The Procrastinatory Minute: Newlywed Marriage Advice Edition

The healthy married couple handles conflict without either person feeling that the other is fundamentally rejecting the essence of who he or she is.

— L.L. Etnach

Back at It

If I can just ______, then I'll finally feel like _______.

If I could have a dime for each time the filling-in-the-blanks with any phrasal combination of my brain's choosing was NOT true...

It really seems like it would be true, like, when you finally attain that thing, you just know you're going to feel this certain way.  Well, let me qualify it, maybe it's true that you will feel a certain way, but the feeling never lasts.

If I had considered this when I was say, in my early to mid twenties, I would have thought that idea was depressing.  But now, it's kind of liberating.  Like, the realization that you cannot depend on any earthly event, accomplishment or situation to indefinitely "make you happy" lessens the insane pressure that comes with essentially worshiping the destination and forces you soak in the journey.

Enough philosophizing.  The current fill-in-the-blank combination which has once again proven itself untrue is "If I can just finish this last chapter, then I'll finally feel like I can breathe."

I mean, it felt amazing finally turning it in, but now the reality of the remainder of hard work that still lies ahead is sinking in.  Right now, I'm revising my very first analysis chapter per my adviser's comments.  While I'm thankful that my first draft was "solid" according to her, no red flags or fundamental unsoundness of my analysis were detected, most of my revisions are more complicated than rewording or moving around a sentence or two.  More like "reframing" entire sections, adding several bits of critical/theoretical support...tasks that aren't herculean, necessarily, but that can be time-consuming.  No quick fixes.  And I still have the introduction to contend with.  It's going to be a reworking of my prospectus, so at least I'm not starting from scratch.  But the intro is a pretty big deal, so it's not like I can just throw it together and dust off my hands.  The only thing I will concede is not a huge deal is the conclusion.  So, anyway, I'm back at it.

There is small cause for celebration, however, and it is that I won a Summer Doctoral Research Fellowship.  I'm praising the Lord because this will definitely make our lives easier before our big move.  P scored a summer class (which is not in danger of being cancelled, it's an online class and those fill up pretty quickly) and combined with my fellowship, we'll be good.  My sweet guy got me one of my yummy favorites, a strawberry shortcake, in honor of my accomplishment.  Yay!

I still have my work cut out for me, but it's all coming together and I have a lot to be grateful for.

Lemme tell you somn bout DIS gul

Ey, you heard bout dis gul?

Maaaaann, lemme tell you somn bout DIS gul, yo.

Yooooo, I heard she had finished some last chapter of analysis or somn like dat.

Yup.  Mmmhmm.  She was ackin all crazy and stuff cuz of some dissertation or somn, right?

Den she turn around and finally finish a draft of her last analysis chapter.

Sent it in to her adviser an errthang, fam!

Yeah, so I had heard that all she got to do now is start workin on dem revisions and stuff.

Den she gonna be writin a introduction and stuff.

Yeah, den she gon submit a super revised version with a conclusion and stuff.

Yup, yup.  I know, right?  Junk crazy, right?

Talmbout a defense date July 20.

Maaaaan, that's crazy, tho, right?

I had heard she had been workin and writin this thing for bout two years or somn and now she almost done, tho!

Daaaaang, man, that's crazy.  For real.

"Trying"

So many things don't make sense until you're staring it in the face.

I know I can be an annoying know-it-all.  A control freak who won't even let my husband cut a homemade pizza fresh out of the oven with a pizza cutter because I don't like the way he does it.  The way he does it pushes all the cheese and toppings out of place.  There's a certain way to do it to avoid that...here, just let me do it.  It's this idea that you know how things should be.  How things should be done.  What is "proper."  When I think about this personal quality, it annoys even me.  At least I'm self-aware.  But what I'm learning is that what's in your head of how things "should be" loses all credence in the face of what is.

I can also be kind of a prude.  Even after I got married, whenever couples would talk about "trying" to have a baby, I was just kind of weirded out by that whole terminology.  I often had to try to suppress unseemly images my creative brain would conjure up of said couple struggling, wincing, exerting effort, wiping sweat from their brows as they "tried."  Eww.  That's not the way I would talk about wanting to have a baby, I would think.

Maybe it has to do with the word "trying."  Normally it's associated with something precarious and difficult.  Like, something that takes extra physical exertion and mental skill.  I don't associate the connotations of "trying" with doing what it takes to conceive a child.  I mean, really?  It's not that complicated.  And I'd rather not picture people I'm casually having a conversation with "trying."  lol.  Like I said, I can be kind of a prude.

