Priorities

Have you ever been in a rut? I mean, a big, deep, garantuan rut that you simply cannot escape no matter how hard you try? That has been my predicament for months. I was working on my MBA (FINALLY finished it last week!) and I've taken on more and more responsiblity at work. I've been given these 'other dutires as assigned' not because I am the most qualified to do them but because I am the only one stupid enough to volunteer. I genuinely want to help my studets, so some of the tasks I took on were for that purpose. Our pre-dissertation and dissertation templates were a disaster, so one of my colleagues and I were itching to get our hands on them. Once we got permission to redo them, we worked really hard. I even worked on Christmas to try to get it done so I could start distributing them to students in the new year. I also got corraled into 'temporarily' taking over the facilitation of the virtual residency that is held every nine weeks. Now, it's not looking quite so temporary. My boss also laid in my and my colleague's (we call ourselved Laverne and Shirley) lap an onsite residency that is supposed to be held the last weekend of April, although it may not happen because there is not a lot of interest from students. There were three students signed up last week and we were told we'd go forward with it if there are five, which I think is really stupid because nobody wants to attend a residency that only has five students. We've already put quite a bit of work into planning it, though. In December, I started teaching a class. Up until that point, I was solely working as a doctoral mentor, helping students plan their research and write their dissertations. As of right now, I have 19 mentees and 14 students in my class, so grading takes a long time. And now, to top that off, starting in April, Laverne and Shirley will be mentoring every student who enters the pre-dissertation phase to help them get their research project hammered out so they can be handed off to another chair to conduct their research and write their dissertation.

Most of this my own fault. I was so eager to prove how valuable I am to the DBA program that I jumped at every opportunity. But now, I just feel like I'm being taken advantage of. Laverne and Shirley get the work because it gets done, but, essentially, all we've done is bail out the other chairs who cannot get their students through their dissertations because they never had a good study to start with, and we've make it easy for them to say no to requests to take on additional responsibilites. But I'm tired. We had the virtual residency yesterday from 9:00 to 3:00 and I felt like I could sleep for 15 hours after it was over. One of the chairs who presented was supposed to talk about chapter 3 in the dissertation but instead, she talked about our proposal review board. I was so stressed out and angry that I couldn't see straight. And on top of everything that is going on in my department (lack of oversight, lack of accountability, and lack of caring), major changes are being made at the university level that are stressing me out. It wouldn't be so bad if the changes made sense, but they don't. I've been preparing myself to step back for a while now. I'm tired of working 60 or more hours a week while the rest of the chairs work 20. I moved to the Gulf Coast so I could enjoy the warm weather and sand between my toes, but all I do is sit in front of a computer screen and read poorly written papers that make no sense and stress out about things that are out of my control, wondering what is going to be put on my plate next, and only finding out because Laverne tells me about it (my boss rarely meets with me to ask me how I feel about taking on these projects).

Two week ago tomorrow, my daughter texted me and told me that one of my son's old girlfriends died at the age of 29. She was a wife and a mother of two little girls ages 5 and 3. She fought cancer for 2 1/2 years and on Sunday, February 19^th, she went home to be with the Lord. I did not know Lexy. I probably met her once or twice 15 years ago, but if I'd have met her on the street, I wouldn't have known it was her. Yet, I was shaken to the core. I cried a lot--not so much for Lexy, because I know she is dancing on streets of gold--but for her mother. She and her mother were very close, very like April and I are, and my mother's heart aches for her even now, two weeks later. Of course I am sad for her children, because they will not remember much about their mother, and for her husband, who is a widower much too young, but the momma bear in me hurts so much. Her death also woke up my slumbering (or maybe smouldering) passion for the Lord. For years I just haven't invested much time or energy into my spiritual life. I stopped going to church when I went to Disney with April last March and focused all my time and attention on things with no eternal value, like work and playing video games when I needed to unwind. I'm not saying my work isn't rewarding, because it is. I make a difference in my students' lives; they tell me so. But I needed a wakeup call. One of the pastors who spoke at Lexy's memorial service was the pastor of a church I attended when I lived in Kansas City. At that time, I did not have the same appreciation I have today about the kind of church he pastors. I decided to listen in on a series of sermons he's currently preaching and I also joined an online Bible study. Spiritually, I am starving. I've forgotten how to pray. I'm scared to even try because I feel like I have ADHD whenever I start to pray.

