And now, I talk about myself.
This is brought to you by a serious lack of sleep and an totally overcharged mind.
This PhD application is going to cost me so much money that I don’t have it’s almost amazing. And the sleep I’m going to lose getting all of this stuff under my belt is almost staggering. I’m awake because I was, oddly enough, I was finishing up my study of The Awakening. There’s a cheerful story. The notion of a woman’s life being hysterical is just not all that silly anymore.
Anyway, it got me thinking about myself in some rather large ways, so why not brain dump all over a blog.
It has not escaped my notice that I happen to enjoy learning more than most people. It has also not escaped my notice that I use huge academic undertakings in order to anesthetize myself. I cannot possibly think of my interpersonal relationships (more on those in a moment), my age, or any number of the horrific mistakes I have made when I have my entire being wrapped around some notion of trying to understand the universe.
To me, books make sense. Other things might not make so much sense, but the paper I am writing makes sense. The research makes sense. I can quickly and easily wrap up the whole of my being in some academic trifle that normal people couldn’t possibly care less about and I can do it with an ease that frightens me when I bother to think about it.
My off switch is huge. Almost a clapper.
There are probably a few reasons for my undying devotion to academic achievement and I need to look at them closely before I decide that I really want to jump into this.
1) I was always supposed to be absolutely nothing. I was Nicole’s little bastard failure, destined for a stripper pole and a close retelling of every mistake my borderline insane family has ever made. I reject this. I reject this like it’s a bad organ. I think all of that chatter of “You can do anything you want to,” from my mother has really affected me in some deep way that she wasn’t counting on.
2) Books are full of surprises that can be contained and controlled. I dislike feeling out of control. I dislike being bored. I can have a surprise without feeling like someone has yanked the rug out from under me. Most people have never had to suffer through me finding a hot spot in something I read or write. I’ll milk it for everything it’s worth.
3) I’m an only child. My only childness manifests itself in very odd ways. I did spend a good deal of my childhood reading and existing in my own world, as I didn’t really have anyone to talk to. It’s also affected how I deal with people. I am, in reality, very friendly and exceptionally outgoing, but the problem is that I don’t actually care if I have company or not (or if I have a companion or not). I am just as happy with company as I am without. I am very capable of amusing myself. There are very few people in the world that I have ever had a real, emotional attachment to. Given that I am capable of fending for myself, part of my attachment to academics is, in fact, me fending for myself. I am amused by thinking. I could make an entire career out of being alone…with books. It’s like the only child’s dream universe.
4) I have a very odd sleep schedule and a very odd version of discipline. I sleep odd hours and I work well very late at night. I am not set up for an office. I just don’t work like that, I don’t always wake up a genius at 8am. I can run with an idea until it’s out of my system, but I also allow that my ideas don’t always show up during a business day. Professorship suits me in so much as I CAN get out of bed at 4am and write a chapter of a book and no one really gives a damn when I did it, so long as I did it. I am exceptionally disciplined, however, and can force myself into doing just about anything, so deadlines do work out well for me. Unless I’m bored. Then I (as an only child) cannot stand it and must find something else to do, as the whole world belongs to me.
5) I am terribly excited about all the things that I know. If someone gives me the space (Hi Ben Hi) I will go on about some trifle for a good fifteen minutes.
All of this amounts to “Leave me alone,” however, and I just have to figure out if that’s what I really want or if it’s just what I do.
God, can’t I just study the books and leave the introspection to the navel gazing sixteen year olds?
Related Posts
-
Nemoren
