I. Things move of their own momentum, or perhaps other people just get more done than I do. The workshop proposal associated with the Dr. Wow book project has been funded, so we'll have to have a good chunk of manuscript and a web site up and running by early June (early June!). My two co-authors were in the same place for a couple of weeks in September, and I know that the joint archive has been updated, but I haven't gone to look. I suppose I'm too afraid that the 7 or so pathetic pages I produced in late August have been torched.
II. Just because you're better than me
Doesn't mean that I'm lazy
Just because you're going forwards
Doesn't mean I'm going backwards (Billy Bragg)
Meanwhile, my department has been pondering some difficult personnel actions. We're not a happy department anymore. Really not happy at all. I've even been to two meetings, mostly 'cause I can't believe the extent to which everyone went stark raving mad while I was away. No one listens to me, because I was gone for the crucial happiness-destroying events last spring: that I'm not holding the same grudges is seen as blindness, not objectivity. Ms. Mentor (whom I hold in somewhat higher esteem than do many academic women bloggers) has recently written about meetings; go read her, and I'll spare you my efforts at satire.
Somewhere under the paranoia and random personal viciousness there's a true debate over what direction the department, or, heck, the college should be moving in: towards scholarship, or towards pedagogical excellence and student happiness? (Swarthmore or Carlton? is one shorthand version.) This is, of course, the tension always inherent in the liberal arts college model of education. Around here most seem to believe that the only way to really resolve the issue long-term would be to double the endowment, and not have to compromise (all the sabbaticals you want! half the teaching! three conferences in Europe per year! and a pony!). Those with this belief don't tend to worry much more about the issue—awfully convenient for them.
In the foreground is a false debate: when someone new asks for something that the veterans gave up asking for years ago, and then a three-generations-later dean says, "Maybe, yes, we can consider doing that," how should the veterans react? Especially when the dean points out how "recent hires" have been "stronger" and have "higher expectations"? Of course, the insulted veterans are digging in their heels to oppose the possible improvements in our collective lot as inimical to the Granolan spirit of cooperation and self-sacrifice.
Fuck 'em. And yes, the new hires are stronger, actually, and we have to get used to it.
III. Bad news on the day care front. There are two centers in town, with a total of 15 infant places. Nothing's forecast as available for January, and there's already a list for the one space open in February—they won't tell me how long, although I'll try to beat that out of them when I visit for a tour next week. I am shitting bricks and hoping that everyone else signs up with both places. What will we do? (And why were they so unhelpful when I called last April? Why didn't they put me on the damn lists then?) For now we tootle along hoping it all works out somehow, but oh am I going to need a real plan soon.
Not that it's really imaginable that she'll be going to day care that soon. But she will.
IV. My challenge for the next couple of days: can I referee and wrangle cluster feeds at the same time? Actually, I think the paper's bad enough that one-handed typing will suffice to produce the report. (And, actually, I've been harassed by the editor, who's presumably been harassed by the authors, so I really should get the report out.)
I'll tell you that I referreed two papers within weeks of the birth of my two children. After reviewing the first, which was terrible (and I was only a year into my tt-position), I wrote a colleague and asked him, "Am I being to harsh, or am I just a sleep-deprived new mother."). After the second babe, I approved the revisions on a manuscript I was reviewing (which was really better, but you have to wonder whether the first/second baby dichotomy had anythign at all to do with it).
bj
Posted by: bj | Friday, September 30, 2005 at 10:21 AM
We had a similar daycare issue (which is to say, we got on waiting lists at the centers on the campus where I was teaching, but showed no signs of making it to a slot in time). At the university's Work-Life office (about 2 weeks from when the littl'un needed to be in daycare or was going to be schlepped to classes), we got the list of home-based daycare providers. Indeed, they had *just* updated the list, and pointed out a provider a mere 3 blocks off campus that had an infant opening to fill. She turned out to be the Best Daycare Provider Ever.
So, if there's an office there that might have a list of providers, possibly the provider you're really going to love is on that list and is looking for you.
(I have this theory about the universe looking out for new mothers …)
Posted by: Dr. Free-Ride | Saturday, October 01, 2005 at 04:12 AM
don't you love that billy bragg?
Posted by: delagar | Sunday, October 02, 2005 at 12:28 PM