Ascendance

Posted on January 21, 2014 by drosvally

After a hard-fought uphill battle, I am EXTREMELY pleased to report that I have ascended to Candidacy (with distinction, even!).

I would like to say that this occurred with great pomp, ceremony, circumstance, a standing ovation, and an elephant parade. In actuality, it occurred in an office, at an unremarkable hour on Friday with little ceremony other than a few hearty handshakes. T.S. Eliot’s prediction about the world ending could very well apply to my ascendance (…while I could also use the word “advancement”, how often in life do you get to say that you “ascended” as applied to yourself?).

I didn’t then make a great clamor, but rather had a lovely lunch with a friend, went directly to rehearsal to choreograph the murder of Young Siward on the battlefield by a bloodthirsty Scottish King whose name shall remain unsaid (using broadswords even), then went out to dinner with my beloved. Saturday we celebrated with a spectacular trip to an ice castle in the White Mountains (a gorgeous drive, even when

At night, lit up, the ice was just lovely.

headed through a not-so-small snowstorm on your way home).

I’ve begun a two-week sabbatical from most things academic because I’ve been running on overdrive since May. I can only stop doing “most things” because the semester has already begun and, therefore, my acting class is in session. Luckily it’s a joy to teach and not as thinky as something like… say… Postmodern Theory.

While I would like to say that being ABD doesn’t feel any different from being a Ph.D. Student, right now it feels completely different. For once, I get to think about my own projects and only my own projects. I get to stop worrying about crazy exams and tests that measure my aptitude for things that I may or may not use (probably will, but who knows?) in the near future. I get a chance to really stretch my wings and fly home to victory while dancing in the glory of my subject matter. In other words: from here on in, it’s all-Shakespeare all-the-time.

Mostly. Unless I pick up an intro class, or a history of theatre class, or a writing seminar, or any number of things that they might ask an adjust instructor with a degree in English to teach. I might even teach (gasp!) novels!

But for the next two weeks, I’m catching up on e-mails, putting projects to bed that have been awake for far too long and are (thereby) cranky, running errands that have lain dormant far past their expirations dates, and on the whole preparing for the next step in this grand adventure that is doctorhood.

So for now, I sign of as (for the first time),

Danielle Rosvally
ABD!!!!!!!!

List! List! O, List!

Posted on November 5, 2013 by drosvally

So you know that burn-out that everyone told me would happen right after my written exams but never really happened so I just kept steam-rolling ahead to clear the projects off my desk which had back-piled while I was too busy worrying about comps?

Yea… it’s finally hit me.

Travel beer is fundamental; this was mine during my layover in DC last week

After I got home from Blackfriar’s I had an initial rush and wave of inspiration, but that quickly faded with the realization of how very much work I have to do in the next few weeks and how very little time I have to do it in.

It got to the point where, when I received some updated information on my flight for this weekend (two conferences in three weeks, I realize every time, is never a good idea), I actually began to dread leaving my lair. This is particularly odd for me since I love to travel, I’ve never been to Texas (this weekend’s conference is ASTR in Dallas), and I have always wanted to ride a mechanical bull.

“Plugging away” has become an artform in my life since I started the PhD. “Making something out of nothing” (generally work out of less than zero energy) should really be listed as a special skill on my resume.

When I start to feel this way, one of the few things that I can depend on to keep me going is a copious number of lists. Whenever I feel overwhelmed about the amount of work on my desk, I make a list: here’s what I have to do today. Whenever I feel like I might not get to sleep because I’m worried about how much I have to do the next day, I make a list: here’s what I have to do tomorrow. Recently, a new kind of list has entered my life: here’s what I have to do before I get on an airplane to go to the next conference (in the case of that list, I was even able to schedule when these tasks would get done and sketch out my week that way so that whenever I had that creeping “I’m forgetting something” feeling, I could just re-check my work schedule and make sure I had everything under control which, generally, I did).

Lists help me to prioritize my work. Sometimes, I include “optional” tasks at the bottom of

moody shot of my desk last night; complete with tea!

my lists (“in case you finish all of this, also do this!”). This keeps me from being overwhelmed, but also allows me to stretch to finish all of my tasks. I am the kind of person who really can’t relax unless I am absolutely certain that everything which can be taken care of has been (even niggling e-mails will bother me unless they are sent). My lists help assure me that yes, I can take a break right now without worrying that something is left undone.

