A paradigmatic first-world problem:

We currently have so much food (due to a rainy summer and our very productive garden, particularly in the apple department) that we don't have enough room in our refrigerator to store it. We had to eat half a melon tonight just to clear space for dinner leftovers.

More soon--classes start tomorrow.

Back at it

After almost three weeks away, and three weeks of adamantly not working (and lots of fun, and many great visits with great people, and WAY too much time in the car, esp. with a two-year-old), it's time to get back to work.

In keeping with my businesslike attitude, this post shall be brief and bulleted. Goals for the week:

• 3 hours of weeding/gardening (I have a lot to say about weeding, and my terrible attitude towards it, and its inevitability despite my attitude. Maybe I'll say some of it sometime)
• outline of chapter 1
• 1000 words toward chapter 1 (describe the project, basically--I did this really well over Thai food on Wednesday, and I'd like to capture whatever it is I said)
• print pictures for B's second-year album
• clean car
• schedule oil change
• yoga x 3
• plan little summer class (it's like 1 hour long)
• read L (a book that I should have read for, like, my dissertation. What's wrong with me? I'm such a fraud)
• clean desk -- that one's almost done! It'll involve sewing some little pads onto toddler slippers, and making decisions about coupons, and filing a tape in the basement tape holder, and that's just about it.

I'm not counting the weeks anymore, though, because that would get depressing. Classes start August 27. I have ages.

Love

Happy second birthday, my sweet little Bee. Your smile is my very favorite thing.

(The French blocks and pirate onesie are pretty great, too.)

Drafted!

At 14,200 words, with a reasonably logical structure, a handful of notes-to-self, and the lingering need to read and incorporate at least one major study, I have decided to pronounce M chapter drafted. I'll be putting it away for a while--I'm off to visit family and friends pretty soon and intend to do no work on my [second] book (for I'm starting to force myself to call it that) while I'm gone.

I'm pretty pleased. Today is, what, June 3? And this was one of the major, quite possibly undoable items on my summer list. So hey, list! Check it out! Done!

Of course, it's also absolutely the easiest chapter of the projected book for me to write, because it's the only one that's on a text that I know really well. Aha. And also on my list are "Draft chapter 1" and "Finish H chapter draft"--I started H chapter last fall, but then a) I eventually acknowledged that a.1) I hadn't actually finished reading H itself and a.2) I was still very sketchy on the considerable body of H research. Also b) my colleague died in October. All this to explain why it's not finished yet. Unfortunately, problem (a), with both of its subparts, still exists.

H has been sitting on my desk since last summer, by the way.

Anyway. The drafting of this or that chapter is a problem for another day. I'm heavily into my Pre-Voyage State, which involves trying to clean everything and finish every project. For example, I actually have on my to-do list, "Drop off dry-cleaning" (followed by "Pick up dry-cleaning"), when the clothes that need dry cleaning are clothes that there is no chance I will wear before mid-September at the earliest (if we have a cool fall).

I'm trying to get myself to cross that one off.

We'll see.

(When I was 23 and about to embark on a major adventure trip, I actually finished a novel that my friends and I had about 2/3 written when we were fifteen, because I couldn't stand the thought of leaving it unfinished when I took off. I'm really glad that I did it--the novel is hilarious and such a fun testament to our goofy sophomore selves--but in retrospect that seems a little nuts, doesn't it?)

Unsettled (starting Week Three)

I always feel a little unsettled when I'm writing. I'm a quick writer--I can produce text at lightning speed--and I mostly enjoy revising; I'm very much a process writer, so revising is where I usually figure out what my real argument is.

The unsettled feeling doesn't come from the fact that my arguments take a while to develop, though. Well, maybe it does, in a way: As I write/revise/think over what I've written, I shuttle back and forth between thinking that I've got a great idea, what a brilliant sentence that is, I'm so productive and a dreadful fear that I'm arguing the obvious and/or someone else has certainly already made this exact same argument, and I'm too ignorant in my very own field to know it.

Impostor syndrome persists into tenure, and the only way forward is to ignore the voices and write the next damn book.

I did pretty well with last week's list. I bound Bonaventure's book (pictures to follow iff [that's if-and-only-if] I take and then download them), went to a yoga class (the first one I've been to in Field State that really kicked my ass! And, um, inspired me spiritually, etc.), read through my chapter and identified the next big thing to work on there, made sure that at least the skeleton of my argument is present in the chapter, finished a book that probably isn't very relevant to my project, and did not paint the kitchen--I opted for a trip to the Children's Museum with Bonaventure and TM instead. That was fun. I totally want to just play with all the toys and things myself, and having a toddler with you is a great pretext, since he does kind of need help playing with them.

Bonaventure's in the foreground, almost too little for his smock.

This week:

Writing: Work on the Big Hole in my chapter. I've read one article already; I need to work it into the chapter, and I'd like to read and work in two more articles this week, if I can.
Reading: Read a book for chapter 1. (I've started it; it's interesting and pertinent.) Type up notes.
Home: Clean the floors. (I was going to do this today, but I have a cold, so I won't. However, there's no way I was going to go another whole week without cleaning the floors, so this is kind of a nice freebie on my list.)
Fun and Self: Finish Fun Book; read a bit of Proust. Go to yoga.
Crafty: Finish the scarf I've been knitting.
Yard: Try to get in three hours of work on that infernal sidewalk.

First, though, I need to pick up the milk. Better get to it.

Dream or Nightmare?

(This is an actual bookstore that I have actually been to. And no, I didn't buy anything. I think that I was just too overwhelmed--and a little bit afraid of toppling one of the piles.)

Week Two

So I pretty much rocked my goals last week. Instead of 2,000 words, I wrote 3,000! I also got the car's windshield replaced (the rest of the car stuff actually needs to wait until it's due for an oil change in a couple of weeks), finished a research-related book, copied the theses, and submitted my article--5 goals accomplished! Plus, I vacuumed (twice), did a ridiculous amount of laundry (including cat-beds and hand-washables), found and purchased some acceptable bras, attended a wedding, and played with Bonaventure quite a lot. We got him a tricycle at a yard sale yesterday (it's pink and purple, with little streamers on the handlebars), so there's been a lot of watching him while he scoots down the sidewalk.

I'm tempted to ratchet things up this week, but I'm not going to do it--that's the quickest way to failure, as I know from long, long, LONG experience. Therefore, this week, these are my goals, by category:

• Writing: Make sure that my argument is actually present in the chapter that I'm drafting, then do a once-over through the whole chapter to get a feel for where it's gone most seriously off the rails. (I'm almost at a point where, while I'll still need to write, I'll need to cut a lot, too, so I'm not going to worry about word count so much right now.)
• Reading: Get through another research-related book. Finish my fun novel (might do that tonight, actually.)
• House: If I'm up for it: Paint the breakfast room and basement stairs. I reserve the right to put this off, though.
• Crafty: Finish binding Bonaventure's little book.
• Exercise: One real, actual yoga session. (Maybe some little ones scattered in throughout the week, too.) (And I'll attend my usual class on Sunday, unless something intervenes.)

All right. That sounds good. Or it will tomorrow morning, when I'm sufficiently rested to contemplate work; it's been a rough few nights with Bonaventure. Here's hoping for some sleep.