The Blogging Process

For those of you who haven't noticed, I've been posting a little more frequently of late.  Actually I believe I posted 30 out of the 31 days of October.  I'm not doing NaBloPoMo nor have I started any personal blogging resolutions (who would start a resolution in October?).  No I have simply started a new blogging process and, so far, it seems to be working.

I used to think of posts and then write them.  Generally this would happen 2-3 times a week.  If I had a post in my mind and I didn't have time to write it I would start a draft (often no more than a title) to come back to another time.  I think in my entire blogging career I completed maybe two of those drafts.  More often, I would end up deleting them after several months.

This was not a great systems because when I am thinking of blog posts I tend to think of a lot of blog posts.  I flirted with writing multiple posts and then scheduling them for every other day but that didn't fulfill my blogging needs.  Once I'm done writing a post I want to publish it right away.  Two days later I might be in a very different mood and that post will seem old and out of sync with my present self.

In general I try to write something everyday.  This something can be a blog post, part of a paper, a review, notes to myself, even an extended email.  There is something critically important about forming written words on a daily basis.  Unfortunately by the middle of the semester this daily practice has been known to fall apart.

So now I've been setting some time aside each night to blog.  If a thought has been floating around in my mind all day than that is what comes out.  If there is nothing there, I open up a blank post and see what shows up.  Of course sometimes I have something rattling around so frantically that I can't wait until the evening to get it out.  Either way it is becoming an important part of my day.

Giving Feedback

I've been thinking about how we learn to give feedback.   Giving feedback is a critical skill in academia. We don't usually call it feedback, instead we conduct peer reviews and we grade papers. But how are we actually taught to do these things?  I remember being given opportunities to review papers as a doctoral student but no one really showed me how it was done.  As for  grading, I was taught how to develop rubrics but there was no instruction on how to provide feedback for a poorly written assignment.  I was very lucky to have mentors and editors who provided extensive and painful reviews of my work.  This not only taught me to be a better writer but I believe it taught me how to provide constructive criticism to others.

I have taught peer reviews in both my undergraduate and graduate classes.  Depending on how much time I have to devote to the topic, my instruction ranges from just providing a framework to showing effective reviews and discussing the review process.  As much as I can, I assign writing in drafts to allow for feedback before the final product is turned in.  Often I can arrange it so that each student gets feedback from me as well as from a peer.  Sometimes the peer feedback is helpful but there are many times when it is not.

Regardless of how I instruct students to do peer reviews, good reviews seem to come from good writers.  If you have spent time working on your own writing it is easier to see what is not working in someone else's writing.  If you are clueless in your own writing, it is pretty difficult to provide a meaningful critique of someone else's work.  Or perhaps it is associated with the ability to read critically.  Good writers are usually good readers and learning to read as a writer is one of the best ways to improve your own writing.

Most of my students appreciate my feedback.  They don't enjoy it in the moment but it helps them get to the next step for that particular paper and for their writing overall.  On doctoral committees I am often the one providing the most indepth feedback.  I provide feedback on both issues of design and issues of writing.  Sometimes this means I end up reading more drafts than other committee members, even when I am the outside member.  I don't like the additional workload but I'd rather help out early than have to critique a poorly written dissertation right before a defense.

Some advisors provide very little feedback.  My gut reaction is that this is not a sign of laziness or disinterest in a student.  It does take a lot of time to provide useful feedback but I find most of my colleagues are willing to invest that time in their students, especially their doctoral students.  Instead I think it comes from discomfort with the process.  This is probably a combination of not liking to tear apart someone's work (although many people are comfortable doing this in a blind review) and not knowing how to give helpful feedback.  Like students, many academics struggle with their own writing.  Technically they may have stronger writing skills than their students (although as a group academics are not known for writing well) but they struggle to put words on paper on a consistent schedule.

It is interesting to me that we spend years receiving specialized training in our field but so very little attention is paid to developing skills for the tasks we need to do on a daily basis: teach, write, review.

Fields of Inquiry

I've been thinking a bit about fields lately.  Not the kind found at the end of a path in the woods (although I really like that kind), not the kind where you conduct naturalistic research, and certainly not the kind with four bases.  I've been thinking about research fields; scholarly disciplines; fields of inquiry.

I gave my doctoral students an assignment that involved them reading an essay on the philosophy of science and mixed methods.  To make his argument the author positioned paradigms as shared belief within a field of inquiry or a community of researchers.  While I buy parts of his argument, that doesn't work for me as a working definition of scientific paradigms.  However I realize I am probably influenced by my lack of serious grounding in any one field.  I have a very hard time identifying my community of researchers.