But...(there's always a but), now that the reality of planning to start a family is staring me in the face, I finally see the light.  "Trying" is kind of the only appropriate way to describe that particular circumstance.  I mean, we're all adults here, there are things that you do or don't do to prevent things from happening, and there are things that you start doing or stop doing to allow things to happen.  The most concise way to describe the process of allowing things to happen is "trying." 

I know, it seems like common sense, and of course I knew that people weren't really talking about the act of "trying" but more about their decision to be purposeful about conceiving, but still, it really didn't completely click for me until we began to think seriously about starting our own family.  Not too long ago, I began answering people's inquiries about our future family plans with "We're planning to start trying this fall."  Oh. em. gee.  Did I just use "trying" in the gross, conjuring of undesirable mental images sense?

I'm not a special snowflake.  I don't have a more "proper" sense of terminology or of anything else.  We're just like the millions of other couples in the world deciding when to start "trying" to have a baby.

I wonder if that's a part of what being a mother is like.  What I mean is, if part of being a mother is simply observing your child come to these universal conclusions.

Dear Anthony,

You were one of the ones who got on my last nerve, I swear.  One of the reasons I left that miserable job.  Yeah, that job.  The one that sucked the life out of me and turned me into someone I never want to be ever again in my life.  The one where I lost a bunch of weight, made a few messed up life decisions and quit in the middle of the year.

But back to you, Anthony.  You were a part of my worst class, 5th period. The class I had to take to and from lunch.  The class who stupidly brought little roasted potatoes back from lunch and treated me to an in-class food fight.  You were obnoxious, always finding an excuse to get up out of your seat, go to the bathroom, do anything but your work.  You were always getting into it with the other kids, although I know it wasn't always you.  I know, some of them would make fun of you and provoke you.  The truth is, even though I often viewed you as a "problem student," I knew that at heart you were a good kid.

One thing my brain keeps going back to concerning you is the time someone messed up your food at lunch.  I don't remember exactly what it was they did...like poured milk in it or something to make it inedible.  You got SO mad.  Oh, my God.  You nearly got into a fight with the kid over it and afterward, I remember us standing there in front of my classroom door, you still super heated over the whole thing, and me, talking to you to try to calm you down.  You were so upset, you started tearing up.  "That was my FOOD, man!" you kept repeating.  Suddenly, it hit me, and I felt ashamed.  The reason you were so upset, tears welling up in your eyes because some stupid kid poured milk in your lunch was because having lunch at school was probably the only time you got substantial food during the day.

Another thing surprised me.  When I finally announced that I was leaving, you were one of the most vocal ones crying out in protest.  "Pleeeeeassse don't leave, Miss Smith.  I'll change my ways, I'll be good in class, on God, if you just pleeeease don't leave us."  I remember cynically thinking, really?  Now you want to change your tune after putting me through hell?  I couldn't believe that you, of all people, were begging me to stay.  It was slightly amusing.

Anthony, I couldn't believe it when I got on Facebook yesterday and saw some of my former students, your former classmates, posting R.I.P messages about you. (Yes, some of them wanted to be my Facebook friend after I left, and I figured why not.)  I immediately messaged one of my most dependable students from that time and asked what had happened.  She told me that you were shot and killed the other night while playing dice with a group of others.  She didn't give me all the details, but I can fill in the blanks.  Some argument probably arose between you...I'm guessing money was probably at stake.

What a senseless killing.  What a senseless death.  I'm sorry, Anthony.  I'm sorry for you and your family and for all the people affected by losing you.

I thought about you for a long time yesterday.  I wondered if maybe I should have stuck with that miserable job until the end of the year.  I had the chance to affect your life in some way, but I was too demoralized, cynical and burnt out to think about anybody but myself.  I really hated where I was in my life during that time, but I'm really trying to learn that it's not always about me.  For what it's worth, I will always remember you.

Your former Spanish teacher,

Miss Señorita Smith

The Procrastinatory Minute: Music Edition

Another late night library date with my man.  Poor guy has been burning the midnight oil a lot lately.  It's his last semester of coursework.  The least I can do is drag my lazy carcass to the library with him to get a little more of my you-know-what written.

