The Evolution of Illumination

http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/the_evolution_of_illumination/

Daily Dialogue

Me: “Get out of your damn pajamas and go running!”

Me: “but its COLD and it SNOWED and when I get tired of running I will be improperly dressed for the weather and stranded.”

Me: “Ok, so don’t go running, just go outside with running clothes under your coat to make yourself feel sporty and energetic.”

INSERT HOURS OF PUTTERING AROUND APARTMENT MAKING BUSY NOISES.

Me: “okay, yes indeed, I think I can handle that.”

WALKS OUTSIDE INTO COLD SUNSHINE, PUTS ON SUNGLASSES AND IPOD (on shuffle), BEGINS WANDERING.

Me: “So, what about your dissertation project, aren’t you going to work on that today?”

Me: “Yeah, what aBOUT my project!”

STEVIE WONDER, SUPERSTITION COMES ON IPOD.

FADE OUT.

Idle Hands

This semester, by a twist of paperwork, I am not teaching. People tell me that this is wonderful. I can focus on my own

project and not worry about freshmen who dont know how to spell A-u-s-t-r-a-l-o-p-i-t-h-e-c-u-s. Most graduate students that I have found, hate to teach. They slide their heavy feet along and lament about taking the time to teach students who just don’t care. These graduate students have much more important work to attend to. Well, I have found, that I don’t.

I am feeling astonishingly useless as I sit around at the computer day after day and read and think and write and question. Its just about the most indulgent, selfish activity a human could engage in. Can you imagine another primate spending time on such an activity, that does not procure food or sex. I know, I know, humans have loftier intellectual goals than the basic need to sustain life. But it just feels wrong, for me anyway.

Amazingly enough, its just as self-indulgent and vain as being a true fine artist would have been. But then at least my art could have made someone happy. I doubt my dissertation will bring a smile to anyone’s face in quite the same way a painting might.

My work now is not emotionally cathartic, nor is it practical. At times, like these, its hard to justify doing it at all.

Today I met my husband for lunch. We sat across the table from three women who had on shockingly immense diamond rings and fur coats that looked like they had murdered a bear. The women were in beautiful cashmere sweaters talking about how they have applied to pre-schools for their children and are waiting to hear back. One woman complained incessantly about the nanny, who was no doubt home with her children as we sat there. Another woman scolded the waitress because her now empty plate had been sitting in front of her for a full 15 *gasp* minutes! They seemed cliché and bored.

I realized that I am in the same position as these women (sans the rings, coats, nannies and sweaters of course). But with all the wretched, lonely, despicable anxious parts of having nothing to do and none of the money to actually do something.

As things stand now, I would be better off working in a coffee or pizza shop. But I am afraid my patience and skill for those tasks would fall short of the average person. I know, self pity is always unbecoming.

This video about graduate students from the Simpsons is pretty accurate this week: click to view.

&

ampersand project

“ ”

And how about this quote for a Tuesday, late morning.

Someone reminded me that I referenced this quote once. I didn’t remember using it and suspect it wasn’t really me and that they were mistaken. I am happy to take the credit though:

“ No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”

—Eleanor Roosevelt

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ok, on an up note for Friday early evening, lets try this quote:

“life is not easy for any of us. but what of that? we must have perseverance and, above all, confidence in ourselves. we must believe that we are gifted for something and that this thing must be attained.” —Marie Curie

Undiscoveries

I began this post while sitting in the lab at school on Martin Luther King Day. No one was there. It was like a post-apocalyptic world. And because of some poorly developed plot circumstance, I thought I was the only survivor. Then the locksmith swiftly keyed into our lab and scared the shit out of me. I hid my facebook page, blogger page and the off-beat scientific publication on my screen and cowered with a quick beating heart. Sal didnt notice, a thing.

Which delivers me directly into the pulsing vein of my next point: Science is scary. If you are a non-scientist, the intricacies of the scientific world can seem mysterious, intimidating or insurmountable. And if you are a scientist, you know that science really truly requires deep intellectual risks that ignite unparalleled feelings of unease. Other people might describe this as the rush of discovery, I might too. But suffice it to say that science can at once be unbelievably wonderful and atrociously heart-wrenchingly terrible.

Science takes courage, creativity and sometimes brutal honesty to practice. One has to be sensitive, deeply pensive and yet dispassionately logical and critical. And not everyone is cut out to do this.

I listen to Obama talk about how we need children to excel more in math and science. and I notice a poster at school encouraging undergraduates to pursue math and science careers. But really, really do they know what they are getting themselves in to? and really, should we be encouraging more average people to pursue a career that requires such a bizarre combination of intense dedication, intelligence and persistence to excel in? Maybe its best that just a few nerdy boys in the back of the chemistry room take this on. Maybe its best that most of us keep our distance. Maybe its best for Science that pretty girls stick to being pretty, jocks continue being sporty and that most of us just look on in some kind of half-blind respect and delight at what those hard working mal-adjusted weirdos are accomplishing.