I went to a bar this week and wound up hanging out with some
new people whom I didn’t really know. For the first time since I’ve had it, one
of the men asked to look at my wedding ring. Another guy looked at it, trying
to figure out the stone and guessed adventurously that it was tourmaline. I
laughed and said “Valiant effort, it’s Benitoite” which rendered a general WTF
face from everyone. ::proudly displays hipster badge::
The man who had initially asked about it asked me why I was
married. I said that it’s because I am not a very stable person and my
relationship stabilizes me. He said “But why did you get married?” “I dunno, I
guess societal norms and the changing of labels mattered to me.” He then said
“So in other words, you’re weak.”
“Yeah, I guess I am.” I replied. But it didn’t hurt. It was
actually one of the most freeing things I’ve ever said to a stranger at a bar.
I am allowed to be weak and I am allowed to have a partner who strengthens me.
I am allowed to ask for help. I am allowed to not be the strongest person in
the room. And the freeing thing was that I didn’t give a fuck. Why should I?
I’m human, and I’m allowed to show
it.
I’ve been thinking a lot about validation this week, and
especially how it relates to people being able to be people in science. I’ve been trying to figure out how to express
precisely how I want others to behave in my house, in my office cubicle, that
make me feel safe in those places. What makes those spaces mine? Now that I have all this newfound ownership and privacy, how
do I maintain it? I have been setting hard boundaries to differing success and
trying to take away which important messages do I want out of life.
Work
This week a lot of things cleared up at work. I was able to
have a really level-headed conversation with the scientist who “supposedly” had
beef with me. As I suspected, we are both humans and we were both frustrated
with the situation. Midwest Momboss caught my nonverbal cues and quietly stated
to observe/moderate the discussion. I felt the opposite of alone. As long as I
have access to in-person discussions of stuff like this, I have regained a
little hope that the people who work with me are mature enough to work things
out. I do not have blind faith or absolute trust in that. Two weeks prior of
unproductive frustration have made me weary about being naïve that the “adults”
will just take care of things. I don’t want them to.
I was invited to give my TEDx talk again in front of various
higher ups at TLoTH. During this meeting, the Heads of my department were
really nice to me. Head 1 didn’t say too much but was very supportive of my
critique of their system. Head 2 (who I’ve mentioned, in a different context) was very energetic about how to incorporate more diverse undergrad
students. He admitted that the department hadn’t been thinking about pipeline
that far back and that it could do a better job.
One interesting passing comment was another department Head
commented on sourcing undergrads for student programs. He said that he would
look only at students from top universities because they were “obviously” the
only students worth looking at. I was already in a little bit of a delicate
situation in terms of how freely I could speak my mind so I did not address
him. But I think mentalities like that are exactly WHY places like TLoTH have
diversity issues. They do not think critically in how the universities population does or does not reflect a diverse range of
backgrounds. The topic of public universities being truly public is a touchy
and political issue. And of “top” universities, most of the ones he listed were
private, therefore unattainable for all but a select few outside of those who
can “pay” for it. Private (and public) schools who choose to invest in
“diversity” students loose tens of thousands of dollars per semester on these
students putting a lot of pressure for those kids to perform to certain GPA
standards. Coupled with lack of role models and often lack of a support
community on campus and at home, students in these scholarships have it pretty
rough. If they are not feeling confident in fulfilling these basics (who
would?) they might not be confident enough in themselves to apply for student
positions at places like TLoTH. Thus leaving your applying student population
homogeneous and small.
There are more sides to Imposter Syndrome in
academia than one can understand after merely reading four articles on HuffPo.
Start with reading Brene Brown, at least.
I care about the outcome. I care about how the pipeline is
treated and I care about the system as a whole. That’s why I get invited to
managers’ meetings. I’m certain (and have been encouraged from people reading
the blog) that I will make a career out of caring about whole systems. This is
why Big American University invested in me; I’m trying to make a decent return
on investment.
Work (continued)
I would like to take a moment to say that I am
extraordinarily proud of myself for my advancement to master two incredibly
difficult programs with very little guidance. By which I mean one of these
programs doesn’t have a users’ manual and the other has a user’s manual from
2000. But I am human (and the quant program [written in Excel] is quite possibly broken) I got to a roadblock. Because I am
me, I asked for help.