I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, but I am definitely not there yet. One way or another, as George R.R. Martin would remind us, winter is coming. And in this case that isn’t so horribly bad because winter means break time. I just need to make sure all of my work gets done first.

Jargon

Posted on October 9, 2013 by drosvally

I’m at a truly odd point of my PhD process. That is: the in-between place.

Right now, I’m not quite a “Student” not quite a “Candidate”. I’ve passed 2/3 of my exams, but I still have 1/3 to go before I can say that I’ve completed them and, thereby, moved into the next stage of my PhD.

Explaining this to folks who are outside of the academy has been an interesting process. There are many terms and definitions that are commonplace to us denizens of the ivory tower but sound mostly the same to folks on the outside. As such, I’ve found myself having the same conversation over and over again (which I don’t begrudge; it’s wonderful that

…bringing this one back because it’s quite possibly my favorite pic I’ve ever posted on the blog. I am, in fact, a Shakespeare Paladin.

folks in my life care enough about me to ask questions about this process). However, since I’ve found that it is a common communication issue, I also think it would be useful to have an easy-access reference guide for those less-than-familiar with this process.

So, in case you have a struggling Graduate Student in your life, here’s some good vocabulary for you to know:

A.B.D.: Stands for “All But Dissertation”. This is a colloquial term that we use to refer to someone who has passed all of her degree requirements except writing the book. It’s also a way to refer to someone who is a….

Doctoral Candidate: Someone who has passed all degree requirements except the dissertation (generally means that the dissertation is in process). This is not to be confused with…

Doctoral Student: (Yes, this is a different thing, only in academia….) A Doctoral Student is someone who is in progress with the early parts of the degree (coursework, exams, etc.). Alternately, someone who has been accepted into a program but hasn’t started that program yet. As an aside: mixing up these two terms can be… awkward. You are either giving someone credit for work they did not already do and thereby devaluing that work, or taking away a hard-earned benchmark. I have, over the years, been called by well-meaning onlookers a “Doctoral Candidate” and even “Dr. Rosvally” before needing to quickly correct this. In an industry that functions almost exclusively on the importance of words, it is not considered supportive to devalue those words by using them outside of their accepted meanings. In short: try to use the appropriate title for someone in the process of his PhD. Don’t worry; you have the rest of his lives to call him “Dr.”.

Comprehensive Exams: Or “Comps” (yes, if you’ve been following this blog at all over the last few months, you already know what this means). The exhaustive, stressful exam generally administered at the end of coursework (sometimes administered in steps over the course of coursework) that proves a student is a competent generalist in her field and, thereby, is qualified to move on to the next step.

Orals: Sometimes, the comps include an oral examination as well as a written examination (this is the case in my department).

Dissertation: The large piece of writing you produce as one of the final steps in your PhD process. This is an exhaustive, original piece of scholarship and (presumable) a PhD’s first long-term project. It is sometimes colloquially shortened to “diss”. It is not to be confused with a…

Thesis: This generally refers to the culminating project of a Master’s degree. It is shorter than a dissertation and with less expectations of originality. The big difference between a Master’s degree and a doctoral degree is that a Master’s degree shows that you have mastered a given field while a doctoral degree shows that you have added something to the field. The capstone writing projects for each degree exhibit this difference; the thesis is based upon work that has already been done and the dissertation is something completely new.

Home Institution: The place where a scholar calls “home”. This implies that the scholar is somehow in residence at the institution, either as a student, candidate, or professor.

Committee: An assembled group of scholars (who, ideally, have some expertise in the field which the candidate is writing about) who evaluate the dissertation for its worthiness

alternately, you could find a partner to go dance in a bookstore with. No word of a lie, this is a past time of mine.

as an original piece of scholarship. Generally, this group consists mostly of scholars from the candidate’s home institution with one outside reader for consistency/fairness/representation of the field at large.

So now that you’re able to use the lingo, your academic street cred just went up by at least 10%. Seriously. Go have a latte and stand on the steps of the library chatting about your most recent re-read of a major canonical work and see if I’m wrong.

Happy Wednesday, everyone!

Reclaiming my Life

Posted on September 27, 2013 by drosvally

In a faster-than-light turn-around time, the fate of my PhD career has been decided: I have, officially, passed my written comprehensive exam!

There is still a long way to go on the road to doctorhood (next up: orals; after which I can (non-denominational deity willing) call myself a “Doctoral Candidate” instead of a “Doctoral Student” and, perhaps, take a much-needed and well-deserved BREAK). That said, I’m champing at the bit for the next challenge and I’ve hit the ground running with the projects which had been sitting dormant just waiting for my exams to be complete.