The discipline in which I received my training is different from the discipline in which I have conducted research for over twenty years.  I tend to identify with the field in which I work and not the field in which I was trained.  But with no true credentials in this field, I am often considered a bit of an outsider. It is a very interdisciplinary field so it hasn't been a large problem in terms of getting positions or funding but there are subtle exclusions.  I've felt them the most in my current position when it comes to discussions of curriculum and teaching opportunities.

Since my adopted field is interdisciplinary, we tend to publish in other people's fields.  We play in a lot of people's sandboxes, especially when it comes to publications.  At least I thought we all did. Now I'm realizing that even in an interdisciplinary field, most researchers tend to find a focused set of outlets (in terms of journals and conferences) and set up shop.  I haven't done this.  My CV is rather all over the place.  I believe this is contributing to my long list of rejections lately.  I'm treading into areas where I am an outsider.

I've also been thinking about fields of inquiry because I'm reading a fair amount of theory in other fields.  I like theory.  I like reading about it.  I like thinking about it.  I like finding ways to apply new theories to my work.  I even have a fledgling theory that I'm trying to develop.  However theories overlap across fields (they also diverge in interesting ways but there is a lot of overlap) and it should not be so difficult to accept a theory from another field.  Yet sometimes it is.

So I've found a theory that I really like that is in a field I know pretty much nothing about.  I've been reading a lot about this theory, mostly articles and books written by the theory's founder.  In doing so I've been really struck by the benefit of immersing oneself so firmly in one field (and this case one theory).  It is not that she hasn't learned from other disciplines, she certainly has, but her focus for developing the theory, evaluating the theory, and writing about the theory is all soundly in her field.

It would be nice to be so firmly positioned but I realize this never would or could be me.  I enjoy hopping around to much to ever stay in one field.  I like making analogies and connections across disciplines.  I feel I learn much more this way.  In fact lately I have plans to position my work in three additional fields (or subfields).  I don't know where this all will lead me but I imagine it is going to take me longer to get there.

On Rejections

Just the other night I had finished up a post and was closing my laptop to get ready for bed when I checked my email one last time.  It was right before midnight and one lone email popped up.  It was a decision email from an editor rejecting my paper.  Who sends out rejection emails at midnight?

I have certainly received rejections throughout my career but lately they have been coming fast and furious.  I have not had an acceptance in a long time.  Actually I should say I have not had an acceptance where I was the first author in a long time.  My students and colleagues that write with me have faired much better than me as of late.  It has been over a year since I've even received a revise and resubmit on a first authored publication.

At first I thought it was because I was not spending enough time and careful attention on my own work. I still believe this was true but not for the last few manuscripts.  I may be picking the wrong journals but this last paper has been rejected by two journals in the past 4 months and both of them were very carefully selected.

So I need to ask myself, what exactly is going on?  Unfortunately there are a lot of variables so it is difficult to pinpoint the problem.  I could chalk it all up to a bad streak.  However the one consistent thing that that has changed is the my perception of my writing and research topics.  When I had less difficulty getting published I thought most of my work was rather boring and not all that unique.  Sure there was something in each manuscript that hadn't been asked before, but that something felt rather minor.  Lately my work has felt a bit more cutting-edge.  I'm trying to merge fields; I'm using riskier (at least for my field) methodology; I'm asking unique questions.  

I am also operating on a smaller scale.  In my last position I had the luxury of large grants (which generated large datasets) and a famous PI.  Our methodology, though conservative, was sound. Currently most of my work is put together on a shoestring.  I make it happen by my efforts, a student research team and (if I'm lucky) a few extra dollars thrown to me from my university.  

I think it is possible to be successful in academia asking unique questions with risky methodology but you probably need the resources and the backing that I had before.  I also think it is possible to be successful doing smaller scale work, but you may have to be more conservative.  Or perhaps it is something completely different.  Perhaps I have just not found my voice in this new area yet. Science is incredibly conservative and new ideas need to be introduced carefully.  I know this from my training.  The problem is I don't know if I have the patience.

My ideas are well received in conferences and presentations.  People seem excited about what I am doing when I talk to them about it.  Normally I would say that they are just being kind but my previous experience tells me that academics enjoy telling you what is wrong with your thinking or methodology, even to your face.  

