This Is Nothing

Insane Graduate School Edition

3/16/2009

Aaaaand BREAK!

Whoah, it’s spring break? When did that happen?

My first clue was that my building was devoid of undergrads claiming every square foot of table space with laptops and papers spread out “just so.” Then I noticed the buses were less crowded. There was even less traffic? Yep, it’s Spring Break already. For grad students like myself, this is really all it means: fewer undergrads. Like me, most grad students aren’t even changing their work pattern, let alone going anywhere fun. But as sad as that is, it’s still a sort of vacation from all the undergraduate-related crowding, noise, and mess.

It’s also a slight bellydance break for me, which is actually good. I think I’ve taken on one too many dance activities this semester, and with extra show practices it was getting a bit crazy. Lots of sore muscles and exhausted 10PM’s for me. But I DO have some pretty nice upper body muscley-ness going on, which is fun, and rare.

The weather is actually warm right now, so Andy and I took walks on Saturday and Sunday around the neighborhood, scoping out houses, dogs, etc. I had to joke that this was our way of affirming ourselves as more than just lab rats. See? We could go outside in the daylight! I like our walks together, because we talk about our lives together and generally catch up on our current state. And I love picking out houses we like, paint colors, landscaping . . . even though we likely can’t afford any of it.

There’s plenty of big stuff to look forward to in the months ahead. Highest on my list is Andy defending his thesis at the end of May. I’m sure it’s more terrifying to him than it is to me, but I’m still kindof breathless about it. “You’ll be FREE” I keep telling him. I’m oh-so-jealous. But in the meantime I realize he’s going to need lots of support and patience, so I’m hoping to get myself in order to be the less-stressed one. That’s how it works best, when we take turns being stressed. Ironically, I’ll probably actually be very stressed but oh well.

The Spring UW Bellydance show is coming up, so that will be awesome and all-consuming until it’s done, and then it will be a little sad. I’ll go through dance withdrawl all over again. Of course, there’s still plenty of stuff going on in the dance community, and I need to remember that I hope to graduate from studio class level 2B to 3: a big step up in challenge and intensity!

Career exploration has been one big push to get some contacts for information interviewing, and now I need to push myself again to actually meet with these wonderful people. I need to figure out if this career I’m thinking about A) Is what I think it is, and B) Is something I could actually get into after graduating. Once I figure that out, and assuming all looks good, I’ll need to choose a date to finish and just push through all this work I have ahead of me. “Just”. Hah!

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