I had been told that Comps would drain me. That I should expect to not do much of anything for a week or so after I sat the exam.

I found that this was true for the day or two directly following my final turn-in moment. I was dead tired. But I was also aware, as only a Type A personality can be, that I had a long list of things waiting for me. I had some deadlines looming; conference papers to write, blog posts that I owed people (details on that to follow!), and friends to catch up with.

While I was bone-weary, I was simultaneously caught in an existential loop of utter chaos.

a pretty shot of campus I took the other day

My life had been built upon preparing for and taking this exam for so long; what was I supposed to do now without it? Who was I if I wasn’t a book-reading machine designed only to take notes and choke down more theatre history? And what did my academic career really mean if I, for some reason, hadn’t succeeded at this monumental thing that I just did?

That not-so-slowly faded into a wave of “OH GOD I HAVE ALL THESE PROJECTS TO DO!” Luckily, since I had effectively proven to myself via the test that I’m an invincible super-girl, this did not panic me nearly as much as it would have in the days B.C. (Before Comps). In picking at the sides of my projects, I have been slowly but surely making good progress on them and, after Tuesday, will have knocked a few things off my desk so I can move onto the next step: orals.

It also took me some time to reconnect with my social and personal life. Towards the end of the comps process, I limited my interaction with the outside world. Part of this was of necessity; since I was studying much more, I didn’t have time to see anyone. Part of this was also a calming mechanism: as a terminal introvert, I just didn’t have the extra energy for social interaction. Especially any social interaction that I had to think about (which, for an introvert, is a surprisingly large amount). Because of all these factors (and the fact that I was still tired and brain-fried), I had to be very careful about re-introducing myself to my life. I did not have a giant blowout bash; I made play-dates to see my close friends in small group situations. I did not invite a ton of people over to my house; I went outside to smell the fresh air and not have to look at my desk for a while.

I cleaned my desk. Oh god did I clean my desk.

I also hopped in to rehearsal to put together some stage violence. Because nothing gets me feeling like myself again like punching students.

I’m slowly returning library books, but as my last count was over 150 books and I can only bring them back in manageable loads (10-20 or so), it’s been taking some time. At this point, I’ve gotten at least half of them returned (though I have picked up some more in the process to assist me with aforementioned projects).

I am, with more and more seriousness, exploring the idea of reading for leisure once more. During the final stages of studying, it was all I could do to tumble into bed at night and, due to eyestrain and general brain fatigue, leisure reading was right out. This unfortunately meant that To Be or Not to Be (Choose your own Adventure Hamlet) and William Shakespeare’s Star Wars: Verily, a New Hope sat sadly in the corner mostly un-cracked. The more days that go by, the more these volumes look appealing to me. It’s like regaining your appetite after you’ve had a stomach flu; it feels so good just to want these things again.

I’ve been calling this process “reclaiming my life” because, really, that’s how it feels. For several days after the exam, I walked around feeling not like myself. Like a stranger in my own body. These days, I’m feeling more and more Dani-like. The whiteboard is back to its normal peacekeeping. My tasks feel less alien and more comfortable (and comforting!). I’ve returned to using caffeine as a morning stimulant and not a life-line.

On the whole, I’m doing great. I’m not back to 100% yet, but I can tell that I’ll get there. I’m also feeling ready to take on the next challenge which, really, is the most important part.

Onward! Into the Wild Blue Yonder! To Doctorhood; and beyond!

I’m Back!

Posted on September 23, 2013 by drosvally

I am back! Did you miss me? I can say, dear reader, with some certainty, that I missed you.

That and it feels like forever. I can only describe with great trepidation the odd sensation of time over the past few weeks. It would slow down and speed up of its own accord and my willingness to make it do otherwise had little or nothing to do with this.

For example: the week before my exam felt far too short to be a week. The day before my exam was gone before I knew it. The time that passed between arriving at the testing center and receiving the exam questions felt infinite. The time that passed during the exam felt miniscule. The time that has passed since I turned in the last portion of the exam feels monumental.

But I get ahead of myself. Let me start here: I learned many things during this process.