I don't need a lot of new publications.  I have published a lot for someone at my level.  Also I have the luxury of tenure and I continue to publish (although not as first author as of late).  One of the problems with the rejections is that I need to keep working on the same manuscripts.  I want to get them out because I am wedded to them.  They not only represent a significant amount of my time, effort, and thought but they also represent the voices of my participants and I feel they deserve a chance to be heard.  At the same time I have at least a dozen (actually it is getting close to 14) new papers that are somewhere in the analysis/writing stage.  More importantly, I have a desire for bigger projects.  I have several book-length projects in mind but I don't feel I can start them until I've cleared away most of these papers.

My manuscripts are beginning to feel like children who refuse to leave the nest. 

Writing Group

Last year I started a writing group with my doctoral students.  It is primarily a support/accountability group.  We meet every two weeks for coffee and to update each other on where we are with a current project or product.  Attendance was spotty the first year but by the end we had a small core group that volunteered to keep the group going during the summer.

We had a meeting today and many of my regulars from last year had to miss it.  However we have had an influx of new members this year, including 4 first year students who showed up for the first time today.  The first years were very excited to be invited to the group and some of them took notes.

Standard advice is that these types of groups should not combine faculty and students.  I believe the thinking is that (a) faculty can be intimidating (making students less likely to be open and honest and making it harder for students to get the support that they need) and (b) it can become an instructional group, with students looking to faculty members for instructions on writing.  I don't feel that this is happening with my group but my original intention was to get it started and then back out.

  

Today we had a discussion about the composition of the group: whether more faculty should be invited or whether it should be faculty-free.  The group was quite clear that they didn't want it changed from its present configuration.  We share problems that arise in the process of writing and I do give more "tips" than any other member.  I find myself fluctuating between mentor and group member and I haven't been completely comfortable with it.  Today I was told that the mentor role is critical for them and they don't want to lose it.  

Last year progress on completing writing products were slow for many group members. I felt like the accountability part of the group was not working.  Today however I was pleasantly surprised with the progress that people have been making (myself included).  It finally feels like it is coming together.                                                               

Meta-Awareness

I enjoyed this list the other day.  I enjoyed it because I like lists; it's a good list; and it made me think. Mostly I liked it because it made me think about what I do and I really enjoy thinking about what I do. I particularly enjoy thinking about what I do while I am doing it.

I enjoy yoga because to learn it you need to think about what you are doing while you are doing it. You need to be aware of your body and the posture and your body in the posture.  While you are doing all this thinking and posturing and thinking about posturing, you can suddenly become aware that you are aware of your body in the posture.

I really enjoy that.

When I write I am thinking about what I am writing and I'm thinking about how I'm writing while I'm writing.  I enjoy writing because, like yoga, it is really difficult to get everything to align correctly but when it clicks into place it feels wonderful.  I enjoy both writing and yoga because they feel like great big puzzles I have to figure out.  No matter how many times I solve the puzzle, there is a new one waiting for me.

The psychology of flow involves getting beyond awareness but I find it so much more fascinating to hover above it; to live in the land of meta-awareness.

I Used To...

I used to tell stories.

Sleepy little boy bedtime stories.
Silly passing time on boring train ride stories.
Scary vampire monster bat stories.
Sexy pillow talk lover stories.

I used to tell stories.
I used to write poems.

Now,
every so often,
I capture a story
by clicking a button.

But mostly
I fumble
silently
in the dark.

RBOC: Things On My Mind Edition

• Ruth recently posted about coming up against the blogging wall.  She's been blogging for 3 1/2 years and this is the first time she asked the question "why?"  I commented that I was amazed it took this long since I seem to go through it at least once a year.  Currently I'm not asking myself why? but rather why not?  Why am I not posting?  I have ideas.  I procrastinate in other ways.  What is keeping me from writing here?
• In the early years, our children have many developmental milestones.  As parents we are always proud but as they age the opportunity for milestone pride grows increasingly rare. This week I was very proud at my son's first use of the term "hegemonic" in an email. 
• b is the King of Smoothies.  He makes them at night and it always a surprise what is in there. Tonight he claimed it was "brie, bacon and sun-dried tomato" but I knew we didn't have bacon in the house.  He then said they were "Black Death" smoothies.  Whatever it is, it's delicious.
• Blogger has a new gizmo that allows you to create a book from your blog.  I played around with it (but didn't lay down any cash).  One of the nice aspects is that you can choose posts from specific labels.  It was fun to see posts I'd written years ago cataloged by content. Sadly, I realized that my posts have deteriorated in this past year.  I blame tenure and photography. 
• I think yoga is affecting my personality.  Today in class I truly loved my toes.  I was also not only more than happy to appreciate the body I was in but to appreciate my time on this earth. It's going to be an interesting summer.

