Timshel

There are particular times of the year that drag. For whatever reason that no one, not even you, can figure out... you just get down. Call it cabin fever?

I've had a taste of this lately, but I the more I think about it, the more I slowly put together all the little things that just add up and bring me down. Not depressed, mind you, just... listless. Again, cabin fever.

That is when I remind myself that they are all little things and in the end the spring is coming, things will slow down, the sun will come out, flowers will blossom, birds will sing.

Tonight as I was cleaning up after dinner, I listened to Mumford and Sons' "Timshel." If you have not heard this song, I highly recommend. Here is a vid:

The refrain (of course) stood out to me, "You are not alone in this. You are not alone in this. As brothers we will stand and we'll hold your hand. Hold your hand." What really hit me while I listened was that no matter what little things get me down, I am lucky. I have my husband and my family. I have a job. I have a lot more than other people.

I also have my stubborn optimism as well. That, in the end, is stronger than any sense of dreary gloom that may try to impede on me.

Spring is coming.

It all comes down to Corn Whiskey

It was one of those days. You know the kind. You get to work and you are like,


"la la la! I'm skipping to work! I didn't sleep well (in fact I slept like a turd), but here I am!!! HAPPY MONDAY!"

and you open your email and get to work. It's 7:00am. Then 8:00 hits and you wish you had just stayed in bed. You went through your email and every email requires 50 steps to follow up. In addition, a piece of paperwork that students fill out that filters into my database (so I can ACTUALLY DO my work) wasn't working.

Well. There you go. One thing after another. Until lunch hit. Hooray! A BREAK!

I skip up to lunch, convinced that after lunch, I will for sure have a particularly excellent afternoon.

I open my lunchbag to discover what wonders I packed myself. Mixed veggies to reheat.. okay, good. Salad, Yum! Celery and peanut butter, sounds good. And saltines. Wait. What? I packed all veggies and 5 saltine crackers??? What the hell?

Healthy? Yes.

Able to carry me through 5:00? HECK NO.

UUUUUGH. I ate my veggies and kept my crackers for the inevitable tummy-growling that would occur at 3:00.

What followed this afternoon was more of the same. Tons of email, nothing going smoothly. Finally, 5:00 hits. WOOHOO! I go home. In fact, I caught an earlier bus that goes nearly straight to my doorstep. SCORE!

We had porkchops for dinner and now here I am, sitting in front of the TV drinking RC with a shot of corn whiskey (a gift from our friends in Tennessee). Life is good.

College, Entitlement, and Careers

I read a piece on NPR this morning that reminded me of a blog article that I read a while back. The NPR article, titled "A Lack of Rigor Leaves Students 'Adrift' in College," discusses how students coming out of college today have not developed their critical thinking skills or writing skills beyond what they had in high school.

We could play all sorts of blame games. In the end, I think that we run into a chicken-egg dilemma. Have we created a system in colleges where faculty/adjunct positions depend on student evals, thereby forcing teachers to be soft on the students? Or is it something else?

I think it is a combo of things. One thing they mentioned in the article was that 90% of high school students expected to go to college. Expected. Really? College is no longer a privilege to most people. They see it as a right. But is it?

When students get to college, they are paying money to be there. Based on my experience, some students (and their parents, for that matter) tend to see themselves as customers. As customers, it does not matter how little or how much they put into something, they expect to get what they want, which in academia, is an "A."

I'm sorry if I am callus or whatever, but in my mind, you are PAYING for a PRIVILEGE. You are paying to sit and learn from people who have proven themselves to be experts in their field. You should work your BUTT off to do well.

I hate to sound old, but "when I was in college," I had a professor once ask us, "Since when is a B bad? B is 'above average!' A is 'exceptional!'"

AMEN to that.

Now. All of this smacks of entitlement. One article that I read (that I cannot remember right nowl... uuugh) wrote that some students coming out of college feel that since they paid for an education, "did their time," and graduated, that they deserve a job. Not true of most students and certainly not true of the students I have worked with. However, I think that it speaks towards an undercurrent of the current culture.

I don't want to overgeneralize. I was an odd undergraduate student and just didn't mingle well with the other students.

In the end, I wonder. What, if anything, can we do to stop or reverse what is going on? CAN we stop it? Do we want to? And finally, do we NEED the rigor?