This is obvious. One does not simply read two hundred books over the course of three months and learn nothing (I’m not joking about this number or even exaggerating… I tracked it via library checkouts, loans from friends, and the extent of my personal library which got shuffled around over the summer). I learned facts, dates, biographical details, yes. I also learned how to learn, how my body reacts to extreme stress, and where the line is for me, personally, between “I’m Okay” and “THIS IS TOO MUCH” (for the record: that line is somewhere in between life-changing personal crisis compounded with life-changing exam compounded with the seeming requirement for shouldering the burden of household responsibility). That’s something of itself as, really, who gets to push herself to her own personal limit? Ever? I can tell you for a fact that anyone with the letters “PhD” after her name has done so at least once and probably many times.

What I have hinted at here is the not-so-apparent aspect of what comps teaches you: it’s not just about memorizing and synthesizing information. It’s also about the academic process and your personal process.

In many ways, comps was a series of alternatingly small and gigantic revelations about myself as a human being, myself as an intellectual, and myself through my work. Once a revelation was achieved, then came the inevitable breakdown; I’d discover something mind-bending about the avant-garde, then cry about eggplant. I’d unearth some fact about theatre history from my brain on complete impulse and relate it to whatever was going on at the time, then melt down because there were dishes in the sink. I’d come to some miraculous understanding of Noh drama, then rage quit talking to anyone in the outside world because they just didn’t understand what I was going through in that moment.

Let me tell you, taking the exam puts certain things in perspective. Day one of my in-

house, during my lunch break, I walked across the street to my favorite pastry shop to purchase a treat for myself in an effort to maintain my own sanity. The gentleman retrieving

my desk on the last day just before I left to turn in my take-home

my delectable carb-bomb did so grudgingly, with much heavy sighing, and not a single smile or kind word. I couldn’t help but think, rather viciously, that there was no possible way he was A) having a worse day than I; or B) more mentally taxed by his job on that particularly day than I.

The exam lasted for six days; two in-house and four to write a take-home. Over the course of these six days, I had six (what I shall refer to as) “Golden Revelations”. Allow me to take a moment to share those with you now:

Day One: I might just get out of this alive.

Day Two: I know a lot more than I think I know.

Day Three: My personal library contains a lot of books about my area of expertise and, moreover, these books are actually useful in paper-writing.

Day Four: Mostly, this process is about never being able to utter the words “I can’t” ever again.

Day Five: This is how the rest of the world writes research papers (at the last minute under the pressure of a hair-triggered-gun-wielding-maniac ready to grade you down for the slightest mistake). I never. Ever. Want to do this again. Ever. When this is over, I’m going to devote my time to ensuring that my schedule accounts for this new personal quest.

Day Six: Against all odds, I might just be an intelligent human being with worthwhile things to say. Particularly about things I know about. I just used the same word twice in a sentence. I may be tired.

Despite the ever-present urge to draw a picture of Shakespeare riding a T-Rex while battling Godzilla, turn that in, and call it “good”, I managed to finish my exams without a single doodle (and narrowly avoided using the following phrases, all of which appeared in preliminary drafts of my essays: “not your momma’s authentic Shakespeare”, “fifth act wedding-palooza”, “as Ru Paul says: Don’t F— it Up”, and “one does not simply discover that she’s have an incestuous relationship with her own son/husband’s killer (same person) then calmly walk offstage to hang herself”).

“the other side” has given me room to do things like pontificate while climbing trees. As you can clearly see.

So here I am. On the other side.

Or, I should say, here I am in the waiting place since it’s not really over until they grade the exams and release those results. But for now; I’m going to revel in the fact that I did it. I got through my exams. For better or worse, I have walked through that particular fire. It has changed me, but I’d like to think that it’s tempered me rather than melted me.

More on comps to come, but for now I’m just glad to be back.

Riding the Wave

Posted on August 23, 2013 by drosvally

Lately I’ve been doing what I not-so-fondly refer to as “riding the wave”.

It begins like this: it’s Monday. I have all my books lined up for the week in neat bite-size piles. I can totally do this. I’ve learned so much already and I’m a rockstar. No, I’m friggen invincible. I’m bloody supergirl. I can conquer not only this book pile, but maybe one or two from tomorrow’s book pile and OH MAN THAT EXAM BETTER LOOK OUT!

Tuesday morning dawns and I’m still riding the Monday high, rearing to go, totally ready for whatever the day brings with it.

By Wednesday I have to slow down a bit. My zen isn’t completely blown, but I begin to experience symptoms of eye strain/brain overload/stress and I decide to take it easy for the day so I can make it through my week.