RBOC: End of the Semester is Here Edition

• I taught my last two classes today.  All I've been doing for the last two weeks is listening to presentations but it is still nice to know that I don't have to be in a classroom again for over a month.
• One of my undergrads gave me a hug today after she handed in her final exam.  They've been a great group and I'm going to miss them. 
• I do have grading to do but I assign my heaviest stuff mid-semester so it really won't be that bad.
• I thought life would get easier now that coursework has slowed down but, alas, that is not the case.  I'm on a search committee for 3 open positions and there are a lot of applicants (and most of them are really good).
• We have also moved our deadline for doctoral applications up to December 1st.  I am happy to say that this has resulted in a much larger number of viable candidates.  However I think it also means we have to pick quick and woo the good ones into the program.  My work is cut out for me. 
• I have also taken on another doula client.  I know I swore to take some time off but this young mother-to-be (and grandmom-to-be) are right up my alley.  I met with them the other day and was smitten.
• Did I mention that I have two new research projects starting up next semester?  I'm training one student research team tomorrow afternoon and the other doesn't even have a team yet (although I did manage to submit the IRB application today).
• The spring semester is going to be messy.  I give you all permission to call hooey when I'm complaining in a few months.  It is all my own fault. 
• Now that Thanksgiving is over, b is allowed to play Christmas music.  He has already starting shopping (I haven't even come up with a list yet) and we'll be doing some decorating this weekend.
• My last doula client is going to be in a local production of A Christmas Carol (our favorite) and has given us free tickets.  We are very excited.
• There's something going around the blogosphere called #Reverb10.  At least three bloggers I follow are playing along.  Sounds like fun but I really can't commit to daily blogging right now. 
• The first prompt was to pick one word that captured 2010 for you and one that captures your hope for 2011.  I hate these types of prompts.  I'm not a one word kind of person.  I rarely have favorites.  I need at least a list of 15 for just about any question.
• Today's prompt was what keeps you from writing.  Honestly, nothing keeps me from writing. I love to write.  Nonwriting work sometimes keeps me from writing but much of it is stuff that will eventually fuel writing.  
• Reading and writing, in some form or another, is what I do on a daily basis.  This is why, no matter how much office politics, service assignments or even students can annoy me, I never want to be doing anything other than what I do.

Thoughts At The End Of Week One

The first week of classes is officially over.  As first weeks go, it was pretty sweet.  The biggest downside is that, what with our new workout schedule, I have been completely exhausted by the end of each day.  The weather has finally turned nice here in SouthLite and I really really wanted to take a bike ride last night.  However it was all I could do to find myself something to eat and crawl into bed with my latest passion (soon to be a blog post on its own).

The other issue with this semester is that it is going to be crazy busy for me and a lot of that is going to be service (not my favorite).  As I may have mentioned, I am the new Doctoral Program Coordinator in my department (yay tenure).  Of all our programs, I am most committed to the doctoral program and its students so I feel this is really worthwhile service.  I think I have already made a difference in the lives of several students and I'm hoping to have a larger impact on the program.  It is a very new, fledgling program, and needs some TLC.

Morale was fairly low among the doctoral students last year, so I suggested a once a month shindig at one of my favorite local watering holes.  The students were interested (b thinks it is somehow wrong that I'm drinking with students, but they are all well over 21) and we had our first meeting tonight.  The weather (we sat outdoors) and venue were perfect and everyone had a great time. Of course this isn't the most significant change I need to make, but sometimes the little things can go a long way.

I'm teaching two courses this semester.  This is the third time I'm teaching both of them so the preps aren't too difficult.  One is an undergraduate course in Women's Health.  I enjoy teaching this class, as it is crosslisted with the Women & Gender Studies Program and has a strong feminist bent. I usually have the joy of seeing students get the "aha" moment about women's roles and feminism in this country. This semester I have changed things up a little bit and added a service learning component. I LOVE service learning.  I really like to get students out into the real world and see what it is all about.  I've done it before with small groups of students but never an entire class. Most of the students seem really psyched about it.  I have three community partners and they will all be coming in next week to describe their agencies.  The students will then pick first and second choices for the project they want to work on.  Each agency serves either women or girls in the community and the students will get a chance to directly apply what they are learning in class.

My other course is a doctoral class in qualitative methods.  I am one of those nerds that really enjoys teaching methods.  I read about methods and think about methods quite a bit, so I enjoy the opportunity to talk about it and get really deep into it with my students.  Doctoral classes are great because they are generally small and three hours long.  We can really take our time and get into some meaty stuff.  I also like teaching methods because, in between the heady philosophy stuff, I can make it very interactive and hands on.  This year I know everyone in the course very well so it should be loads of fun.

