femminista: thoughts of a feminist rhetorician

Why does it seem as though there's never enough time to do the things I need to do, much less the things that I want to do?  In between grading papers and writing them, I've been doing a spot of internet browsing of the shopping variety.  My mother wants a wishlist from me and I'm trying to oblige (as difficult as it is).  So, I've been surfing the indie shopping sites for interesting trinkets.  It worked out really well last year, so it seems sensible to go that route again, but what I'm finding is that my greatest wish is for more time-- time to make my own jewelry and knit my own lovely kitty creations and time to paint and play with various media, time to make my own nifty creations.  Unfortunately, in spite of all of my good intentions, it

A particularly good teaching day today. My students are working on multimedia presentations that must function as stand-alone documents. Most of them, unsurprisingly, have chosen to use PowerPoint. After discussing the readings for the day, I had intended to have each group comment on another group's project, using our online forum to download project drafts and submit review comments. I changed my mind. Somehow that idea seemed interminably boring and isolating. So, as an alternative to group peer review, we conducted a class-wide review of each project. This was made possible only because there are four groups and thus, four documents to examine and critique. It started out slowly (and actually, the idea developed from a question over font and background readability issues on one of the projects; I couldn't read it easily but to be fair I solicited the opinion of the group). Students were initially hesitant and in spite of my continued reassurance that pointing out areas for improvement should be seen as constructive and not critical (or for that matter personal), they spoke up hesitantly. At this time I was also aware that as facilitator I felt the need to summarize sets of comments and that my summary and commentary might be construed as overly critical or that it might make students feel singled out, albeit in a group. I was struggling to think of a way to make this work.

The end of this torturous semester--are we there yet? In spite of the fact that I have a wonderful and beautiful partner who I've been to visit in the Pacific Northwest, that I have climbed mountains and walked on beaches, that I have a fabulous, strength-training Mom, a beautiful best friend (who needs to email me...before I hunt her down)and in spite of all the other wonderful things in my life, I am pretty consistently miserable right now. I have an enormous workload and it seems impossible to keep up with all of it. I have had at least two (that I know of) email disasters within the past month and countless other "incidents," almost all of which have been related to graduate school. Oh, and did I mention, my cat peed in my suitcase when I returned from my last trip.

I would love to have enough time to reflect more fully on the readings that I am doing and the experiences that I am having.

Several hours ago I had one of the experiences that all teachers come to know and long for--I turned in my grades for the semester. At 11:30am on this Monday I filled out my green sheet, stuffed it back into it's red envelope and handed it to our department secretary. Bliss!

The class that I taught this semester was distance ed Business Writing course, English 420S. This was my first foray into the world of distance ed and I am happy to say that the experience has been entirely positive. First of all, teaching in your pajamas--'nough said. Actually the course was so well-designed by the head of Professional Writing at Purdue, Dave Blakesley, that it almost ran itself. Okay, that's totally the rose-colored of it. As with any type of computer technology, we had our good hours and our bad days.

First of all, this blog. I want so much to write in it. I compose entries in my head, but somehow the demands of the day draw me away from the writing. Living with chronic illness(es) puts a strain on my ability to even stand up sometimes and the frequent dizziness makes even the refuge of my laptop closed to me. These sorts of days make me the most depressed. Make me feel like a non-productive member of society, a slacker, a waste of resources, a social parasite. I don't contribute to the world in any meaningful way on these days. On these days I am a waste and I feel guilty for it. Hell, I feel guilty for writing about how guilty I feel. I get a sick feeling inside when these days and my lack of productivity causes things that need to be done to remain incomplete, or worse yet, not even begun. I know that once again I'll have to explain this failure and apologize for it, even though I had no control over it. I know that frequently the blessing of looking healthy and attractive will be a mark against me. Any happiness that I show will be catalogued as evidence that I am "faking it." That this is my version of the dog ate my homework. My attempt to make the best out of a bad situation, to enjoy the parts of life that I can, make me into a liar . Even though I know that I am not lying, that I in fact abhor lying, their doubt makes me feel like the moral equivalent of one. I become more depressed. I push myself harder to "prove" that I am capable and worthy. This push inevitably leads to more bad days, which then result in a failure to meet expectations. Again, I am believed to be less than them. I internalize that, shoring up my own feelings of inadequacy, and this vicious cycle begins again.

I refuse to be silent. To worry and avoid and fear speaking truth. I am not a shy person, certainly not a person who has trouble speaking her mind. But there are things that I keep hidden from the world. I'm a terrible liar, but a convincing actress. The name of my famous curtain calls--healthy cat. It's true; every day I perform the role of "normal." Not in the plain vanilla way. No one would ever accuse me of being boring or, to be honest, even normal in most of its senses. No, my performance of normal is much more specific, more "rocky road" than vanilla. I play the role of the fully able-bodied, healthy young woman. I have done so for almost twenty eight years. But now, as I prepare to enter the twenty-ninth year, I note that my costume is ragged at the edges; there are tears in the bodice and on the sleeves; my makeup is wearing thin; my hair falling out. This show cannot go on.

Struggling towards what, you ask. I'm not sure how to answer that question. One- I am struggling towards speaking in a public forum about all of the amazing changes that have happened in my life. I want to share them because I believe that they might be of value to others. I fear sharing them because of those people who, for whatever reason, feel the need to devalue and disparage things spoken from the heart. Two- where do I draw the line between my public life and my private life? I'm not one for secrecy. As a friend of mine recently, and quite aptly, pointed out: I am a "full-disclosure kind of girl." It's true that I find great value in openness and that closing myself off is what I can only describe as unnatural for me. Moreover, closing myself off is painful to me, while opeing myself is beyond liberatory.

I found this quote on an online forum that one of my 421 students' is analyzing. I laughed out loud. That alone may be enough to convince the few holdouts that I'm insane, but what can I say? It amused me.

Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us.
-Bill Watterson

I've been avoiding my blog. It's true. Again, I feel conflicted about what I want this blog to be. Right now the line, which has always been blurry, between my personal life and my work is practically nonexistent. My problem is an issue of privacy and disclosure. How personal is too personal? How to extricate the personal without loosing the meaning? Isn't that where I get my driving force?

And then there is the issue of protecting the privacy of others. I don't want to avoid mentioning friends but I don't want my blog to become an ongoing game of Clue. How many anonymous people can I identify using the information given?

I should not be blogging right now because:
a. I am preparing to defend my life (or thesis-at this point there is little difference)
b. I have coursework projects that I need to be working on
c. I have papers to grade
d. I have a dirty house and a dirty car and about a million and one errands to run

This is why I am not blogging. But this weekend I will reward my hard work with some much overdue blogging. All who read this post should cross both fingers and toes and wish very, very hard that this actually happens.