on loving and living
diss diary #7: some joys that are getting me through the big changes to come
A quick note before we start: I am on a mission to reach my first 100 subscribers! We’re just over halfway there, and I’m so grateful for it. Since this is a reader-supported project, your likes, shares, comments and reposts are so valuable in reaching this goal. Plus, I love seeing notifications from familiar faces roll through my dashboard: warms my heart every time!!!
Dearest weed-ers,
My windows have been open for almost a week straight now that temps are tipping into the 60s. I trick myself into thinking it’s cold at night just so I can sleep with my favorite blanket on top of me without having to blast the AC. I have been going through the stash of cinnamon-y candles from last season because maybe my greatest sadness about moving to Paris is that the phenomenon of #fall (the capitalist, pumpkin spice version of the autumnal season) is very much not in vogue there the way it is here.
the updates
But yes, there’s the elephant in the back of the room, and it’s standing in plain view (verse 2 of the song linked above). I am moving to Paris. Right now, suitcases are splayed open on the floor, and my closet and fridge are emptying out. But depending on when you’re reading this, I will have been there for about 12 hours!
I picked up my Visa a couple weeks ago! After submitting my paperwork and biometrics, they estimated 10-15 days for processing, but within a week, I got the automated message that my passport was ready for pick-up. It’s comical that I had so much anxiety over receiving a fancy-looking sticker in this silly little book that lets us enter foreign countries. Why does it feel so momentous but also unimportant? Why does it feel so deeply material in that it allows my entire life to change, while also changing pretty much nothing at all? It seemed only right to celebrate with a similarly huge yet meaningless cookies-and-cream donut and a coffee.
I have really been enjoying cold sparkling water (with lemon-vanilla simple syrup I made) and other icy beverages. This is far from groundbreaking, but I would be remiss if I didn’t clarify how essential these things have been to my end of summer experience. I would like to stop using so many single use plastics and paper straws, but I consume 85% of my drinks at home, so I’m allowing myself not to feel guilty. I have a dream of making my Paris apartment a hosting space for all the friends I hope to make, where there will be crafts and puzzles on the table, coffees and teas in the kitchen, and shareable homemade meals alongside plants on the kitchen bar top. Stay tuned…
I had my virtual conference presentation for the paper I mentioned in the last diss diary, and it went really well!! Now, did I almost forget about the presentation until the night before and wake up early to run, shower, and prep 10mins worth of slides so that I could be ready by 9am EDT? Maybe.
It was the big annual meeting of all the working groups that make up the association, and my sense was that a lot was happening at the in-person part of the meeting. I love conferences because of their emphasis on collaborating on the knowledge production process. I love follow-up emails, being part of intimate back-and-forths with fellow panelists, and witnessing those dynamics on panels I’m not presenting on. I think that’s the classical pianist in me who occasionally still wants to perform and lives for a good performance.
But now that the conference is over, I am continuing to plug away on the dissertation version of that material. I pretty much stuck to my August goal of writing every day (certainly on the weekdays), and made lots of progress. I’m aiming for an 8000 word chapter, and we are almost halfway there!
the reflection
I was in a Lyft home last Sunday evening, after a full weekend of socializing and reconnecting with peers, colleagues, and dear friends after being apart all summer. I had tried to take the bus home, but the work being done at Harvard Square apparently causes delays even on slow days. And I would have waited the 30mins for the bus, but I was tired and fell for the promo deal and booked the 10-minute ride home. and i get hit with a feeling.
any Friday night in the fall of 2014. marching band. brass saxophone clanking on concrete bleachers. salt gathering in the creases of my marching band bibbers. salt in the air from chicken tenders and athletes on the field. losing my voice screaming chants during the 3rd quarter percussion show. smelling fast food grease across the street, longing for the inevitable carton of fries after the game.
I loved marching band. I often forget how much I loved it because I’m so far removed from the experience now. I loved the sound of a big brassy swell, timed perfectly to a formation clicking into place, and I love that I could make music and still get a PE credit. I also loved marching band because it gave me friends (and some more-than-friends).
