Winding Down

As regular readers of my blog know, I've been struggling with dissertation burnout lately. But, guess what?

I'm working on the conclusion!

I hate conclusions. By the end of a long paper I usually feel that I've already said all I have to say on a subject. I ask myself the big "So What?" question, and, at first, I usually have no answer. But if I just let it rest, give it time to sit on the back burner, eventually--there it is.

With a dissertation, multiply the aggravation times about a million. I mean, I've already had to answer a "So What?" question at the end of every chapter. Now, I'm faced with the "SOOOO WHAAAAAT??" question. And, true to form but equally exaggerated, at first my brain answered: "I've said absolutely everything there is to say about this subject, I'm tired and aggravated, and I've used up the next twenty years' supply of self-discipline. I really just want to watch movies or read escapist fiction and be LEFT ALONE, preferably fully supplied with some form of chocolate. Enough already!!!"

But ever the good little girl, I couldn't rebel for long. I wrote the first paragraph of my conclusion on Friday, took off for the weekend, and came back strong on Monday.

The end is in sight!

Booking It--Refund Reading

April is Tax Month. If you were to get a refund of, say, $500, and had to spend it all on book-related items, what would you buy?

Well, if someone forced me . . . I don't know. My first thought was a Kindle, but I'm just not sure I'd use it. I like to hold books in my hand, flip back to re-read, underline passages, and write in the margins. But I might like one for reading periodicals. Maybe.

But then, $500 would buy a lot of books . . .

Or a lot of skinny lattes in the library or the bookstore. Skinny lattes do count as a book-related item, don't they?

A Different Solution

And the Pulitzer goes to . . .

The Pulitzer Prizewinners for 2009 were announced on April 20.

LETTERS, DRAMA and MUSIC:

Fiction - Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout (Random House)

Drama - Ruined by Lynn Nottage

History - The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family by Annette Gordon-Reed (W.W. Norton & Company)

Biography - American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House by Jon Meacham (Random House)

Poetry - The Shadow of Sirius by W.S. Merwin (Copper Canyon Press)

General Nonfiction - Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II by Douglas A. Blackmon (Doubleday)

Music - Double Sextet by Steve Reich, premiered March 26, 2008 in Richmond, VA (Boosey & Hawkes)

You can check out the complete list HERE.

The Problem with Perfectionism

My writing's been going a little bit better the last few days. One of the problems I've been having (besides my brain turning to sludge) is that I kept finding myself sitting in front of the computer, thinking and thinking and trying to come up with the perfect sentence or the perfect word without actually WRITING anything.

I realized that when I wrote on the computer I felt like I had to produce polished, quality writing, but if I turned to my pad and pencil instead, I could let myself just spill out ideas without that editor's voice taking over the process. Then, after brainstorming all those ideas and letting them flow wherever they wanted to--often to surprising insights, it was not nearly so hard to turn that fertile mess into passable prose.

Of course, I already knew this. I do teach writing, after all. But it's funny. I got so involved in the idea of getting through that I forgot to do what I know.

My Next Read

I know it’s weird, and I know I have a huge stack of books waiting to be read, but this one’s moving to the top. Elizabeth Bennet chasing zombies? What could be more fun than that? (Except maybe a date with Mr. Darcy?)

You scoff, but this book has sold more than 120,000 copies.

You can read an interview with author Seth Grahame-Smith HERE.

Sorry, Barbie

I'm not quite sure how it slipped by me, but earlier this year on March 9 Barbie turned 50. Wow!

Now, I had my share of Barbies. My cousin and I spent untold hours dressing them up, driving them around in that pink car, and having them hold imaginary conversations with Ken. Occasionally, they even kissed him. Don't tell Mom.