By Thursday, I’m completely frazzled. I have (sometimes) multiple panic attacks, I don’t want to see or talk to anyone, I’m pounding my head into my desk singing “I suuuuck I suck I suck I suck I suuuuuccckkkk” (see: 2:48). I often give up reading halfway through the day in lieu of watching filmed theatre or documentaries. I have a fitful night. Sometimes I drown my sorrows in ice cream. Sometimes I opt for a beer.

Friday, I drag myself out of bed and a miraculous thing happens: I talk myself into doing it again. Somehow, through sheer force of will, I sit back down at my desk, portion out some more books, and crack them and get to work. I take it easy for the first few hours, but eventually I get going and when I really get going I’m hard pressed to stop. I remember why I love theatre. I remember why I’m doing this. I remember why I picked this life style. By the end of the day, my spirits aren’t completely revived but I am resolved to spend the weekend relaxing and recharging and getting ready to do it again next week.

The important part isn’t that we love what we’re doing all the time. We’re not going to love what we’re doing all the time. There’s always going to be some part of the job that we loathe, detest, or otherwise makes us utterly stressed out. The important part is that, when this does happen, we pull it together. We pick ourselves up and get back on the proverbial horse. We charge back into the fray, guns blazing, ready to show that research who’s boss.

I am officially T-minus twenty days to comps liftoff.

Here I go, back into the fight.

Lateral Thinking

Posted on July 2, 2013 by drosvally

My friends, I have discovered the secret to comps study longevity.

Lateral Thinking.

“Lateral Thinking” is a concept introduced to me by the great John Basil when I was studying with him at the American Globe Theatre. John contended that it was the key to comedy. He had a hard time defining it, but gave us the following example to help understand it:

He once saw a televised game show akin to family feud in which contestants had to reply to a prompt with something which they think might be a popular answer. So for instance, if the category was “things you would take on an airplane”, the contestant could say “suitcase”, “neck pillow”, etc. There was a time component to this particular round so the contestant had to be the first to press his buzzer and answer.

The category was “things you sit on.” One contestant, feverish in his

Working the other day while hiding out from the heat.

pursuit of fame, fortune, and a cruise, instantaneously pressed his buzzer and shouted the first thing which came to his mind: “BROCCOLI!”

“Lateral Thinking” it turns out is a fairly recent development in logic. A phrase coined by Maltese physician Edward De Bono, it refers to the method of solving problems by way of creativity. Rather than a “vertical” approach (solving a problem step by step, with each step logically leading to the next) or a “horizontal” approach (throwing out idea upon idea without concern for implementation, a process often linked with imagination over logic), lateral thinking encourages ingenuity and attacking a problem via completely indirect means.

In terms of comedy, we can see how this appeals. Comedy, the axiom goes, comes from recognition and surprise. We laugh at something because we either recognize the situation which is being presented to us, or we are utterly surprised by the seemingly illogical response of the individuals/things within the situation (think of every Charlie Chaplin sketch ever).

In terms of comps, Lateral Thinking is key. I can spend several hours a day with my books, but when I recognize that I’ve hit brain-melt o’clock, it is time to implement something drastically different. Often, I can work for six to seven hours at a clip before I just can’t work anymore. At this point, I need to walk away from my computer and engage in a physical activity of some kind.

Because of this, my running schedule has been wonderfully regular, and I’m picking up some extra party tricks to add to my “fun, cool-looking, dangerous things that Danielle does because she was allegedly raised by circus gypsies”*. I’m learning to spin poi (…mostly so that I can light them on fire and add this to my list of fire tricks; I already breathe and eat fire so really, what else is there to do but weave the stuff around my body in complicated and death-defying ways?), and my sister and soon-to-be brother-in-law have finally convinced me of the merits of the bull whip as a viable form of physical relaxation (Okay, I know what you’re thinking, and it probably has something to do with corsets and

my haul from Tisch complete with HELLOPHANT!

dungeons, but please believe me when I tell you that bull whip is actually more of a martial art than a… ahem… personal art form). If you consider the fact that I have to bike about a half mile to get to anywhere where I can legally play with the whip (and where it’s safe to do so), that’s a fair amount of physical activity I can sneak into my day.

I’ve found that this serves as a combination stress-reliever, mood enhancer, and diet-booster. I’ve also found that if I take a break like this for about an hour, I can come back and sneak in another few hours of work.