I need to slow down. I know that now more than ever. Life is vapor, here for a moment and then gone, and I am already more than halfway through my life. I do not know how many more years the Lord will bless me with, but I want to live them the way I lived my younger years when I belonged to the online group Faithfully Standing and couldn't get enough of God. Every thought every minute of the day was consumed by Him. I decided to listen to some of the Christian music I listened to in the 1990s and 2000s. Songs by Twila Paris, Steven Curtis Chapman, Todd Agnew, Rich Mullins take me back to that time and remind me of what I felt like then. I kept saying that once this project was over or after I finish this, I'll stop working so hard, but that day never comes because something comes along to fill the empty space, much like trying to create a hole in the sand on the shore of the ocean; the tide comes up and fills it back in. I need to intentionally leave some empty space in my life for what is important, and I'm finally ready to do that!

Unfortunately, I have to do some work today since I was unable to finish grading yesterday, but tomorrow I plan to take most of the day off. I need to go grocery shopping and my house needs some TLC. So I am off to read the last of my dissertations. I leave you with a picture of my kitty Georgie. Georgie is the kitten I wanted to adopt nearly two years ago, but my daughter fell in love with her so I took the other two sisters. Well, back in November, she asked me if I'd take her because she was bullying her oldest cat, so now I have all three sisters (and yes, she bullies my oldest cat, too, but Charleigh can hold her own).

My Crazy Life

I'll bet you thought I dropped off the face of the earth, huh? I apologize for my very prolonged absence. I have tried to come here and write a few times over the last year, but my life has been crazy busy. I've been working as a doctoral chair in addition to performing my Writing Center duties and working on a second master's degree for a year. I started out with 3 students last August and now I'm up to 16 in addition to being a committee member for seven student (although two of those are graduating in October). Of my 16 students, 11 are in classes right now and 5 are pre-dissertation, which thankfully means I do not have to do much with them at this point. Last year when I started working in DBA, my boss and the program director (PD) of the DBA program worked out a deal that permits me to work on my doctoral student stuff during the day after I finish reviewing the papers assigned to me. My supervisor assigns me fewer papers to review than she gives to the others and once I finish them, I do my doctoral stuff. It is a real blessing because it would be really difficult to keep up with everything if not for that concession.

Back in February, the PD asked me if I wanted to go full-time, and I said YES. Unfortunately, it didn't work out at that time. Our student enrollments started dropping because of covid, so the university implemented a hiring freeze. It was disappointing, but I knew that I just needed to be patient because the PD promised me should would continue to fight to get me transferred. Well, long story short, after months of fenagling, I finally got word last Wednesday that the transition had been finalized and I am starting full-time in DBA the day after tomorrow. Tomorrow is my last day in the Writing Center. Although I really enjoyed my job for a long time, I can't say I'm particularly sad about leaving the WC; to be honest, I sort of started disconnecting from my job back in February when the proposition of working full-time in DBA was presented. I have been a writing specialist for nearly four years and I confess that I am a little burned out.

Interestingly the same day I got my job offer, DBA posted a job for a dedicated doctoral writing coach (which is similar to the job I am leaving). The job was actually first created back in 2020 and I really wanted to apply for it, but the way the job posting is written, I was not qualified. The person they hired was in the position for about a year and a half and she did a terrible job. She was finally let go in June and they reposted the job. I applied for it this time because I was qualified and the PD told me she would give it to me, but she asked me if I really wanted it or if I wanted to be a chair. I told her there was no doubt that I want to be a chair but that I would be willing to take the writing coach job to get transferred to DBA and then wait out the chair opening. At that point, I had no idea how long it would be before they could get approval to open a position for me. She told me she wanted what I wanted and encouraged me to wait. I told her I would continue to be patient. Well, the writing coach job ended up being placed on long-term hold and I think it was because the PD wanted me to get the chair position but didn't want to fill the writing coach position in case the chair position didn't come through because it would have closed the door to me transitioning to DBA. So, after my chair job was secured, the writing coach job was posted, but then it was almost immediately taken off the public website and posted internally, which I thought was odd. But then the PD asked me if I could recommend any of my coworkers for the job. I told her I had someone in mind, so I contacted him and he applied. I feel kind of bad about the prospect of stealing another writing specialist, but we desperately need someone who can help our doctoral students with their writing. Since our student numbers were down, we did not replace the last writing specialist who left and the director of the Success Center was very eager for me to apply for the writing coach job in DBA when it opened because even being down a specialist, there is still not enough work to keep everyone busy. However, losing two writing specialists will hurt them a bit. I think he's a shoe in, so they may end up having to hire someone after all.

So, that is my life for the past year in a nutshell. It has been crazy, frustrating, and immensely rewarding. I am excited to start my new journey with just one job, at least for awhile. I might pick up a part-time teaching job down the road a bit, but for now, I will be content to just relax and maybe get to the beach a few times. It's been far too long since I last stuck my toes in the Gulf.

