Unpeeling

Being involved with different student groups, both at my school and at the university, has helped me unpeel the complexity of the university's structure somewhat and understand why things happen the way they do. I am well into my second year at the university and a lot of my engagement has been around the graduate student experience, sometimes intersecting with internationalization and sometimes with other aspects.

I have so many thoughts on the subject and someday I hope to be able to reflect on this much more thoughtfully. But for now, here is, in no order, a list of things I have realized by choosing not to just be a recipient of the graduate student experience, but to shape it in some way:

Middle of the night

It is the beginning of the week but I am at the end of a long day (and my tether?). It is 1 am and I have just finished the 11th time I did a video for a Fellowship application, that at this moment, I am convinced I will not get. Needless to say, the sound of my own voice annoys me to no end, I think my face is uneven (!), the background was crumpled, you can catch my eyes when they look down at my notes, the tripod that I own for no real reason and lugged all around the world, broke the one time I could have used it. Several of the videos have me cussing loudly after I screw up a line or a word (note to self: remember to delete)

Whether this is the voice of exhaustion, rationality or just good ol' impostor syndrome doing its bit, I do not know, and frankly at 1 am, it is hard to separate things or care. I am surprised and overwhelmed and deluged by the sheer effort this semester is taking, not because too much is going in the now and here, but because as much, if not more is going on in the FUTURE. You know, the future that is around the corner, where new lives, directions, and winter-choices will be made (Minnesota, so much snow in November does not make things look good for you). The haste at which I am being swept along in this semester makes complete sense if I realize that I am living two lives, one right now and one in the future. 

A Borrowed Imagination

One of the problems with a love for reading is that every time something sad happens, something falls apart, you are left with all the possibilities that could have been. Not just possibilities from your imagination, but from the imagination of every author you ever read. You think to yourself, I would have worn two sweaters each day so as to not feel cold, I would have cycled to work, we would have taken walks on weekend, the house would have been full of books, compliments would have been saved for birthdays and anniversaries and so on.

Perhaps that's why I dwell so much. I think of what didn't happen (fact) and then I think about the millions of things that didn't happen (fiction), and now never will. And this of course leads to a journey million miles below the surface of the truth.

I wouldn't stop reading though. I couldn't stop. But sometimes I wish I had only my imagination to deal with. Or an off button. 

Rain by Jack Gilbert

Suddenly this defeat.

This rain.

The blues gone gray

And the browns gone gray

And yellow

A terrible amber.

In the cold streets

Your warm body.

In whatever room

Your warm body.

Among all the people

Your absence

The people who are always

Not you.

I have been easy with trees

Too long.

Too familiar with mountains.

Joy has been a habit.

Now

Suddenly

This rain.

Scatter

I sit here, waiting for the words that won't come. Magic becomes even more elusive on these busy days. It is difficult to see the beauty in a shelf neatly lined with lunchboxes and clothes laid out for the entire week, although I believe in the beauty of efficiency. My childhood self almost can't believe where we are at these days and the weeks are full of moments of redemption.  Winter is coming, to paraphrase Game of Thrones. It turns dark early, the last of the light starts filtering away at five pm, and sometimes it takes with it my will to be anywhere but home. So many exciting projects are underway, it almost explains my inclination to do nothing this evening.

International Collaborative Research Forum

On Friday, I was able to attend a conference on campus and I am very glad I did! It isn't very often that I walk out of a conference thinking that all of it was useful for me but I definitely had that feeling after this one. It was called International Collaborative Research Forum and was held the renovated and fabulous and majestic looking Northrop Auditorium. After the opening session, there were parallel sessions for everything and I attended the ones on grant writing, ethics in international collaboration and internationalization in graduate education. I enjoyed all of these, especially the last one, where in addition to the Dean of Graduate Education at U of M, there were people from Council of Graduate Schools and the National Science Foundation.

Too Many Names by Pablo Neruda

Mondays are meshed with Tuesdays

and the whole week with the whole year.

Time cannot be cut

with your exhausted scissors,

and all the names of the day

are washed out by the waters of night.

No one can claim the name of Pedro,

nobody is Rosa or Maria,

all of us are dust or sand,

all of us are rain under rain.

They have spoken to me of Venezuelas,

of Chiles and Paraguays;

I have no idea what they are saying.

I know only the skin of the earth

and I know it has no name.

When I lived amongst the roots

they pleased me more than flowers did,

and when I spoke to a stone

it rang like a bell.

It is so long, the spring

which goes on all winter.

Time lost its shoes.

A year lasts four centuries.

When I sleep every night,

what am I called or not called?

And when I wake, who am I

if I was not I while I slept?

This means to say that scarcely

have we landed into this life

than we come as if new-born;

let us not fill our mouths

with so many faltering names,

with so many sad formalities,

with so many pompous letters,

with so much of yours and mine,

with so much signing of papers.

I have a mind to confuse things,

unite them, make them new-born,

mix them up, undress them,

until all light in the world

has the oneness of the ocean,

a generous, vast wholeness,

a crackling, living fragrance.