references

I have applied to five grad schools in the united states. It is proving to be a frustrating experience, predominantly because of the difficulty of extracting references from professors. It's not that they haven't written them, or are unwilling to do so, but rather that several universities require that the letters do not pass through my hands, but are submitted directly by referees. That is where the difficulty lies. For starters, several of my referees are utterly computer illiterate, and unable to navigate the online submission processes. And all of them are rushed off their feet, and not able to get letters sent by mail out. I am getting desparate. I don't want to seem like a whiney, conceited student who thinks her issues are more important that the myriad issues of running a music department, but I also don't want my opportunities jeapordized.
On the other hand, I have had some letters submitted almost immediately they were requested, and two that I have read are lovely.
So wish me her luck. Grad-school, here I come (God willing).

Blogging and Presence Online

Blogging and Presence Online I think I may have blogged this before, but I'll link to it here, and check later, when I am on a cheaper internet connection. The Cell-phone bill is getting too big to handle!

Scholars Who Blog

Scholars Who Blog
So I'm getting back to work at last, and broaching issues for my blogging article again. this is the first in a list of several links I have just stumbled across.

blessing in disguise?!?

I was stung by a bee a few days ago. My dear mother was hopping mad, blaming anyone in range. I read somewhere, though, that in ancient folk-lore, a bee sting was considered a blessing. I try to remember that, and the sacrifice of the little creatures life, when I tend to the hot, angry itching flesh on my shin. Surely there is a lesson in that somewhere, though I can't for the life of me imagine what it is.

UPDATE
This link had some interesting/though-provoking commentary about the potential blessing of bee-stings.

commentary.

I have been struggling to blog. I have been struggling to write anything. It may have been related to burnout, a sheer exhaustion brought on by hard work and a sense of unfulfillable responsibilities. Whatever the cause, I have been taking a break, and, nearly a month on, I am finally beginning to recover. I have been avoiding work, and mental effort of all kinds, in favour of becoming reaquainted with myself, an activity desparately needed, considering all that has transpired in the past six years or so.
Over teh last few weeks, I have also been reading, for my own pleasure, rather than work, a trillogy of memoires by Carol Drinkwater, an actress and whiter whose enigmatic half-smile has always entranced me. Her writing about self-discovery, aquisition, loss, heartache and stoic endurance, recovery, rebirth and creativity appeal to me. In particular, she writes in the second book about coming to terms with childlessness, the black void of mourning, and emotional recovery, a subject colse ot my naively maternal heart.
Someone told me years ago never to declare oneself incapable of anything. "If one human being is capable of it," she said "so is every other." There, but for the grace of God.... I wish I had recalled that when I declared myself "not the depressive type." I went through a very angry phase as a teenager, partly precipitated by a spate of depression afflicting several people close to me, a mallady which terrified me in the depth and brutality of its effect. But my eternal belief in human ability to master emotion helped me avoid a similar fate myself, and for a really long time, I was undeniably happy.
It hit me around April last year. Elizabeth Wurtzel, author of Prozac Nation describes the onset and remission of depression as "little by little, then all at once." It's like swimming in a pool on a river, when an unexpected current catches hold of you, and pulls you over a rapid. All at once, you're out of your depth, floundering, turned this way and that by a force with no apparent source, nothing to fight against. And then, just when you think you'll black out from lack of oxygen, it throws you over another rapid, and you land on the pebbled bottom of a shallow puddle. The fall hurts, but at least you cdan lift yourself out.
I don't know what triggered it in my case; changes in my body over which I had little control, 'chemical imballances', the end of a life phase, and a period of uncertainty, the concurrent end of a relationship I never quite mastered, a not-quite love affair that haunts me with its possibilities, deceptively fragile blue eyes and a musical voice, stormy weather, a personal loss i never managed to mourn. Whatever it was, I am gradually moving on. So why do I post this to an academic blog? because I hope it may be useful to others in my position, perhaps, or just because I am seeking to understand it as I do my work. Perhaps its just about making excuses. Either way, I'll have to decide whether this post stays or not. For now, it can languish.

see jane in the academy: on doing the happy dance.

see jane in the academy: on doing the happy dance. This is certainly worth considering. The author of this post points out that celebrating one's successes is as important as doing the work in the first place. She was taught this by an individual she refers to as mentorprof. Funny thing is, my own personal mentorprof is unbelievably self-deprecating and shy about her achievements. Of course I think she's amazing, but I'm not quite as biased as she seems to think I am, because others think the same. She won't let me blog her latest triumph officially, so I can't post any details, but suffice it to say that this is me doing my happy dance on her behalf.
The author of the post linked to, and I, are really lucky. We have a resource many never find in people who believe in us enough to devote the time to us it takes to make these things we call careers, happen. mentorprofs, I salute you, and will strive to honour your contribution to my life, by doing the same for others.

Boys Choir of Harlem Vows That Eviction Will Not Be Its Finale - New York Times

Boys Choir of Harlem Vows That Eviction Will Not Be Its Finale - New York Times This is tragic! good luck to the choir. I really hope they get through this one.