Expectations

I keep wanting to write about a lot of different things all in one post with some coherent theme. I have the word 'expectations' stuck in my head for some reason, but I am not really sure how this will bring everything together. Let's see how this goes.

An obvious place to start is with the Red Sox. I love them. They are currently playing what could be the last game of the World Series if they win. I am staying up for the whole game, which they are cruising through right now.

Running. I mentioned that I told my friend I would run a half marathon a year from now. He is running it next weekend. It is in Disney World, at night, and there is a big food and wine party at the finish line. I dislike running, but figure if I am going to do it, it might as well be at the happiest/most magical place on earth. Anyway. I looked up Disney's running training and realized that I do not have to actually run the whole race. This may seem obvious, but I guess that if I do something, I want to DO IT. You have to finish the race in 3 1/2 hours, and I could walk it in that, so I will finish. Now to figure out how fast I will be able to finish it. I have been running a couple of days a week to get in shape, but hope I can take advantage of the year to pull off a somewhat respectable time.

BIL guy and I hang out regularly. I guess I should stop saying they are "non-dates", but it still makes me feel more relaxed about it, and we have actually just been hanging out. He is a nice guy, we always have stuff to talk about, and I just upped my text plan because we text a lot.

There were a couple of Halloween events on campus this week. My department won the costume contests at each, as we went as an ecosystem. I was a deer (as in a primary consumer, a.k.a an herbivore). I was just going to put some antlers on a headband.

Then I decided I would whip up some fleece pants. It was an imperfect sewing project in which I just used a pair of fleece pants I love as a template.

The costume worked out pretty well though - I put a big white circle on my shirt today to round out the costume.

What else? My students have generally been great. (Which I forgot that I just wrote about, but it must be true if I wanted to write about it again.) It may not seem like a college professor would say this, but even at this age I feel like they are my 'kids'. I am sad that a couple of them in particular have dropped the course, but understand why. Others who are failing are driving me crazy because they are not trying enough. One who improved amazingly on her last exam gave me a hug. One who is really smart finally pulled off a passing exam score with a 90 (yay!) and then proceeded to not hand in a lab report. He is driving me crazy?!

I cooked up some squash tonight and decided to roast the delicata squash seeds with no particular expectations of them. They were DELICIOUS. I have not tried the squash yet.

Oh! I also went up to my parents' a few weeks ago. I show up after dark on a Friday night, and my mother informs me that "All the leaves have fallen off the trees already." I seriously went to bed sad thinking that I missed all of Vermont's foliage this year. Good thing my mom is crazy. Exhibit A:

I still cannot set up a key part of my lab, which is hugely frustrating but I know it will happen. The plus side is that I am definitely expected to do research and involve undergraduates (and I am looking forward to it), but teaching is what is REALLY important (and thus teaching in the lab). I have been trying to use my time wisely to plan for next semester and think about grant writing because the lab stuff is dragging out a bit.

I guess I also want to throw out there that I think I am happy. Well, I am happy. Considering my only post in August was about how my life sucked, this is a nice change. ;-) Other little things have happened that are not great, but they are fine. They are life. In August these little things would have been awful. I guess I had enough time to feel sorry for myself back then, and now I can roll with the punches. Keep it up, Life!

Absolutes

I am enjoying my students and teaching this semester. I have concerns about the level of the knowledge the students are expected to know (and an older faculty member who has been working on things other than teaching is getting concerned, too). I tend towards the idea that if you expect more of people, you will get more from people. The students who expect the course to be difficult are putting the most work in, and it pays off! Other students have ended up dropping the course.

In just a couple of months, I think I have a pretty good relationship with my students in general. I love that they will stop by and ask questions. One of them is serious about trying different things to get her grade up, including coming to my office to take a practice test.

Other students want you to answer every little question they have instead of looking it up, and it drives me crazy. One student in particular has quite a loud voice, and asks questions all the time. This student is smart, but has not quite figured out how to pass an exam in the course. This student asks the most straight forward questions, which is great except they are questions that are super easy to look up. We will see how he does on the next exam...

Regardless, I care about all of them. My first college class. :-)

The biggest intellectual challenge for me so far, though, is committing to an answer when I am not ENTIRELY, but only pretty, sure of the answer. I am used to confirming answers, looking up research, being sure of the answer. My students want that yes or no answer right away. But if I cannot be absolutely sure, I give a vague answer and go look it up later. I need to practice the art of giving an absolute answer, even if I am not absolutely sure.

A girl's gotta eat

I am trying to slowly get back in the habit of really cooking again. Yesterday I whipped up this pumpkin-kale lasagna, and it is pretty darn good. I used canned pumpkin and some sharp cheese instead of the provolone. Kale and pumpkin both have distinctive flavors, so I like the stronger cheese.

Problem solving

I generally like to solve problems. Your experiment is not working? Here are five ways you could figure out why. You screwed up the protocol? Well, to salvage something from the experiment, do this. An undergrad I worked with told me that when he was trying to figure something out, he would ask himself, "What would Jenski do?" When he did what he thought I would do, it always worked.

I can come up with solutions outside the lab too. For example, I can come up with an easy solution to the following dilemma:

So I was watching the Red Sox game with a Yankees fan, who also may be the BIL guy, out at a bar last night. Towards the end of the game, he says that we need to figure out a way to hang out and not have both of us need to drive afterwards (essentially so that we don't have to watch what we drink). He apparently debated about taking a cab to meet up with me, but would have felt bad drinking a bunch and me not be able to because I had to drive home.