There is a lot of political drama going on in my department and in the university this year.  I haven't been able to stay completely out of it (and it probably isn't wise to do so) but the location of my new office has afforded me some protection, for which I am really grateful.  My new office is absolutely fabulous.  It is comfortable and organized and big enough that I can have students around without feeling cramped.  Also, since it is on the other side of campus it forces me to walk a lot more during the day.

My office is also a great spot to write and I've gotten a lot of writing done this week.  This has felt wonderful because I went about two weeks without writing a word.  When I can't write on a regular basis I get kind of itchy.  It is a feeling that is hard to describe but I know it whenever it comes.  So this week has been all about scratching that itch.  I even managed to resubmit a paper today.

It was also Angel's first week of school.  Due to some financial glitches last semester he ended up waitlisted on three courses that he needed.  He only got into one of them and needed to find a back-up course.  He called to tell me he had decided on an Introduction to Feminism course.  And if that is not cool enough, he also needs to find a person he can talk to about feminism for the class. He has picked yours truly.  His first assignment is to ask me my definition of feminism and to get me to draw a picture of what a feminist looks like.  I believe he is also supposed to draw a picture and then we compare them.  How much fun is that?

Finding The Story

I work closely with doctoral students on their research.  Most of it is somehow connected to my research but sometimes it is research they have conducted without me (either on their own or with another faculty member).  I teach methods and writing in several of my classes and students have learned to come to me for assistance when they are in uncharted territory.  This summer I've had two similar but different experiences with students that has me thinking about how we learn to "story" our research.

The first incident involved quantitative analysis a student of mine did in a class I do not teach. From this analysis she got an idea for a paper.  She had permission from the faculty member (who supplied the data) to write it up for submission.  For whatever reason, she did not feel comfortable giving this faculty member her first draft but asked me to read it and provide feedback.  I agreed gladly.  Writing up your first paper is not an easy process (neither is the 50th paper and probably not the 500th paper but the first seems particularly difficult) and you need a trusted yet critical reader.  I was glad she felt I fit the bill.

Before she gave me the paper, we talked about the analysis and how she was framing the story. From that discussion I suspected that either the data was not so great or she was not using the correct analysis.  When I read the paper I surmised that it was in fact both.  She did a great job of drafting out her idea into a full-fledged paper but there were serious problems with both the research design and the data itself for the way she was framing the story.  In other words, the paper she wanted to write was not supported by either the design or the data.  There is potentially another paper in the data that she could write but it would require different analysis and a complete rewrite.  I'm not sure that is what she wants to do.  

My approach to feedback was to point out both the flaws in the "story" and the flaws in the design/data.  I wanted her to have a learning experience for how to story a paper (if the design/data were to fit) but I also wanted her to understand why it did not fit in this case and what type of design and analysis is needed to make the claims she wanted to make.  This type of feedback took some effort and time.  I sent it to her and then spoke to her about it in person.  I'm not sure she completely understands the feedback but this is a student who often needs to mull things over in private before she can learn from feedback and move forward.

The second incident occurred today.  I was meeting with another student over lunch and she was telling me the story of her "dead project walking" (her words not mine).  This is a qualitative study she started a year ago with another faculty member.  The data is collected and mostly analyzed. She felt the project was a good learning experience but did not feel that the findings were publishable and was ready to put it behind her.  However when she described the findings I found them interesting and was able to point her towards literature in the field that could serve as anchors for the rest of the analysis and the framing of the story.  I saw her face light up as the discussion unfolded.  It was not just the idea that excited her but seeing that there is a process to working through the "storying" of a paper.  

Now the second incident was far more rewarding (and less time-consuming) for me but both seem instrumental to student success.  The only way I learned to find the story in my data (quantitative or qualitative) was to work through the process with a more experienced researcher.  I'm not sure it is something that can be taught in a class.  There is something about coming up against a wall first that seems essential for eventually learning how to navigate walls. 

What is interesting to me is that one student saw the story in spite of the data and the other person couldn't see the story for the data.  One could argue that the problems are method-specific but I feel I have struggled with both problems using both methods.  What is hard for students to recognize is that The Study isn't The Story.  Students often perceive manuscripts as lab reports--you do the study and you write up the results--when the reality is writing is a form of interpretation and interpretation involves telling a story. 

Meta-blogging or Where Do I Go From Here?

 Shmutzie has declared this metablog week and I have been trying to participate for days but I've been having trouble wrapping my head around a real blog post.  I seem to be lost in summer funkland. As you can see the week has past and I'm only just now beginning to write.