So there you have it: physical activity saves brains, and always eat your vegetables.

Lateral thinking: not just for problem-solving logicians anymore.

*only partially true; we’re more like the Partridge Family meets a Renaissance Faire

The End Becomes the Beginning

Posted on July 1, 2013 by drosvally

It’s Sunday night and I’m tired.

This week, I’ve been working with Early Modern England. I’m hoping to get through it in the next few days and then hop to Early Modern Italy/France/Spain.

After that, the puritans shut the theatres down for a bit and we do a time-leap to the Eighteenth century, but I may take a detour into Asia just to get something a bit less Western on my palate.

Over the course of the weekend, I have read no books, attended one play, and participated in a variety of leisure activities/household chores to ensure that I am at least a little bit rested and good to go for the week ahead.

It probably says something about something that when I went to go save the word document I am currently writing this blog entry in, I automatically clicked into my comps notes folder.

It also probably says something that, at brunch with a friend who is an

Me and Will at Orlando Shakes

alum of my program, his friends whom I had never met before immediately gave me the sympathy eyes when he told them I was taking the exams that he had taken.

And so, I stand facing down another long week. But there will be a lot of Shakespeare! Tomorrow is Hub Theatre Company Boston’s Shakespeare Open Mic Night at Trident Books. (come join us!), Friday I have it on good word that I will be seeing Joss’ Much Ado, and of course I shall be reading. So much reading.

Working Back to Running

Posted on June 25, 2013 by drosvally

Operation: relax was a great success. Spending a week away from my books has made all the difference in the world and I’m feeling much more capable of tackling the things that I left behind in Boston.

Unfortunately, getting back into my studying groove is proving more difficult than I had anticipated. While I know that I couldn’t have maintained the pace I had achieved when I left, coaxing myself back up to running speed is not easy.

I also have found that taking a week away has done scary things to my sense of information retention. I’m reasonably sure the information is still in there, just occluded in a way it hadn’t been when I left the Northeast. I have to reach around the pleasant cloud of vacation to turn up the things that I need on any given occasion and that, my friends, is rather startling given the amount of effort I put into putting those select facts into my brain.

In addition, it seems I’ve brought the Florida weather back with me. While it was still pleasantly autumn upon my departure, it now seems to be full-blown summer. This makes my life slightly more difficult as while my apartment is many wonderful things, air-conditioned is not one of them.

In summary, while I know I needed the break and I am absolutely assured that it did wonderful things to my mental (and physical!) well being, it’s definitely wrecked some havoc on my studying habits.

Let’s go back to the marathon training metaphor I used earlier this summer. Taking a

artistic rendering of my workspace at the local cafe yesterday.

week off from any intensive training will give you time to relax and recuperate, but there is some inevitable back-slide upon your return. I’m just feeling all kinds of sore from my workouts since my mind, over the course of the past week, hasn’t been as rigorously worked.

It is sometimes important to recognize that we are not machines. Though the comps-study process is a great deal about becoming a sort of professional juggernaut, at some point we need to recognize and yield to our humanity. Slowly working back up to break-neck speed after some time off is one of those things. Actually taking time off is another.

I had promised myself that I would be as gentle as possible with my study habits while simultaneously pushing myself to do as much as I had to/could. These goals, while they seem antithetical, are actually really important to maintaining both sanity and work/life balance. In order to prevent myself from being anxious about all the things I’m not learning, I need to push hard. In order to maintain my mental well-being and not turn into some kind of Gollum creature clutching books to my chest and muttering about French Neoclassicism, I need to preserve some semblance of equilibrium. So without moving into the land of unrealistic expectations, this antithesis is just something I have to balance.

And on that note, I’m going to stop procrastinating and get to reviewing Medieval Europe. If I do well today, which I should, tomorrow opens up early Modern to study and, since that means some quality time with my man Will, if I can’t get excited about that I should probably just quite now.

A Little Help from my Friends…

Posted on December 17, 2012 by drosvally

I had a moment of panic the other day.

I had been summoned to participate in a departmental thing. I’m really not sure who decided it was a good idea to schedule any departmental thing smack dab in the middle of finals time. This, to me, seems like a sure-fire way to make at least one of your graduate students slit her wrists in hopelessness.

