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DearRockers Helps Ease Downloader’s Guilt

Vancouver techy Darren Barefoot has a new project in the works at www.DearRockers.org. From the website:

Many of us own music that we didn’t pay for. We don’t feel guilty about shafting the record company, but what about the musicans themselves?

Dear Rockers is host to the letters people write and send to the artists whose music has inspired, touched, supported, calmed, energized — all the things that music does for us. Read more

A Reading Problem

I was going to start daily blogging of insurmountable problems. But it turned out to be impossible.

(see? I have a sense of humour!)

The latest struggle: staying awake. I’ve always had trouble staying awake. As a babysitter I had to work hard to stay awake until the kids were asleep. Usually the parents woke me up when they got home. At my own pyjama party I was the first one asleep. Dating? /sigh/ Pumpkin time was early.

Now the problem is mostly because I have So Much Reading to do for school. It doesn’t matter if I try reading first thing in the morning, in the afternoon, or after I put the kids to bed. It doesn’t matter if I’m at my desk, at the kitchen table, or on the couch. Within a few pages my eyes are heavy and next thing I know I’m waking up.

I have to allot several sessions to get a reading done because I know I will not be able to stay awake through a sitting.

It doesn’t matter if I drink coffee. I can fall asleep drinking a cup of coffee. I can put on music, sit outside, even read at the university. Anywhere, anytime — I’m asleep. And once I’m out there’s no bringing me back.

I’d appreciate any tips for staying awake or how to read while sleeping so I can get through this “chapter” of my life. (egads! more humour!)

Magic Birthdays

On a magic birthday your wish gets extra power points. My kid deserves it — he’s sick home from school for the third day in a row.

Just think: to be turning seven on the seventh day of the month in the seventh year of the century? It doesn’t get much cooler than this!

image (CC) by Mermaniac

History and Sexism

It could just be a coincidence.

This semester I run two of ten tutorials for a very large first-year world history class that covers the years 1914-1945. There is an acknowledged Western perspective.

Last week there was one lecture (50 minutes) assigned to the topic “Women in the 20th Century.” This had been rubbing me since the beginning of the semester when I first got the syllabus. I had heard of the “add women & stir” approach to women’s history but had never seen it so boldly in action. This week the students read the first (and only) readings for the course written by women.

Message here:

• women only write about women
• women don’t write about the world in the 20th century

But that wasn’t where it ended. The prof wrote to the assistants a day before labs to say that covering only a few of the discussion questions would be adequate and mainly to concentrate on returning student papers and exams.

Message here:

• it is okay to dismiss the small bit of women’s history/feminist history included in the course
• what women say isn’t important — what women say isn’t as important as what men say
• women are not a significant part of 20th century history

Of course this is nothing new. History (patriarchy for that matter) is full of dismissing women’s thoughts, writings, and activities. I know I was sheltered living for four years inside of Women’s Studies, thinking that as I was opening my eyes to it so was the rest of the world. Since moving to the discipline of History I am frequently reminded why we still need women’s history.

Until women’s history is integrated in the survey course there is no equality.

Facebook Names and Privacy Concerns

So there’s this new application out there — you may have heard about it — it’s called “The Facebook.”

I jumped on briefly when Rob was doing some developing and wanted me to do some testing with him. I know people who are deeply involved with their Facebook accounts but I didn’t really think of it as “my sort of thing” so set up my profile using just my first name and initial. I was also troubled by the privacy issues connected with Facebook.

Go figure that people I know in real life found me and friended me there and this weekend the circle grew again. Read more

Time for a schedule, time for a list

Life will be okay even if it’s not how I’d imagined. I keep telling myself this and focusing on the wonderful things in my life — and there truly are many of these.

But I’m bogged down by the unfinished, the overwhelming, the physical and mental clutter surrounding me. It’s time to make a plan to manage these things. Life is always going to be chaos — such is life with kids, blended families, and an insane ex. I cannot prevent things from being overturned again and again in front of and underneath me. All I can do is find some peace in my life so that when bad stuff goes down I have a store of energy I can draw from.

So I’ve decided to make a list of the things that are costing me energy/giving me grief. These are the things that run through my mind at least once a day and I think, “yeah, I should do something about that.”

So… where to start?

I figure my life has three major categories that make me anxious: school, family, and housework. Each of these has subcategories and of course there’s plenty of overlap. If I can feel caught up (or ahead even) in one area it spills into the others and I feel good. Of course, if I put “me” up there as a category it might help me feel good more often. (:wink:) But then that’s never been my strong point. One goal of this exercise is to figure out where the self care is going to fit in.

