Crunch Time 3

So I did it.  I handed in my thesis to my professor earlier this week.  Now begins several months of re-writes.  I wonder how sick I will be of my thesis before it even goes to my committee?  While I await the first set of re-writes I am hearing horror stories of both the length of time other grads have experienced for re-writes and how many people cry either during or after their thesis defence.  Despite some harsh criticism of two parts of my thesis, I did not cry during or after the proposal, but I was in shock for about a week.  Walking around thinking about how I could have made the proposal better to have avoided the criticism, as well, wondering where a university's responsibility begins in teaching about their students how to complete research, and where the individual grad student's responsibility begins.  Besides, open verbal group feedback is a very difficult experience and chilled me a bit to the bone.  Then again, that is the whole point of a thesis committee, the group that gives you ideas about how to improve your work, your abilities as a researcher, and your writing.  A bit of a double-edged sword, pointing out the weaknesses while at the same time helping the individual to improve through little tiny repetitive cuts to the top layer of skin.  Hopefully I can handle what comes.  The end is near, I just have to sustain my level of progress until the very end.

Towards the end I looked like every other crazy student's space: papers everywhere, books piled in each other, pens, pencils and highlighters all over the place, cups of leftover beverages strewn about, piles of dishes in the sink, semi-rotten food in the fridge, running out of clothes to wear, few clean towels left, and a dirty apartment that scared me.  The picture below is the cleaned up version of my study space (you will not be seeing the rest of the apartment).  Should have taken a shot before I organized.  It was a hilarious, academic mess.    

Worry, not, I was not bored after I handed in my thesis as my student political career winds down at the end of this month as well.  What a strange and eclectic ride that has been.  Full of the interesting, bizarre, and overwhelming experiences that can crush one's soul or bend you in ways you thought you were not flexible.  I had to have a long conversation around January with a colleague about the sacrifices I was making to complete this political work and the tole it was taking on my academic progress.  At the time I was being steam rolled by a colleague and it was exhausting and disappointing, but not worth delaying my academic progress.  From this and other experiences I have learned that democracy is illusive and hard to work through as a process.  I am willing to interpret rules in order to serve people and ensure their needs are met, but there are multiple interpretations of rules and critical thinking is always necessary.  We serve people, not words on a piece of paper, but the ideas attached to those words are important and subject to interpretation.  This makes democracy challenging and formidable.  It has been an interesting few years.  

As these two main pieces of my life come to a close, work that has occupied my life for three years, I wonder about the next steps.  I am lucky as I have already had several job interviews for work in both the tourism and recreation fields.  This weekend I am spending time thinking about what I want from life, and I wonder what the future holds for me and what choices I will be asked to make.  All unfolding uncertainties.  Exciting and a bit scary at the same time.

Off to create a poster and re-read my thesis just for improvement sake...again.
I'll keep you posted.

Born to Run

Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen by Christopher McDougall
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Running is not something that I like doing unless I have a basketball, am running bases, or playing some sort of sport.  Having started running in the Running Room clinics a friend lent me this read.  After devouring this interesting novel about a tribe of people who run as their more used form of transportation, the Tarahumara, several well known American runners organize a race down in the Copper Canyons of Mexico.  A fantastic read that will make you think you too can run for miles and miles.  While I continue to plod along, I shall allow this read to motivate me as I learn to run for the sake of my body and its abilities.


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Holi Easter Birthday

Good Friday was March 31, 1972 back on the day I was born.
Easter Sunday is March 31, 2013 my 41st birthday.
Easter and, as it turns out Holi, has always hovered around my birthday, gone off into April, then returned to hover.  This year it is an alignment that is encouraging me to spend time with my closest friends who have shown long term kindness and mutual consideration with a few fun but subdued gatherings.  I will chat with family long distance and enjoy their company further afield since none live in the same city.
Nothing crazy like last year.  Just a few sweet memorable moments.
Enjoy your weekend, whatever you do or do not celebrate.
Thanks for reading!

Crunch Time 2

Update on how thesis is going.
Well.  Quite well.
Then I had a colleague that came to the grad student office sick.
Sick people should stay home.
Then I got sick.  For a whole week.
I stayed home.  Still recovering.
Still managed to get some work done in front of my computer.  Productivity down however.
Will persevere.

A few years ago a good friend introduced me to this blog:

Crazy Aunt Purl

She is a hilarious blogger who is living a different sort of life than she had planned.  I read her blog in early January and she had decided not to make any New Year's resolutions.  Instead she was creating monthly goals that she wanted to try to achieve.  Well, some were daily, some weekly, and some monthly.  Purl even made herself a beautiful (and tacky in a fun way) Kindergarten version of a star chart on a piece of large clipboard paper.  Turns out it worked for her and she remembered her goals all month, plus she now has an almost fully decorated chart full of shiny, red, happy stars.

I am in.
I made my list.
I made it twice.
Here it is:

Daily Goals:

1.) 1 hour of exercise

2.) 5 servings of veg & fruit 

(called 5 A Day in the UK; picked this up while traveling)

3.) 3-4 hours of work on thesis

4.) to bed before 11 PM

Weekly Goals:

6.) 1 shopping/grocery trip

7.) 2 healthy dishes made

8.) do 1 large cleaning job

9.) 1 fun night out planned 

One of my awesome sisters (I have a few) made family calendars and every day I write down the number of the goals I achieved in the day's respective calendar box.  

