Warblings from my coffee cup

It is not without a certain amount of trepidation that I look ahead to the beginning of school. Living in a college town that is also a capitol city allows me to see and interact with a constantly shifting group of people (and drivers). I find that I would rather deal with the damn politicians.

I have been in an educational system for 30 years now, starting with montessori when I was 3. In that time I have learned to accept that I will be in an educational system for the rest of my life. Academia is a good place to be and I find that my own version of stability in life is quite happily met there. I am constantly surrounded by thinking people who are also doing what they love to do. It is a heady mix and one that I am loathe to be without.

Having said that: I detest college students. I hate them with a passion that is usually reserved for child molesters and batterers. It's not healthy, and I keep finding amazing peolpe on campus and in the field who totally blast my impressions of whatever class of undergrads or graduate students I may have developed. My illusions get built up, and then they come back to town. Droves of clones looking to get their degrees just to get a better job, generally not even in the field they happen to be studying, who don't pay attention in class, never get passionate about anything while they are sober and who speak of nothing but inanities outside of the classroom, and frequently in the classroom. The romantic ideal of roundtable discussion and socratic method is not an ideal, it is a reality in many worlds and many schools and many classrooms. It is wonderful to be a part of a group of people who are actively engaged in whatever discussion is at hand, even if it devolves into a mass condmenation of any movie with colin farrell in it. It is wonderful to see and hear people's minds change, to feel my own mind change, and to be actively dynamic.

So it hurts my heart when women and men on campus walk around seeming to care more about how they look and how little work they have to do in order to just pass and get out than they do about taking advantage of the environment in which tye find themselves, and not just to further social expectations of marriage and job. I hear stories of women saying that they don't agree with feminism because women shouldn't be expected to think for themselves. I see athletes lugging their beaten bodies around with students who are paid to do their homework and make sure that it gets turned in on time. Leaving class is a parade of flipping cell phones and declarations that class is boring and all anyone can wait to do is get to the bar or the movies or the pool or the tanning booth. Even the nerds are getting in on this! At the coffee house downtown, the only people who actually study are the ones who have a test tomorrow or graduate students.

And don't even get me started on the bar scene. I go to bars where the student population is very very low. I'm older than they are, I can get away with it.

My complaints are not new. People have been lambasting the younger generation for eons. It is not the younger generation that I have such problems with: it is the generations of people who are running around not thinking for themselves and not being actively involved in their own lives. These students are frustrating, not just because I don't understand their need to hypersexualize themselves, but also because they don't seem to have a concept of personal responsiblity. They have parents who will call the departmental offices if their child has a simple question. The number of parents who call for their children has grown depressingly in the last four years. I have done some data collection on this, as I used to work in an academic office, and I've asked people what their impressions are. The number of professors who are being relegated to the role of comedian or entertainer without being able to feel like they have imparted anything of substance is getting ridiculous to me.

There is a counter to all of this, of course. Professors and students who see this problem of mediocrity and are responding, as they always have, with an increased level of creativity and activity. Classes on the literature of science, independent reading courses that grow out of discussions in class because there are so many people interested that there just isn't enough time without it, research oppurtunities that involve undergrads in the work of their professors and in the application of the all of the memorized info and theories, the list goes on. I only hope to be a positive addition to that world, instead of feeling like every time I walk onto campus I am going to be assaulted by waves of apathy and hair product.

On a lighter note, I think I'm going to have go into geography. I'll start with History and then go to Archaeology, but I suspect that my research, which is becoming more and more urban oriented, will, in fact, lead me to my father's old office where I will be ensconced, quite happily, for the rest of my life.

back into the womb

or back out of it, whichever. i can't quite decide this morning. birth is tiring and messy and kind of smelly. my home is kind of the same way right now. been gone for ten days. felt like much longer - combination of working and being in beautiful country and having much done - much more mental space to interact with the world around me without having the constant filter of 'must get something done' in front of me.

to explain further: i am going into hiding, sort of. i have taken some time away from regular job and regular relationship responsibilities and am focusing on my home and my creative outlets so as to create a life that is the one that i want, truly and fully. i have writing to do, a desk at which to do it, a chalkboard at which to line it out or draw it out or whatever and many many ideas which need to be written down and rejected or fleshed out. i have yarn and knitting needles and crochet hooks and many projects in mind. i have a job, perhaps, making stained glass windows again, only this time, it's on my schedule (albeit with deadlines) instead of someone else's. i am thinking of working on a set of designs for glass insects - flies and bees and dragonflies and damselflies and butterflies and such. perhaps i will also work on designs for some of the native plants in the sandhills that i find beautiful and ingtriguing also. the colors will be more difficult to match and the customers for such work more difficult to find, but i would like to do the work of it.

right now, however, i have a home that is stinky. just plain sitnky. it is one of those unidentifiable stinks that is the result of the combination of cats, litter, laundry, dishes, chicken grease and very very high humidity both inside and out. oh, and we smoke indoors. the vacuum helps considerably, but i think the house has only been vacuumed once in the last ten days, so i must do that today. i have sage with which to smoke my room (the dumpster for our building is right outside my west window) which, in combination with doing the laundry, changing the sheets and vacuuming, should return it to a state that is acceptable and even enjoyable to me.

i tire of being social already, and i have only been home for 20 hours. it is a short time. i have only four days and most of that time will be spent doing things that i enjoy and that i know will lead to better things later on in the week.

oh, and myspace is being stupid on my computer, which is why i am spouting off here as opposed to there, which is, i think, slightly better equipped for personal rants than this one was intended to be, but i haven't been here in a while, so maybe it's a good thing to get back in practice, no?

slowly but surely, the world falls together with smiles and a happy sense of predictability. just a mess right now, and i kind of want sugar and much more sleep. only i have slept enough. it is time to wake up.