So looking at each category there are things that have needed doing for a long time and things that require attention on a regular basis.

School:

• papers for school – 6 this semester that I need to do
• a research topic for this semester’s directed study
• figure out what the heck I’m going to do after the MA
• small things related to my major research project

If I can get all these things done I’ll feel much better about where I sit in terms of school work. It actually doesn’t look so bad now.

Family:
I’m actually feeling pretty good about this today. It’s birthday time and I’m keeping up pretty well with that. One kid had a great party two weeks ago and another one is coming up in two weeks. Trick-or-treating last night went well and I think we might be through with daughter bombshells for the moment. Rob is good and we seem to have settled down from the move. We’ve got some routines going and things are getting a bit easier. That said, there are still things that should be better organized:

• a plan to make school mornings easier
• sharing responsibilities
• time for doing fun things in the community like hikes in the park or trips to the pool

No really clear answers pop out on these. Hmmm. At least now I know what I need to think about.

Housework:
This is where I’m overwhelmed. There are so many loose ends from the move. Construction isn’t done yet. Stuff from my house is in a big pile in the middle of the basement. The kids need help organizing their rooms. Our bedroom is full of boxes of stuff. My office space is disorganized. Rob’s office space is brimming and he still has lots of his stuff spread out around the house.

I hate living in the clutter. When I moved this summer I threw so much stuff in the trash — I lined the curb again and again with garbage bags. How can I still have so much stuff that passed the cut? I know I have to go through it again and get rid of more…but it takes a lot of time. And I can only do it with my own stuff. Eventually my stuff will be under control but will it be enough? My kids have too many toys and clothes they don’t wear but we don’t have enough time to get to it. And Rob and his daughter are pack rats. I grew up passing toys and outgrown clothes to shelters. My parents live in a very tidy home partly because they’re both really good at cleaning but also because they keep the contents down and are always cutting back. Clothes that aren’t worn get passed on. Books that are old are passed on. Dishes that don’t stack well or are a pain to clean or take up too much space are passed on. If it’s not in use and/or adding to joy in the house, and is not likely to be in use again soon it goes.

My old place was a mess of clutter. I know it. It was small and had stuff from way to many ages and stages (baby stuff to teenager stuff, sewing supplies from when I used to sew for a living, ballet stuff from when I taught, school stuff that I still use, and activist materials from every cause I’ve ever been involved in). Everything was important. But this big move prompted a huge purge. It was a chance for me to start fresh. And Rob’s house is so nice. I want it to stay that way.

I know with my collecting of important papers (which I go through later and usually end up tossing) and Rob’s attachment to anything that enters the house, we’re in grave danger of living in a fire trap. And I know that the daily cleaning is going to get harder still if we keep on this way.

So, in list form here’s what I need:

• clear out the clutter from living spaces
• create a routine for the regular chores like cleaning the bathroom, vacuuming, dusting
• a menu plan so that I don’t have to go to the grocery store 3 times in a week like I did this week
• a special bonus would be to hang some pictures, paint, and any other types of personalizing the space so that it’s clear that “special people live here.”
• dividing some of this up so that each person has something they’re in charge of. Asking someone to do something is like setting up for battle sometimes. If it were automatic I’d have a lot of energy left over.

It’s a lot harder doing these things here, in the new house, all blended-family-style, than it was in my own house, on my own, with my own kids. I’m hoping that it will get easier with time. For one thing my house was a lot smaller. Another was that my house was in rough shape so anything I did made an improvement. Here I feel responsible for keeping the house in good condition. There are a lot more people here now (me and my kids) and things can go downhill pretty quickly if they’re not looked after. Things are further complicated by the kids’ different and complicated schedules. Every-other-weekend-ness (for my kids) and skating-gymnastics-piano-piles o’ homework (Rob’s kid) doesn’t make it easy to divide responsibilities. And the fact that Rob and I have different expectations re: bedmaking, clean bedrooms, helping etc. turns into a chorus of “why do I/we have to if she/they don’t have to?” Rather than pushing the issue I tend to just do as much as I can. Since it’s my issue.

So right. If I can look back at the list and see the things that are under my control I can do something about them. It’s a good place to start at least. And who knows, maybe the rest of the family can make lists of what they’d like to take care of and we can all help each other. It could happen!