And for all you grown-up little girls out there who still secretly feel bad that you didn't grow up to look like Barbie, this should make you feel better:

Real Women vs. Barbie
Real Women Average woman's heigh is 5'4" Their weight is approx. 140 lbs. They wear a size 14 dress Their bust is between 36" and 37" (B cup) Their waist is between 30" and 34" Their hips average between 40" and 42" Their shoe size is estimated to be between 8.5 and 9.5		Barbie (as a human) Barbie's height would be 7'2" Her weight would be 101 lbs. She would wear a size 4 dress Her bust would be 39" (FF cup) Her waist would be 19" (same as her head) Her hips would be 33" Her shoe size would be a 5 0

Barbie's body would have room for only half of a liver and only a few inches of intestines, as opposed to the usual 26 feet. The result: chronic diarrhea and death from malabsorption & malnutrition. Barbie's neck is twice as long as the average human's which would make it impossible to hold up her head. Barbie's waist is the same circumference as her head. Barbie's legs are 50% longer than her arms, whereas the average woman's legs are only 20% longer than her arms. To look like a barbie proportionally, a healthy woman would need to add 61 cm to her height, subtract 15 cm from her waist, add 13 cm to her chest, and 8 to her neck length. If a woman had the same measurements as Barbie, she would not have enough body fat to menstruate (and obviously to have children). There are 3 billion women on the planet who don't look like Barbie; only 8 women come close. Barbie would be unable to walk upright (she would need to walk on all 4's): her feet are so proportionately small that her chest would pull her perpetually forward onto her toes. Now, don't you feel better?

The Rabbit or the Turtle

I've really been battling Dissertation Burnout lately. All through the process, I've set daily goals--read a certain amount, take notes and develop an organizational plan today, write X number of pages--and for the most part I met them. I was submitting chapters regularly, and that stack of typed pages was growing steadily higher.

Until I hit the last chapter. Then my brain turned to mush. Instead of writing several pages a day, some days I'd sit and stare at the computer screen and, by the end of the day, be lucky if I'd finished a whole paragraph. Aaaarrrgggghh. I couldn't hold a train of thought, I wasn't sure if what I'd written made sense, and I'd have to keep reading the previous pages to make sure I was going where I intended to. Very frustrating.

But I talked to an old friend who's been through the process, and he gave me some great advice. He said to remember that getting a PhD is like a marathon, not a sprint. By the end, it's not about speed. It's about not quitting. This really made sense to me because I've run a marathon. And I remember at about mile 20 really just wanting to walk over and sit down on the curb. But instead, I kept putting one foot in front of the other and repeating in my head "I will not quit, I will not quit, I will not quit . . ." And I didn't.

And I won't.

Booking It--Library Week

Last week was National Library week, and since my technical difficulties kept me from posting these questions last Monday, I thought I’d do them today:

How often do you use your public library and how do you use it?

I rarely if ever use the city library, but I use the University library (both Harding’s & Ole Miss’s) regularly—mostly for research.

Has the coffeehouse/bookstore replaced the library?

As far as sitting and browsing or surfing the internet, yes.

Did you go to the library as a child?

Oh, yes! It was one of my favorite places. I still remember exactly where on the shelves some of my favorite books were. I lived out in the country, so not only did I visit the library when we went to town, but I was also a regular patron of the Bookmobile. Although books, of course, were the main attraction, I still remember how wonderful it was to enter that air-conditioned Bookmobile on a hot summer day.

Do you have any particular memories of the library?

The library was only a block away from my grandmother’s house, and I’d walk down the street, through a honeysuckle-lined alleyway, and across the Community House lawn to get there. Every summer I’d attend the weekly Story Hour, and I remember sitting on the floor in a circle with other kids, listening to the librarian read. The library had high ceilings and was full of polished, dark wood. It always seemed like a wonderful, mysterious place to me.

Do you like sleek, modern, active libraries or the older, darker, quiet, cozy libraries?

I’m thankful for the amenities in the sleek, modern, active libraries, but my heart prefers the older, darker, quiet, cozy ones.

I Know How He Feels