I invited a scientist whom I have met a few times but never
had one-on-one time with. He is a wealth of knowledge and I expected he could
show me how to troubleshoot my problem.
It boiled down to a very simple issue where I had done the right thing
in the wrong window. I also didn’t know the shortcut for copying the whole
column in Excel. Neither of these things were a big deal and they were easily
fixable and then I could move on to play with the data sets.
Except.
The dude somehow dragged out this encounter to be 45
minutes long. That’s annoying on it’s own but he spent the WHOLE time (from my
perception) insulting me. This was at my
desk, mind you. The thing that he said, several times, which really irked me
was:
“I thought you’re from Big American University. Aren’t you
supposed to be smart?”
He said this exact thing at least twice. He was laughing
that nervous laugh of the socially awkward making what they think is a joke but
they kinda are aware it might be harmful. But maybe not understand why. I
responded: “I don’t think that has anything to do with what we’re talking about
right now. Can we please focus on how to fix this issue?”
After the encounter I went outside and cried for a bit and
felt better. I do not think this man’s intent was to be harmful. It’s possible
that he’s used to treating students in this fashion and no one has ever
commented. But I fucking raised hell. Quietly. To my mentor. Because that’s how
we play at TLoTH.
Friends
This has been the Week of the Grad School/Early Career
Freakout. What pains me about my friends experiencing feelings of deep
inadequacy is that they are not taking advantage of services offered by their
universities/employing institutions to help them cope. One of the most
perfectly scientist ways someone put it this week was:
“I hadn’t considered [seeking help] before. I mean,
depression isn’t clinical until it goes on for more than two weeks, right?”
We, for the most part are so uneducated about mental health
as a valid and legitimate aspect of our health that we cannot even identify
when we are in a crisis. We fear that if we are now in a crisis, then what the
hell was it before? And I didn’t get help before, and I was “fine” so why can’t
I just suck it up this time and deal with it. I have been reading Amanda
Palmer’s The Art of Asking and she
says it perfectly. “PLEASE BELIEVE ME. I’M REAL. NO REALLY, IT HAPPENED. IT
HURT.”
I am happy to provide validation, support and love to my
friends. But I learned there is a point I will draw a line. When a friend who I
care about reflects on periods of past depression and says “yeah, like thinking
‘I fucking hate myself. I am worthless and never going to do anything with my
life.’”
Though this disturbed me as I heard it, I was proud of
myself. I said “No. Not here. I do not abide by that thought process and I will
not entertain it in this discussion. Hard boundary.”
I have never done this before, but I realized that it was
the right thing to do. It’s completely OK for me to protect myself. It’s OK
that I don’t engage with self-loathing. I feel like this is one of the hardest
lessons I have learned yet from living on me own. But I don't feel like I'd learned it very well previously, so I count it as a victory.
Creative Hobby
Rehearsals for the two little plays I’m in have been going
pretty well. I submitted a proposal to the board of the theatre to direct a
play. It is a very difficult and potentially boring play. I have never directed
anything, let alone a 3 hour main event. I convinced a guy I’ve never met to be
my producer. I’m stoked. I hope I get it.
Active Hobby
Went back to Derby practice on Sunday. Ow. Things I didn’t
know existed hurt. My workout buddy was in a world of pain but she toughed it
the fuck out for the drill we were in together. I’m proud of her. After that, I
learned how to weave (at a very slow pace) both backwards and forwards. We did
this one exercise where we all held onto each other’s hips and built up
momentum to go around the rink. I didn’t really have to do anything and I just
got to go really fast and yell “WHEEEEEEEEEEE!!!”
I am not at all interested in this cold bullshit called "winter" that seems to be descending at a rapid pace. The only thing I am very
much looking forward to is ice-skating. I haven’t ice-skated since I was a
little kid and that’s the only thing about winters I have missed. My best
friend growing up trained to be a figure skater and made it a couple steps away
from the Olympics. Before she got really into it, we went to lots of lessons
and played at the rink together. I was pretty good, even though I liked ice
hockey more than figure skating. I am very much looking forward to going around
the rink senselessly for an hour at a time, even if I don’t have a friend with
me. Sure as hell beats running in my book.
Eeeeeeeeennnyway. I’mma close out now with a song. This
video is worth every second so please bear with it. The announcement at the
beginning is a time/space capsule in its own right. Videos like this capture
some of the absolutely brilliant magic that is live music. I truly hope you
enjoy.
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