Making friends came easily to me because I was usually okay introducing myself to people. But I often had lots of “weak ties,” shall we say, and not many strong ones. It meant that I found myself on the edges of friend groups. Marching band was the first time I had a core group of people whose houses I could go to, who I passed notes to in the hallways between classes (technically we hand-wrote letters and passed a notebook back and forth every day), and who helped me come into some version of who I am right now.
There was a kind of reciprocity about being in the band that charmed me. Because, shocker, I have always given too much of myself and not received the same in return.
To march, you develop new kinds of self-awareness. If you mess up getting to your dot, you could be on a collision course with a sousaphone or color guard member, and you learn pretty quickly that that could spell disaster for you or your instrument or the shape of whatever is happening on the field. You have to remember where your feet are in relation to hips and shoulders and elbows. And you have to remember which music goes with which parts of your drill. So much for a growing brain to hold onto.
Through cultivating your own awareness, you also learn to trust other people. Sort of like singing in choir, we all worked toward a collective goal that none of us could really see or hear completely from the field. We had to trust that what we individually offered was just as much as what our neighbor offered. We had to trust that our leaders could guide us to the desired goal.
Shortly after college started, those people from my band life, who had held my deepest secrets and with whom I had incredibly intimate moments, just stopped texting. It’s like neither of us had ever existed to one another. I often still wish I knew why this happened to us, and in general why this seems to be part of the human condition.
Some reasons that I tell myself is why: I had a really different college experience than the friends who went to state schools further from home and who pursued business degrees or medical school. There was a lot of heartbreak. Many of my friends had friends they’d known since childhood, and I entered their circles ten years too late. Some had just always been bad at keeping in touch. But it felt personal and lonely. And sometimes I still wander around afraid that people will just leave, not tell me goodbye nor tell me why they’re leaving.
There’s probably a lesson in there about not needing to have all the answers to everything all the time. But that’s not what reared its head on the car-ride home.
10 years ago, my sister and I had curly fries and jamocha shakes after game days and marching competitions. sometimes waffle house depending on which of my friends was driving.
so imagine the uncanny feeling of seeing your 18-year old self in the window reflection of the Harvard student center as you sat at the Greek restaurant, laughing and crying with friends over fries and a glass of wine. Imagine the warm nostalgia of watching afternoon football on your friend’s couch after watching football with your parents every Sunday for 22 years. Imagine the joy of coordinating a picnic of unionized graduate student workers making friendship bracelets and playing card games, using the same kind of cheap wooden beads and thread you played with as a kid.
I am overwhelmed, and for once, it’s not with the logistics of life.
It’s with the love that comes with living.
I am overwhelmed by feeling like I finally have reciprocal relationships that do not drain me in the bad ways. What a privilege it is to be known. I have learned to ask for things when I need or want them, and I have learned that it’s not always personal when people say no. I have learned that I love community and finding ways to practice communal care with secondhand shopping, supporting local businesses, using recycling and buy-back programs, and enjoying public libraries and parks.
In some ways, life feels perfect right now because I can see glimpses of my previous selves in present-day everyday moments.
They are signs that I am on the path.
And it may be my path, but I’m not alone on it.
There are a couple of professional announcements I want to sprinkle in here:
reminder to check out my first major article that was published a couple months ago now. if you’re curious about what my academic writing voice is like, this would be perfect for you!
i am co-coordinating a 2-day symposium thematized around gardens, with one of my dear friends and colleagues. we have envisioned the event as an opportunity to challenge some norms of the conference-going experience, which has impacted the kinds of thinkers we invited and the variety of sessions on offer. it is free to attend, and will be held in hybrid format on Zoom and at the University of Oslo.
thank you dearly for your eyes and ears. if you feel so called, please share this diss diary with a friend, upgrade your subscription, or leave a one-time tip! i am so grateful to have you here as part of the journey, and honored to live out this version of a happy writer’s life. :)
... the band picture of you and your sister was taken by the Wii swordsman, "the double master"!
Loving the ee cummings photo and caption ❤️❤️ such a lovely heart filling post