You might wonder about the simplicity of some of these goals.  I am in grad school and basic self cleaning, eating and care takes a back seat to many other projects.  You've been there.  You know what it's like to wonder if you neeeeeed to shower one day, or if you haaaave to buy healthy food this week, because it takes time and that time could be used on one of those projects.  You've been there.  This is to keep me clean, healthy, happier, and keep my energy hustle level up to get my thesis done.  February went well.  Very well.  March has slowed down because I am sick.  Once I am over this, I am back.  Full force.  

If this is your thing, give it a try and let me know how it goes.

Thank you Purl!

The Scarlet Contessa

The Scarlet Contessa: A Novel of the Italian Renaissance by Jeanne Kalogridis
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Really like her books.  The covers make these look like romance novels but they are history lessons, stories of power and control, and reminders that women did play roles in history, we simply have lost their stories and creatively have to fill in the holes.  Great author.  Page turning books!


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Nutty Professor

This week has been strange.  Many things occurred but in all I am concerned I will never, ever, ever get a job.  Ever.  Let alone one I enjoy.  I expressed my concerns to a full-time instructor from my university, when I saw her at a conference, and she gave me some advice:

"Tonia, quit trying to look into the future and do what you need to do now.  Focus on finishing your thesis.  Become the typical nutty professor who has documents, papers, and pens all around, writing, reading, sleeping and writing more.  Give into this time period and really experience it for the next few months, then worry about the rest of it later.  Be in the moment, this moment."  

Tough advice for someone who is always looking into the future, who has student debt, and is anxious about the next few steps of life.  The more I think about her words, the more they are sinking in.  Listen to the people that have come before you and do what they say.  They know more than I and this is actually advice I have heard from several people on campus.  So I let go.  I focus.  I trust in those who know more than I, immersing myself in this experience.  The only way to enjoy the road and the destination.

What will that destination be?  Dang, still looking forward.  Need to go back to writing but I will be updating my Nutty Professor posts once in a while.  Bring on not showering for four days, wearing the same clothes day in day out, and ordering in food keeping my brain and body in top processing shape (maybe a little cooking would be better for the last one).

Nutty professor.  Here I come.  In costume?!?

Canada Reads! Yes We Do!

It is Canada Reads time!

Five more books to add to my reading list.

One or two are twenty years old; several new to literature.

I love Canada Reads, in particular the radio debate.

Keeping books and radio alive!

The contenders:

(Excuse the fuzzy books.  Read them anyway.)

Canadian Geographic Nod

We take a break during this regularly scheduled thesis writing time to make an important announcement.  About one month ago I was re-introduced to Instagram, one of the big 2012 website explosions.  This website is a photo sharing site on which those who post retain the rights to their own photos (unlike Facebook and others sites), can use quick filters to alter shots, and look at other people's creative talents.  I only have about 52 pictures up so far but I am finding a great place to post current pictures and past travel pictures that are sitting on my hard drive but deserve to be seen.  Here is my Instagram feed: toniavoyage (pics also on the right hand side of this blog).

Like all social media there are tricks and tips on how to increase traffic to your pictures and connect with other photographers.  By photographers, I mean people who actually take interesting shots with creative perspectives and interesting compositions, not people who take selfies (pictures of themselves) or food pics (just eat it, don't capture it every single day).  So I have been connecting with people, making comments, learning what hashtags connect with the type of people I am trying to connect with, etc.

This week I received a nod from a magazine that I look at on a regular basis and have a goal to be published in some day, Canadian Geographic, one of the premier photo magazines in Canada.  They liked the following picture that I took back in early December:

Art Books Architecture

The photo is a combination of a new art installation on campus near the University Centre, winter and architecture.  In the foreground on the left, the art installation includes old brown and black books encased in decorative plexiglass or plastic, suspended in a larger decorative rectangular prism also made from plexiglass.  The gold, dark yellow and brown leafing and designs set around the books and prism enhance the artwork's details and compliment the colours of the books.  The middle ground leads the eye down a lightly snowed on path, lined with planter boxes and trees, until the eye extends into the background, the Administration building enveloped in a sunset, the most iconic structure on campus.

This small but significant nod made my week.  Approximately 80 million photos are uploaded onto Instagram on a regular basis, and I was LIKED by Canadian Geographic.   Go me!

Back to thesis work I go.  More photography later!

Crunch Time

So it is crunch time for me and my thesis.  I have nine weeks to complete the document and can't afford to take any longer, not professionally, not financially, and not personally.  The number of participants I have is great, if I get a few more, then fantastic.  The data has been organized and now I will sit at a computer for nine weeks and try to find themes, relationships, patterns and create categories to organize all the information.  I hope this part goes well and I complete a thesis of which I am very proud.

Since I take on too much and stretch myself a bit thin, mostly because life is worth experiencing and living, I have had to remove everything from life that would be a distraction.  No work for my faculty, no favours available for friends, and some time away from other responsibilities so I can get this done.  It is interesting to me the number of people I have met in the past three years who have said they started a Master's degree but never finished.  Now I know why.  It is all on the individual in the end.  No one can make you do this work.  There are no due dates, they are self imposed.  You forgo an existence of participating in the world around you.  No one really cares as much as you about finishing.  It is not relevant to others if you have money or not to finish.  And in the end, you have to want to finish this document and move forward with your life.

Hence, I will not be blogging as much in next few months.  I have to save all my good thoughts, words and ideas for my thesis, as there are only so many that go around ;), so all 10 readers, bear with me.  And if you are travel blogger who has participated in this research, thank you, thank you, thank you.