Shmutzie's first post covered her original reluctance to meta-blog but I have no such compunction. Academics like to meta- just about anything.  We meta-analyze, we meta-cognate, why not meta-blog?

Meta-blogging is no more complex than blogging about blogging.  It is fun and I invite you all to give it a try.  For myself, I've been thinking a lot about what I have been doing here on this blog; about changes that have occurred gradually and naturally and about changes that I want to make in the future.

I've said before (without quite realizing I was meta-blogging at the time), I started this blog for two purposes: to join a conversation among academic bloggers and to work on my nonacademic writing voice. Both purposes have been realized and many others have been born.  Lately the academic portion sections of this blog seem few and far between.  One reason for the decreased emphasis on academia is because I've become involved in so many other great blogging communities, particularly blogs focused on creative writing and feminist mothering.

Up until now I haven't explicitly discussed my research or declared my field.  I've done that to help keep the blog pseudononymous but it is a strong factor that has pushed me away from academic blogging.  You see I'm not particularly interested in the administrative aspects of academia--there are only so many posts I can write about the mind-numbing effects of faculty meetings--and while I love writing about my students I worry about their identities and who really owns their stories. What really interests me is the subject matter of what I teach, what happens in the classroom when I cover this material, and what I learn from conducting research on these topics.

I'd like to write about that more explicitly here.   My work is as important to me as my family and not writing about it here seems fake.   As happens with all pseudononymous blogs over time, I have slowly revealed enough particulars that it is fairly easy to track my real-life identity. Also having achieved tenure I find I'm less concerned about colleagues finding my blog.  I rarely discuss specifics of my university and I just don't find office politics interesting enough to write about. What I don't want is to have my professional name linked to the blog.  I'm not sure why I feel strongly about this.  I don't want someone who wants to know about my research to find this blog in a Google search.  Perhaps I will feel different about that once I start blogging more openly about my work, but I doubt it.

My experiment with the Unravelling course and my ongoing pursuit of becoming competent with a camera has also affected the tone and feel of the blog.  I now think about the visual aspects of the blog almost as much as the written aspects, which is quite a step forward for me.  This seems natural, correct and organic.  Unravelling has also made me much more comfortable with taking and sharing photos of myself.

I've started a 365 Project and I'm sharing it on a private Flicker account with a small group of Unravellers.  Some of the 365 Project overlaps with this blog but not all of it, particularly not photos of me and my family.  I've started putting them into a separate blog and I'm thinking of linking to that blog from here.  I'm rather undecided about that.  How is it I'm more open to having my face linked to this blog than my name?  Other people share my name but no one shares my face.  But in academia you are known by your name and it follows you for your entire career even when you don't want it to. [My name from my first marriage is on two thirds of my publications and I will never be able to truly give it up.]

So be on the lookout for changes in content around these parts and perhaps a link to images from my daily life.  We'll just have to play it by ear and see what happens.

RBOC: Writing a Grant Edition

• More great feedback from our grant consultant guru has resulted in me trying to get this grant out in a week.
• Have been reading more than writing and while I love reading, I feel stagnated when I don't write.
• I've been taking yoga and tai chi classes. Loving both but am feeling itchy without a more cardio workout.
• The weather, general bad timing, and heating problems have kept me from the steam room all week.
• Bought myself clothes today that actually fit. Although my size hasn't changed dramatically all of my old clothes were bought for my pre-40s body.
• Pumpkin landed a great new job as a graduate assistant. She'll be making more than she ever has and learning cool new things!
• Pumpkin is also in The Vagina Monologues this weekend but the show is cancelled tonight due to snow.
• Snow is falling right now and I'm trying to stay warm and cozy.
• Hair is cut and colored.

Making Space

I wrote earlier that I was trying to slow down--from work and internet distractions--during this break. I want to give that other side of my brain a chance to emerge. Tapping into my creative mind takes a lot of mental space for me, space I don't normally allow myself. I am, by nature, pro-active and list-driven. I like to accomplish things simply for the sake of having accomplished them. It takes a fairly odious task to make me procrastinate. This trait has made me successful in any job I've had but, alas, creativity doesn't work on a timeline.

My more creative thoughts have come in the off moments and most of my creative writing has emerged either (a) on vacation or (b) under emotional duress (when I'm literally too upset to accomplish tasks). Once I spent several months waking up an hour early to write fiction. This worked well except it made it harder for me to accomplish my academic writing later in the day. I've always found it difficult reconciling what feels like my two writing brains.