Any who know me will tell you that one of the things I am best at is time management. I never leave anything to the last minute, I have a good sense of how much I can handle, I work until I’m done, and I know what is okay to sacrifice and what simply can’t be cut from any given day. As such, my schedule books very far in advance. Often, I have trouble squeezing in social engagements unless I’m made aware of them at least two weeks before they happen (at the busiest times of the year, this becomes more like a month). As such, if I was having trouble departing from my desk to attend said departmental thing, it was not because I was having last-minute finals panic, it was because scheduling a departmental thing during finals is inhuman.

The departmental thing took longer than I had planned (but not longer than it had been scheduled, I simply misread the schedule and under-calculated my timing). I got into my car and felt like my chest was clenched in an iron clamp. I still had errands to run. I still had all kinds of work to do. And I still had one more appointment with my ever-wonderful Partner in Crime that I could not miss because of a long, convoluted series of events which amounted to him helping me clean my apartment (I think he realized by looking at me that even mundane tasks were well beyond my capabilities to handle and, left to my own devices, I was in very real danger of exploding… spontaneous human combustion: not just an urban legend).

During the drive home, the panic attack symptoms started setting in. Increased heart rate, hopeless whirl of uncontrollable thoughts, and pressure behind the eyes that threatens to burst into uncontrollable weeping.

I got to my desk, sat down, and forced myself to breath.

For those who have ever experienced a panic attack, you will know: the only way to coach yourself through it is slowly and methodically. You need to clear your mind, breathe deeply, and slow your heart-rate back something resembling normal. Sometimes you need to cry for ten minutes just to get it out. I don’t have them often, but my PhD has taught me all kinds of new and wonderful things that my body is capable of when pressed against the wall (some of these things are more useful than others).

This time, head in my hands, trying to calm myself down enough to look at the word documents I had left up on my machine, my gaze drifted to my desk ornaments.

I’ve spoken about them before. Over the years, I’ve accumulated a seemingly random assortment of bits and bobs which have come to reside in happy harmony upon my desk. What I didn’t realize until that moment is that all of the little guys directly under my monitor (and, in fact, most of the baubles as a whole) were given to me by various important someones in my life. Shakes-cat: a gift from a dear old friend. Baby-hatching-Gargoyle: a

a selection of my desk baubles.

present from my grandmother upon realizing that it looked just like the logo for the theatre company I ran out of New York. Liberty-Duck: a random Monday offering from my Partner in Crime. Long-Duck-Silver: from my mom when she came to visit me during my brief-tenure in a soul-sucking office position pre-Master’s (it came in a box of Band-Aids and helped to cheer my gloomy day). Tribble Fluff the Yarn Monster: made for me by my wonderful penpal and sent in a box of comfort yarn around the holidays one year. The list, believe it or not, continues to the point where I really can’t chronicle all the things on my desk attached to all the wonderful people in my life.

And, in that moment, it was like getting a hug from all of them simultaneously. Like somehow they were all there (without even knowing that I needed them) to tell me to get my act together because I could totally handle this.

Over the past week or so, I’ve received an immense amount of support from my usual support network, but also some very unexpected places. People who are around, but whom I don’t speak with frequently (perhaps the epitome of this being a random and unprompted text from an old friend with the news that he had procured a GIANT BAG full

some very old friends who are still in my life came to help me celebrate my birthday this weekend; they are amongst the awesome folks who helped me get through finals this semester.

of my favorite girly-scented lotions and things and was sending them to me imminently… thanks again, Brian, you seriously made my week). People who would have little way of knowing the insane amounts of pressure and stress that I’m under right now who, from some twist of the universe, had me in their thoughts on a given day and thus found some way to send some extra love my way.

My point is this: no man is an island. The PhD is the equivalent to academic boot camp. It will strip you down to your most basic human elements, take those away, then re-build you (and I’m not even through the “easiest” part of the process yet). But just because you’re stressed, just because you’re tired, just because you think your brain is going to melt out the side of your head, doesn’t mean that you should forget something: you are loved. And if you can’t remember that, take a moment to find someone who will help you remember it.

So many thank-yous to all of my wonderful friends who, wittingly or not, have once more gone above and beyond to help me get through this difficult time of year. If I seem ungrateful or passive in person, it’s just because I lack the brain cells to express how much you mean to me right now.

And on that note, it’s time to face the music. Turning in my first final today. Queue The Imperial March, La Marseillaise (it always sounds victorious to me), anything from Newsies, or One Day More and send some good thoughts to Dani-land. Here we go.

Daniprose

academic adventures, theatric theoretics, and sundry snobberies.

Category Archives: PhD programs