Looking For: Traditional Wife

The System is not made for me. Graduate students are not supposed to have families to care for, houses to clean, meals to prepare and clean up, or groceries to buy. They are not supposed to organize birthday parties, coordinate repairs, clean and sell a house, finish a basement, wash laundry, fold laundry, garden, or cut lawns. I need someone to do all these things for me. (*edit: Can I also add that this person must care for the physical and emotional health of all members of the family, including me? And let me tell you, grad students are Needy.)

Graduate students are supposed to read, research, think, discuss, write, present, read, research, think, etc ad infinitum. My job should be to go to school then come home and study in isolation, with occasional breaks for midnight rollerblading and Chinese takeout. It’s supposed to be a lot of work, but it’s supposed to be doable.

For some crazy reason, maybe because I managed an undergraduate degree with small children around, I thought I could do this too. It’s been an interesting month and a half — maybe because of the fun I’ve been having with family law court, police, children’s aid, and counsellors (could another agency possibly be interested in my life?). Somehow I think that even if my life were stable, with no drama or crises, it would still be too much to be a grad student and mother.

I met a 4th year student yesterday who is married, planning to do the MA next year. He’s only a few years younger than me — in his early 30s. His wife lives one and a half hours away, he has an apartment here… he has a kid that doesn’t live with him and she has 3 kids — but they’re her kids, not his. Because they are her kids, according to their arrangement, there’s no need for him to be there. He’s focused on one part of his life — school.

I don’t have that option. My identities are completely interlocked. I’m not a student from 9-5 and a mother from 5-9 and a partner from 9-midnight. I cannot separate out one piece of my self and put the rest on pause or say they are insignificant or disposable. I am all of me. Like it says in my bio on this site: I am a feminist-activist-artist-geek-parent-student. I am all of these things at once. I can do what I do because of all of these things. The skills that I have, the insight that I bring, I bring because of these multi-dimensions.

Alas, the Institution of Academia is not made for real people. To receive funding I must be a full-time student. The perception is that unless I am full-time, I am not a serious researcher, that maybe I have a job somewhere. Maybe it’s time (or past time) for Academia to realize that there are other responsibilities in a person’s life and that these other things do not preclude people from making contributions to the Academy.

As long as the system runs as is, the only people in academia will be the ones that fit the mold: young people, no family responsibilities, no primary childcare responsibilities. Hmmm sound familiar? This is going to be a problem because more and more people want undergraduate degrees and there aren’t enough good teachers to fill the roles. By excluding a woman like me from academia, a good potential educator and researcher is lost. There has got to be a change. Maybe more distance education options, maybe a part-time option with funding. It’s sad to think I may have to give this up because the logistics are beyond me.

Failing

This post is more about questions than answers.

There’s a lot of pressure on us to succeed: be a good parent, partner, child, employee, employer, friend. It doesn’t seem to ever end. Do we act based on what we desire, what we think is best for us, what we think we’re supposed to do?

Do we step on a track and just keep following where it leads, without evaluating whether or not it’s what we should really be doing?

The problem with the pressure to succeed is the fear of failing. Failure is such a loaded word. It’s hard to accept failure in one part of our lives and not let it affect other areas. For instance, just because parenting is the pits at any given time, doesn’t mean we can’t still be a good partner. Or just because we’re thinking that dropping out of school makes the most sense given life/family responsibilities doesn’t mean we can’t be a good employee.

These things don’t have to be connected but the message to be superwoman — to do it all — to be the best — is so strong that it’s hard to keep a head up when things are looking dim.

Green Candidate Info for Windsor-West

Because I had a hard time finding this information I decided to post it here for others.

The Green Party Candidate for next week’s provincial election is Jason Haney. His website is here.

Greens have policy statements on climate change, energy, income support, health, education, and local sustainability. I’m pretty sold on the position of one publicly funded education system for all children, but the focus on preventative health is a strong sell for me too.

There are links on the site to some Youtube videos like the one below.

Learn more about the Greens at www.gpo.ca.

Intelligent Gmail

I’m blown away. Something that *should* be, actually *is*.

Say for instance you have a gmail address with a “.” (dot) in it, say for example sixteen.punches@gmail.com. If someone sends mail to that address — or the same address but does not include the dot the mail will find you at the right address.

Sixteenpunches@gmail.com sends mail to my account at sixteen.punches@gmail.com

I’ve tried this with several different address and it has worked every time. I can only log into the account that I created and if I try to create the other one I’m told it is unavailable.

This is how the Internet is supposed to be: it’s just supposed to work. It shouldn’t depend on people knowing what they’re doing, or doing everything exactly right — it should allow for a bit of understanding and empathy. 🙂 The contact is trying to find you. There’s nothing wrong with a little help.