So far I've managed to avoid most work-related tasks but find myself filling my days checking off lists of holiday preparation items. Today is devoted to baking, cleaning and wrapping presents. Tomorrow there will be more baking but also enjoying Angel and b's company. My daily lists are growing smaller and smaller as the week progresses and I'm trying to insert large blocks of unscheduled time.

I feel it shouldn't be this hard but for me it is. It seems I'm a doer who wants to be a dreamer.

The Bloggy-Blahs

I have momentarily lost my will to blog. I'm hoping the act of writing this post will get my bloggy juices flowing (yeah--that just doesn't sound right, does it?) again.

Its not that I don't have a ton of things to write. Quite the contrary, I have a back-log of blog posts on the usual topics: doula-training, end-of-semester shenanigans, InaDWriMo wrap-up, Angel, Pumpkin, and even one about a cool international food market we recently found.

I also can't claim that it is a lack of time that keeps me from posting. Although it is the end of the semester and everyone else is running around like a headless chicken, I'm actually sitting pretty.

No, unfortunately it is just a case of the old-fashioned bloggy-blahs. Like any other malady, it may just need to work it's way through my system.

It's All About The Writing

If last weekend was the Weekend Of Cooking, this is the Weekend Of Writing (or WOW). Next weekend (after The Big Day) may end up being WOW II. Now that my classes are just about a thing of the past and I have only 6 committee meeting scheduled until the end of the semester, I actually have some mental space to get serious writing accomplished.

As you can see from my little cartoon counter above, I've been very slowly plodding away at InaDWriMo. I have not been able to track my # of days spent in writing-related activities very well but my sense is, in spite of my Week Of Conferencing, I'm not that far off the mark.

Here's what I'm trying to accomplish before the semester ends and the holiday festivities begin:

• Get 2 papers--that are currently completely drafted--polished, to co-authors, and out the door. One of these needs some serious editing to get it down to the 3500 word limit, which messes with my InaDWriMo word tracking system something fierce.
• 1 article for a cool encyclopedia on a topic that interests me greatly but I know very little about. Article has a 1220 word limit but is due December 1st.
• Revisions to Mmy NIH grant that needs to be submitted in February but my wonderful, excellent, oh-so-amazing grant writer editor wanted to see the next draft in December.
• This paper that has been the bane of my writing existence for far too long now, has come back as a revise and resubmit. For those of you following along, it took a long time to come back from the last journal as a revise and resubmit but with comments from the Editor that (a) made no sense and (b) gave me reason to believe the Editor did not want it published regardless of reviewers. Revisions from the current journal are not that difficult but one reviewer wrote a 9-page review! It was mostly complimentary but will require some effort making sure all the suggestions are incorporated or explained.

If I can get all of the above accomplished it will leave me free to start and/or get back to analysis on 5 papers (that I have desperately been wanting to write for some time now) in the Spring semester (when I thankfully am teaching only 1 class). I also have 2 articles currently under review that I am anticipating major revisions. It will be nice to have these out of the way before those reviews come in.

Posted with Permission from the Author

Trek Back to 187th

That day in middle school a bully

joked about airplanes hitting buildings.

I couldn’t believe

When we sat spaced out in homeroom,

Staring at the fluorescent lights

And clock, towering over the intercom.

My name was called and father appeared

Standing outside the sunlit streets of New York.

He took my hand and pointed to

The steel smoking across the sky.

He said, this is the sight I never want you to see.

The sight of war.

We walked the streets of the city that never sleeps

And witnessed its bi-polar depression.

A women in a red dress, face wrinkled from tears,

Broken in the middle

Of the intersection. Like

A car accident, She collided with

Pavement and waited for help.

A man wedged his car door

Open blasting victims with news updates.

A couple stopped with us and

Stood around. Grim faced, crossed arms

We knew,

There was nothing we could do.

We joined a crowd.

And waited for a bus on 63rd and Lex.

Taxi’s sped past like angry

Yellow-jackets. One stopped

And a black man was first to reach it.

The driver argued against the man

And my father cried for justice

As it flew off.

That day I was afraid of sticks and stones

And towering buildings falling down on me.

-Angel, 2009

InaDWriMo 2009 Begins

InaDWriMo 2009 begins today and I haven't written a single word. InaDWriMo is the academic equivalent of NaNoWriMo and you can learn more about it over at Brazen Hussy's place. The rules are pretty simple: pick a writing goal (most choose number of words but there have been other ways of quantifying your writing in the past) and track your progress through the month with a handy-dandy writometer (see above). Each Saturday we post our progress over at Brazen Hussy's blog.