I think we do need rigor. Now more than ever, with so much information at our fingertips, we need to teach our students how to think critically, write, and properly ask questions.

The Scary World

Life right now is strange. I am in a holding pattern at home while at work, everything is moving so quickly that I cannot keep up. Every night I dream of falling behind. I enjoy my job overall and am happy (and feel very fortunate) to work where I do. However, I find it ridiculously sad that I dream about work.

One day, I had a student come in to see me. She is thinking about getting her masters in our school, so I was meeting with her to discuss career options. She surprised me by saying, "I don't care what I do. I have always had food on the table, so I am fairly confident that no matter what, I will be okay."

WHOA.

How refreshing is that? Because of her, I have decided that when my husband finds a job (if it is NOT in Bloomington... in which case, I will keep my job), I will continue my work towards my non-profit idea. This would mean working from home and pinching pennies to make ends meet. But in the end, I also know that as long as husband makes as much as I do right now, we will be FINE. I love the sense of adventure and the tiny thrill I get in my spine every time I think about it.

My mom is adventurous and started her own businesses. She is a strong woman. The older I get, the more I realize that I am like her. The scary part is, I am okay with that.

New Hobbies and a New Plan

It is amazing how humans continually reevaluate their lives and change, like pieces of Play-Doh... or Gak. Remember Gak?

This year has changed my life entirely. So many small things happened, that I was just BUSY all year long. In the large scheme of things, not much happened if you compare my life to others. Seriously. I'm just not used to constantly having something to plan for.

Now that things have slowed down, I am needing some change in my life. I decided to take up sewing and embroidery. I am also hand-making recipe cards for an antique recipe box I bought on Ebay. Overall, I'm pretty pumped about these new things. Like I wasn't spending enough money on knitting... right?

In addition to that stuff, I renewed my membership to the campus gym and purchased a new pair of running shoes. The goal? Run a half marathon. This is something that will not happen anytime soon, as I need to work on getting back up to three miles just to start the training schedule, but overall, I like having a goal.

I think that is what I have been lacking for the past couple of months. Something to look ahead to and say, "Yeah! That is going to be awesome!"

I know I can do it. Just watch me.

The Personality

As a career counselor, one of the things that you try to help students with is trying to figure out who they are as people so that they can better figure out where they would be happiest working. I was reminded of this in class today and my colleague interpreted the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator for my class, who just took the MBTI online. The test, for those who don't know it, asks you a series of questions that sort your personality type into a particular category. People can be divided into one of 16 categories.

I am an INFJ. I took the MBTI when I started working as a career counselor and the more I look into this personality type, the more I know that I KNEW before I took it what I was.

I am an (I)ntrovert, I(N)tuitive, solve problems with (F)eeling, and organize things by (J)udging (but not in a bad way).

What does this mean? I Googled this personality type this morning, just to remind myself why I view the world the way I do, and came to this website:

http://www.personalitypage.com/INFJ.html

Turns out, I am less that 1% of the population. Hurrah? At least I now realize that those gut feelings I have all the time that usually get laughed at by one person or another, I need to start listening to those. Plus, I am apparently ALWAYS right. So there. HA.

I recommend taking the MBTI to anyone. Even if you think you know yourself, at least you can see on paper an explanation of how you move through the world. It helps to have something like that in black and white.

The Year 2010

I realize that it is a bit early to start looking back on the year, but so much has happened this year, that I am pretty sure no one will care if I start early.

So far this year, I have:

- Been to/in 4 weddings
- Got hitched myself
- Traveled to Washington DC -- and consequently met Bo (the dog) and passed out in front of the Oval Office
- Got a promotion
- Taught a couple times - and launched an online course
- Moved to a new apartment (2 weeks after our wedding)
- Had some other, personal things happen that caused an emotional rollercoaster that has yet to end

Overall, I'm pretty satisfied with this year. Yes, I could have done some things differently, but I am not sure that given the choice, that I would change anything at all. So, what have I learned?

Do not take anything for granted.

Do not look back and dwell on things that you can't change.

Try to be the best person you can each and every day.

and finally... It's not WHAT happens to you that is important. It's how you REACT.


So. Enough with the cheesy, corney stuff for now. On to life.