Short Update

Happy Sunday, friends. I don't have a lot to share today, but I thought I'd pop in since it's been a month. Our weather changed yesterday. A cold front must have blown through yesterday morning, because for awhile it looked like it was going to rain, and then the sun came out and a brisk north wind started blowing. We had temps in the 70s yesterday and as of 2:00pm, it is only 71 degrees. I am thinking that chili is on the menu for dinner tonight.

For the past few weeks, Dan has been building April a screened porch. Today we are going to hopefully finish up. He has it all framed; now he just needs to install the screen. April's kitties will be very happy to be able to go outside. Mine spend a lot of time on our screened porch. Other than that, I don't have a lot on my agenda for today. We just groomed and bathed Emma, and now she's sulking. That was the only thing I really wanted to get done this weekend besides a grocery trip, which I did yesterday. I learned a long time ago to not go to Walmart on Sunday. For some reason, Sunday mornings are insane. Most of the tourists are gone now, but the snow birds are starting to arrive. Fortunately, they are easier to deal with because there are fewer of them. This past summer was insane. We had so many people visit the beach this year. I think it's because nobody traveled last year because of the virus-that-shall-not-be-named. I'd like to make a trip to the beach next weekend, though Friday is graduation, so the CSU graduates might make the beach a bit more busy than usual.

Speaking of graduation, this will be my first graduation as a faculty member. I'm kind of excited to see things from that perspective for once. I have always viewed from the audience. It's the first time I'll get to wear doctoral garb as well. I ordered a tam and gown for my graduation, but I never wore it since my graduation was virtual. Some day I might travel to California and walk in a graduation, so I'll need that getup. I think faculty sit according to college, so I won't be able to sit next to Dan. I am also only participating in two of the ceremonies. The third one is at 5:00pm, and we have to be at the auditorium by 8:00am, so that means the animals will be home alone all day for the first time in I don't know how long. The second ceremony should be over by 3:00pm, so I'll leave after that. Dan probably won't be home until about 7:00pm.

UPDATE: here is a picture from graduation.

I revised my school plans and will now be starting classes on November 10^th. I'm a little bummed that the new Pokemon games and a big update to Animal Crossing are coming out right around the same time, so I won't have a lot of time to play them. My second doctoral course (as a teacher) starts the same day, and I may have five students next term, although more than likely I'll only end up with about four. One of the students I was supposed to have last session is still not making any progres in the course he dropped last term (which prevented him from progressing to the dissertation phase) and had to retake, so I don't hold out a lot of hope that I'll end up with him this term either. The course I'm teaching now isn't officially mine. I do the grading but it is actually my mentor's class, because I was not officially hired when it started, but now I am official. I received notification last week that I will be getting at least one of my own classes next term, and I may get a second if I get a newbie (or two).

Well, that is my short update. I need to get ready to go to April's house now. I hope you all are enjoying your fall!

Another Rainy Anniversary

Wednesday was my and Dan's 31^st wedding anniversary. Last year we had to put off celebrating our anniversary because Sally was blowing in, and she made landfall very early on the 16^th. On Wednesday, Nicholas was making landfall in Texas, which is not very close to Alabama, but somehow we ended up with seven inches of rain just on Wednesday from him. It finally stopped raining around 4:00, which was perfect timing, because that is when Dan and I got off work and went to grab dinner at our favorite Mexican Restaurant. Here are a few pictures of the rain, the water-filled drainage ditches, and dinner.

I splurged a little more than I should have, lol. It's the chips and salsa that always get me, but the veggie quesadillas were pretty good too. It started raining again just as we got back home Wednesday evening and then it rained a little more yesterday. Today was dry, so Dan and I decided to go for a drive along the beach road.

We drove through Orange Beach and over to Perdido Key, FL just to see what is there. I noticed lots of shops that I'd like to visit someday, but since Dan isn't much of a shopper, I didn't suggest that we stop.

Do you all have anything fun planned this weekend? I have a student's paper to look over and give feedback on and then I may start working on the class I signed up for this week. It won't officially start until early October, but I can get a head start on the assignments. Other than that, I will probably do some cleaning and laundry. Oh, and my diploma was supposed to be ordered today. I never found out why it was not ordered after my degree was conferred, but I'm just happy it was a mistake. I had to order another copy of my transcript to be vetted for my faculty position, and it was delivered almost immediately. I remember the old days when they had to be mailed out and it would take weeks. Now with digital technology, it's almost instantaneous.

Well, it's getting late, so I am going to call it a night. I hope you all have a great weekend!