Last year I failed pretty miserably. I had three encyclopedia chapters due by December 1st for a total of 7500 words. I forget how many words I managed but in the end I pushed the deadline until January 15th. This year I have one encyclopedia chapter due on December 1st for 1500 words and 3 papers to finish. You are allowed to count revisions but quite frankly that seems like a lot of work. Also not all my "writing" results in written words, therefore I'm going to set two goals and hope I can make good on at least one. The first goal, as depicted in my wordmeter, is 5000 words. My second goal is to engage in the academic writing process (including analysis & reading of the literature) for 21 out of the 30 days in November. The 21 days covers the number of weekdays in the month this year. Of course I'll be allowed to write on weekends (in fact that's when I normally do the most of my writing) but this will force me to spend a lot more time writing during the week, since I'll never accomplish my second goal by just writing on the weekends. It will be particularly difficult since I'm going to a conference for 5 days in the middle of the month and I rarely write while I'm at conferences.

Wish me luck.

Drafts Versus Finished Products

When does a draft turn into a finished product? Many of my students (graduate and undergraduate) believe it is when they have covered all of the required fields and (hopefully) proofread/spellchecked the document. I often believe it is after I have written several drafts for myself--taking it as far as I possibly can with my limited knowledge/skills--and then, after receiving feedback from external sources, complete another round or two of drafts to incorporate that feedback. This takes a long time but "finished products" eventually get out the door.

Unfortunately they are not really finished products at this point. Inevitably, no matter how much work I put into a manuscript/grant and/or how much feedback I get on it before it is submitted, the peer review process quickly shows me it is but a draft. I like this about the peer review process. Yes it is painful to get the feedback. It stings in a very special way to have something you produced and believe to be "done" come back as "try again." However once I actually re-read the manuscript/grant I realize it is far from done. Ultimately when the product is truly finished it is a much better product and so I remain grateful to the process.

I have had the fortune/misfortune of having 3 NIH grants funded on the first submission. I have never had a paper accepted without at least 1 revision--usually major. This makes my grant rejections sting far more than my manuscript rejections. I have faith manuscripts will eventually become papers (even though I have a drawer full of manuscripts that never made the grade). I know persistence pays off with grants as well but the work often seems more futile. A manuscript is reporting on work already completed. The work is done so how can I NOT see it through to publication? A grant is potential work; a grant is an idea for work; yet it takes a considerable amount of effort to package that idea into a fundable application. If it is not funded that idea may never come to fruition and I get very attached to my ideas.

On the flip side, I have had manuscripts that--after a round or two of revisions--I know is done. There is no more or no less to the paper and if reviewers don't agree with me there is no choice but to either trash the paper or find another journal and start the process all over. I am currently there with one manuscript. After 3 revisions I gave up and sent it to another journal. If the reviewers of this journal need major revisions, the manuscript will end up in the dead zone drawer.

I am getting close to that point with a grant application. I am about to submit a version of it for the third time. I knew it was a draft on the first submission. The second submission seemed like a finished product (fortunately/unfortunately it was kicked back for a technicality and not reviewed) but working on it for this submission I realize it was still a draft. I am sending this current version out to many people (those who know me and those who don't) before I submit. It is not a finished product yet but there is a good chance it will be before it is submitted. With NIH now, we only get 2 submissions. Through another technicality this will actually count as its first. I can see doing one more revision if necessary, but if more are required I will (a) not be eligible and (b) not be motivated.

For me there comes a time when I'm finished with a product. If others still see it as a draft then I have to believe it was not meant to be.

The Work On The Work

I finished writing my annual review yesterday. At SouthLite we are supposed to tally up all of our "products" (research, teaching and service) for the year via a web-based system with an incredibly awkward interface and then write a "reflective" piece on each area. I was tempted to include my tenure packet as a manuscript. Honestly the amount of time I have spent on writing about my writing (and research and teaching and service) for the tenure packet, the teaching award application, and this annual review could easily equal two--maybe three--papers.

My friend, A-Girl, and I often commiserate on the "work-before-the-work," which is what we call all of the bureaucratic form-filling, back-scratching, somersault-turning shenanigans one has to go through within an institution before you can even start your research. I now see that academia has this on two fronts--the "work-before-the-work" and then the "work-on-the-work."

When do I just get to work?

All whining aside, my other revelation is that the academic year is very similar to the first year of mothering: you feel busy all the time, torn in multiple directions, don't get enough sleep, don't take very good care of yourself, feel like you are accomplishing a great feat if you manage to shower on a daily basis and at the end of the day there are very few tangible products--yet you can't imagine doing anything else.