Ok...I changed it some. It's "verbal communication-equivalent mediums". It's being action-planned as I type. We'll benchmark it. That's always a nice word to use. It may take a few months. Cool beans with me, plus I don't have to do a lot. The two people at work that needed to like it liked it, and it kind of fills a need for quantifying the difference between (let's just say) Training Type A and Training Type B that we've been getting nastygrams on for a few months, anyway. I mean, *we* know they're the same, and any dingbat would, too; they both have equal results...none whatsoever, not that anyone cares. But this can legitimize it, plus it's hyphenated.
Then I left and drove to campus for class...the same class I have with my advisor. The same class I just scored a B on a test in. I never get Bs. Or, if I do, they're like 88% and higher Bs. This one was way beneath that, because I didn't study; I was working on Magnificent Octopus. Another girl in my program who I want to like with all of my heart (in spite of the fact that she asks very bizarre questions that make you think she's tuned in to lectures other than those which you are hearing, and has a voice that....oh, god. It's annoying. Picture Snow White as a junkie hooker, jonesing for a fix. Yeah, that. It's a high-pitched, almost baby-sounding, draggy drawl.) but anyway, when I told her (reluctantly!) what I'd made, she looked shocked, and wanted to know why my advisor'd let me sign up for actual classes, and not just put me in (a type of) independent study class that didn't have any requirements. I don't know. No one mentioned it to me, and I didn't think about it. I'm the last to get any memo like that.
After class, Advisorwoman ignored me until we got downstairs (we took the same elevator), then before she left asked how I was doing (fine) and to let her know if she could help (yeah, sure). She said I didn't look good (no kidding?), and I said I was just tired. So then she launches into how she's tired too, and boy this is sure a rough semester, and blah, blah, blah. And I'm just thinking about the lecture she just gave, and how she was taking about being in the park with her kid last weekend, and how she spent a whole summer becoming an expert at some video game with her husband.
Somehow, I don't think our schedules are quite the same.
She says not to take this Magnificent Octopus thing too seriously. Huh? It's only my career, silly woman. I think she was in some weird way trying to smooth things over. It kind of makes me feel badly about how I think of her, but...I don't know. She's just a very difficult person. I don't want it to take up too much of my thinking time anymore. I was tempted to just start typing on Octopus, or this entry, or something like that in her class, but I stopped myself because that's being very passive-aggressive, and I'm not about that. I hate talking to people one-on-one. I wish she hadn't bothered to talk to me.
I tried on the drive home to decide if I'm really upset at her because what she did was uncool, not in keeping with the rules, and unfair, or if I should have predicted that she would do something like this, and I'm really just upset because she said I wasn't perfect and because she over-criticized me a little in front of that one other panel person because I care so much what he thinks of me. I've decided it's kind of a combination of the two. I should have known she was being too hands-off. I should have demanded attention, though politely. I couldn't have anticipated some of her "points" (ironic quote time here), because most of them were silly, but I could have not let it throw me so; my reaction was what was under my control. And I don't mean externally, because I didn't really have an external one, I mean internally; I didn't have to let it throw me for a loop like that, didn't have to let it hurt me. We weren't friends, so it isn't a betrayal. She's never been a perfect advisor, so that wasn't a betrayal, either. In short, I can't point too many fingers at her; I need to point some at myself. I'm usually good at working independently, and I disagree with her assessment that I am not, but whether or not I get offended by that assessment is totally under my control. As for criticizing me in front of the other person from another department...well... That's a different issue. The third person on the panel is immaterial (it's actually her husband, but we'll deal with that later; I don't care what he thinks of me. That's the short of it). I do care what the out-of-department person thinks for a few reasons. Number one is that I respect his opinions. Number two is, of course I want to look good. Number three is I kind of like him in a weird way; it's some perverted validation thing, probably. Ok: Number three is psychotic, and needs to be taken out of consideration entirely. Number two is this says more about her than it does me, and I can still look ok by just doing my job. Number one is a little more difficult, because I don't really know what his opinions are, and if they've changed and he now thinks I suck, I'll never know--so it's out of my control. So the bottom line is, who cares. Right? Right. So I've decided to just do the putting-my-head-down-and-working thing.
So I'm ok with everything. I don't care. In a way, not having someone to talk to made it easier for me to be upset, I think. A lot of this is my fault, but the fact still remains that (1) I can fix it. (2) I can go elsewhere, to another group in the department that is maybe a little more traditional and structured, where I will have a better idea of where I stand at all times, especially before something as important as the presentation of an Octopus. At the very least, I am thankful that I didn't run into Really Cute Guy today like I have other times after this class, because I really looked like shit today. Not that that matters, either. When all of this is over, and I have MO (Magnificent Octopus) done, and I can go teach as an adjunct, and maybe quit Eviljob, things will be better. And I can do that, and finish my bigger MO, and then move out of this state and get a good job teaching and doing research somewhere else and just be me and have my own lab group and run it the way I think it should be run and just be happy and be me and then die. I just need to keep my eyes on that. That's the goal. More freedom and less fakery. And so, so much of what I do at Evijob is fakery, in my opinion. I don't care--about the job, the company, the dumbass mission statement…none of it. Other people do, but I don't. Trying to change anything at Eviljob is futile, so I don't try. So more freedom. Yay. And it's raining now here, it's really beautiful, and I'm sitting in my room; it's cold inside and rainy outside, and at this very moment, Mom's ok and alive, my sister is ok and alive, my son-friend is ok and alive...everyone I know is ok and alive. And I think I will be a good teacher, even on the adjunct level; even though it may not seem like it, I value freedom--I'm not asking for structure everywhere. And I know what it's like to not know what you should do, so I can give better direction to other people that way. And I have to see the whole stupid group tomorrow, but that’s ok, because number one, there are nice people there, too. I can ignore the bad ones, like I have been doing. And, there’s always the fact that I don’t have to be there. I’m there because I want to be. I’m in the program because I want to be. And they didn’t have to accept me; it’s not an easy program to get into. So there’s that. I need to focus more on the things I am grateful for, or I am going to turn into the same kind of bitching, hateful witch I can’t stand being around.
The last time I was in Minneapolis on an Eviljob business trip, I took an afternoon off and went to this cool outdoor art gallery type thing…they have a neat pond, with a big spoon that is holding a cherry—stuff like that. In one area, behind a wall of hedges, they have benches that have inscriptions on them. I liked those best of all. One of them said something about how it is wrong to sleep curled into a ball because you are afraid of being hurt; you should sleep with your legs stretched out and your arms at your sides, ready to attack. And it’s true. I need to relax and just do my work, and wait for my time. And if something comes at me, attack it, but not tie myself up in knots and fill myself with fear over things I have no control over, like when it will attack. I wish I had thought ahead and brought a camera or something to take a picture of that saying. Just another instance of my lack of planning. But anyway—at least I read it. I’m glad I took that afternoon off. I’ve lost sight of the things I can be grateful for, bigtime. That’s my own fault.
Plus, maybe I’ll get to sit next to Really Cute Guy tomorrow. Well, ok…maybe that’s a bad idea; I’m in a mood. I always get like this before and during my period, for some screwy reason. So no RCG, but… Well… There are other things to be grateful for that are more important. Everyone being ok and alive is a big big one.
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