But what am I doing?  Regaling my readers with random songs I have to listen to.  You know how a random song pops up in your life and seizes you and then you have to keep listening to it and it keeps hitting you in the feels and you can't let it go until you've run it into the ground?  I hate the weird, cornball stuff I end up liking.  I really do.  It's embarrassing.  

#1.  "Dearly Departed" by Shakey Graves.  Just the name of the artist is so stupid.  But I was having a solitary lunch in this place downtown which specializes in pot pies and it came on the radio.  And it got its stupid catchy clutches into my brain.

#2. "Underneath" by Hanson.  I was reminiscing about the 90s with my husband and we started playing Hanson youTube videos and laughing.  But that little 90s reminiscence inspired me to add Hanson to my Pandora playlist.  And then I heard a Hanson song I'd never heard before that hit me DEEP in the feels.



#3. "Show Up" by John P. Kee.  You know I got that Contemporary Gospel box checked on Pandora, tho.  And when any John P. Kee song, but this one in particular, comes on, I'm in the kitchen with my mom on Sunday morning and I feel a warm blanket of home wrap around me.  Like someone put a big plate of some good food in front of me.  Like a black prayer warrior grandma just enveloped me in her ample bosom and she just bound the enemy and loosed every blessing in my life.  This is like the best dissertation writing song.  I have to listen to this on repeat sometimes.



 Sigh...let me try to type a few more lines...

Like a Wedding

Me and Lucía during the Q&A after the reading

That's how I would describe my latest feat of academic significance, organizing a campus visit with the author of one of the novels I analyzed in a chapter of my dissertation, Lucía Charún-Illescas.  I was pretty pleased with how everything turned out, and it was such a rare opportunity to meet her and expose students and colleagues to information about the black presence in Peru.

Anyway, there was so much planning: getting sponsorship, dealing with paperwork and rules and coordinating dates, making sure the bookstore would be there with copies of the book...and then during the visit: going to and from the airport to pick up the guest, running around to pick up food and supplies, making sure everything was in place.

And then, just like that, it was over.  Like I said, like a wedding.  All of this planning and agonizing over it, and then when it happens, everything's a blur and it's over.

All in all, it was well worth it, and I hope to stay in touch with Lucía in the future.  And now, back to writing my you-know-what.  I think I'm finally starting to see a tiny light at the end of this long tunnel.  And I have a defense date set: July 18.  Almost there...almost there.

Thirty-four

Wednesday was my birthday.  Since I am currently still off of the Face of the Book, I didn't get the annual perky, cute, heart-warming Happy Birthday messages plastered all over my wall.  It was my self-inflicted punishment for working slow as heck on my dissertation.  Oh, you don't want to finish this chapter?  No FB birthday messages for you, slacker.

Nevertheless, my big day was a sweet and lovely day in no small part due to my sweet and lovely handsome hunk of a man. I woke up to several cute and cozy small gifts with a lavender birthday card.  After wishing me happy birthday, he admitted sheepishly, "I didn't know what to get you."  I just cried, overwhelmed by his sweetness and sincere desire to please me.  I loved every single thing. He was also determined to make me a birthday cake, and, by George, he pulled it off.  Chocolate on chocolate with sprinkles and pink gel writing out "Feliz cumple Channy."  My husband bakes cakes, people.  And yes, he put 34 whole candles on that sucker and did light them and I did blow them out. (Not before I made a wish!)  He really helped me have a special day.

How did I get to be 34? When I turned 31, I called it my "Baskin Robbins birthday" (31 flavors, har har).  When I turned 32, I called it my "Magic Johnson birthday" (his jersey number).  When I turned 33, I jokingly called it my "age-Jesus-was-when-he-was-crucified birthday."  But now?  It's the last-year-before-my-fertility-takes-a-nose-dive birthday.

I know, I know.  I need to stop reading statistics online.  There's something to be said for educating yourself, but there comes a point where it becomes obsessive, and that's no fun.  To be frank, just my existence defies all kinds of statistics. The fact that I was raised in a two-parent black home with parents who never divorced. The fact that I spent my childhood in Italy.  The fact that I'm a college-educated, married black woman (the stats are brutal, y'all), married to a white man, at that.  The fact that I'm about to finish a PhD program.  The fact that I'm trilingual (more or less). I could go on...Can I just accept the fact that I defy stereotypes, statistics, norms, whatever and live with it?  If the statistics have often not applied to me with everything else, why would they now?

Things will happen when they happen.  The present is a gift.  I should celebrate it and take care of what I can today.  Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself.