.
And then, here I am, having a good time and enjoying my work. Feeling inspired and thinking I could actually get through this PhD with my soul in tact, that I could go to INdia and write something awesome, get published, give papers, get a job.

FOUR: If things were different, I would run off to Seattle or Portland with my friend S and spend some time just living, doing a crap job and eating vegan, seeing the world and traveling maybe (cheaply). Walking in shoes and sleeping in beds that don't quite fit but that always remind me just how good I have had it. Just how wonderful the world can be. If things were different.


A river of thoughts and things to do. A river to ride out to the source.
Or until the world falls out from under us (and we learn it was a disk all along).