I kept what might be one obvious solution to myself, although I guess I could suggest my staying in his second bedroom. A friend had a better unassuming solution that I ask my friend who lives in the city if I can stay at her place after going out with the dude...to which I added, I can always text her if I don't need her couch...

On being lonely

I have thought about this post for a long time, and apparently had pasted this link about loneliness and sickness into it at one point without writing anything else. In case you did not know, real loneliness is bad for your health. Although rereading the article is very interesting, it is not really the point I initially aimed to make, which is...

The realization that I have come to over the past year and a half that life in general is an isolating experience. Regardless of your experiences. Period.

In my own life, I finally (took out a student loan and) got my own apartment to finish up my PhD. People said how lucky I was to have my own place (true), but I got my kitty soon after unpacking for some company. I might say that people are lucky because they have found their life partner, and maybe have even started a family (true), but that comes with challenges and a dearth of 'me time' as well.

On one hand, I LOVE spending time with friends and family. My friends once joked that I am the 'glue' that often held us together. I will avoid a leadership position in hopes that someone else will do it, often to find myself annoyed with a lack of leaders and taking the helm and being successful at it. I am definitely an introvert. I LOVE being home alone so I can relax and rejuvenate. When my cat wants too much attention, I get annoyed. When I am lonely, I want to pet her and then she bites me. The funny thing is that my mother always said I was her cat what I was a kid: if she wanted to snuggle but I did not, I would not sit still and would have nothing of it. On the other hand, if I wanted to snuggle, she couldn't keep me out of her lap.

I could probably call out any of you readers and name a time I knew or can probably accurately guess that you were lonely, regardless of whether someone would look in on your life and guess that. We seek out others with similar experiences, and the internet makes this easier, and we become dear friends with people we never would have met otherwise. I always wonder if anyone can truly feel how you do, even if it seems their life journey is so eerily similar. Which is why I think compassion and empathy are critically important in general, and what makes a real friendship when two people have different paths in life.

Today, I was reminded of my singleness, and later in the day this reminded me of my periods of loneliness. I met with a financial advisor/accountant again and brought records of my limited finances. He commented on the fact that I am lucky my employer matches my retirement fund contributions at a slightly higher percentage than my required contributions. I joked that there has to be some benefit to the meager faculty salary! He filled out his profile form, confirming I am single. Then later in the form, asked to confirm that there was no partner in the periphery or hiding somewhere. Meaning what? That is right. I am doing it alone. I would like to buy a house in a couple of years. It is what it is. Tell me what to do with my money, dude, so I yet again prove I can do life by myself.

In other news of not being alone, when my cat was super sick a week and a half ago, and the vet suggested she was a few years older than I thought, I was already making plans to go adopt ASAP if she did not make it. I felt guilty for leaving her to go to church that Sunday, and probably prayed for something for myself for the first time in a very long time. I am also not going to lie that I am not much of a pray-er. But given her age and the fact that I do appreciate her company, I asked that when she gets sick or is actually going to die, that it is obvious to me/the vet and she does not suffer. She was better in a few days (with one more really bad day of horrible balance and no eating), and is back to normal for now! She even tried to bite me today.

I have also discovered that men resort to text conversations these days. I guess that is less intimidating than calling someone? I need to get myself a better text plan, though, if I plan to keep up this dating thing!

Right under my nose?

I spent time today with a friend I had not seen in years. We would email maybe once a year or so, but had not really kept in touch that well. She got married last spring and lives within an hour of me, so it was great to see her, meet her man, and hang out. We talked of relationships, as people will do. She was asking me about what happened with CF, who she didn't know much about, if you need an indication of how frequently we talked. She laughed that at least I was not dating the ex-ex.

She and her hubby have known each other for 10 years but only started dating a couple of years ago. They spent a lot of time "not liking" the other, before they found themselves at an event, she mentioned some other guy, and her now husband started making his move. So we were joking about maybe there is someone right. under. my. nose. A guy who has been there all along; who I am missing.

I cannot think of that guy though. Over the years, through grad school and my post doc, I have had some serious, but fleeting, crushes on various guy friends. A couple of whom if they ended up in my current city, well, look out boys. A friend from college and I have a fair amount in common, but I have sadly never had a crush on him (although I did promise to run a half marathon with him next November in Disney if he decides to do it again, and he's not the type to let me get out of it...who's in???). And just this week, because several people are leaving my church where RF is, I told him that I suppose he has to leave next, and he should move to my city! (We have an ongoing "competition" to see who can get more friends to move to their locale. I figure getting him to move here is the ultimate win. He did not go for it.)

The dude from the online dating thing and I have been out twice now. As with previous online dating experiences, I do not really need to make new friends with random people, that is what my job, possibly a new church I have been visiting, and maybe even my alumni club here, are for. I definitely have stronger feelings towards guys with whom I have been friends first, but I do not think I find him attractive enough to get to know him better to see if his attractiveness grows on me. Make sense?

I also hung out with someone who used to work at the same company as my BIL. I call it a non-date, because it was under the premise that we are both new to this place (although he went to college here), and are happy to meet new people. Non-dates are funny when it is with only two people who are attracted to the gender of the other person though. One beer turned into two, turned into bar trivia and hanging out for nearly 3 hours. We are hanging out again this week. He seems more like the kind of guy who would totally grow on me; I am much more comfortable hanging out with someone with whom I share a common person; and as I am sure Rapunzel would agree, pre-screened friends are always better. So yay for another non-date with BIL guy?

Also my cat is sick. Boo. She is perking up a bit, so I think the antibiotics and appetite stimulants are helping...