Wednesday, December 27, 2006

Random update

We had a fabulous trip to New York overall - got back late last night. On Christmas Day, we had yummy brunch, then lingered over tea and coffee in a coffee shop, then walked for three hours, then went to a movie (Stranger than Fiction - what a delight!) and then a really, really good dinner. What a great way to spend Christmas - I'm all about the getting away...though now that I've been away two Christmases in a row, I know I'm going to have to spend the day with my Christmas-mad mother next year.

I'm feeling predictably overwhelmed by the task - organizing and packing to move - that confronts me over the next ten days. I am moving out on January 6. So I'll blog, instead! I don't have anything much to say, just thought I'd like to say something...So here are some things I'm thinking about:

- I am wrapping my head around the job. After some anguish, I've decided that I can't pass up the opportunity. (Favourite job, which asked for a writing sample, won't be shortlisting till sometime in the new year, of course - I need to just get on with the offer I have, can't wait around for that possibility...) I need to get my career really started (I have a book to write, dammit, and feel as if I could do that much better with the support - financial and otherwise - that a permanent job would give me), I need to have some security, I need to not be on the job market next year, I need to not be unemployed over the summer, I need to throw myself into the admin work it will entail and get really experienced and good at it so that I'll be able to go on the market again in a couple of years bolstered by that - with a view to ending up back in my part of the world.

I have to recognize that it is a great opportunity, partly because of the university - even if it's in upheaval - and partly because of the role I'd have, which would give me more freedom and pull than most junior faculty members get to have. Of course, there are hidden perils in it but I could learn from it all, I think.

- A straight woman I was talking to recently asked me, "What is it about you lesbians and your breakups?" She was referring to the famous tendency of lesbians who are splitting up to be so enmeshed even through the breakups...or to not be able to really break cleanly at all. I guess that GF and I are a textbook case of this. But I guess that it is the only way I'd like to have it. It makes intuitive sense to me. We'll see if it bears out so successfully in the long run. But for now, I'm happy to make a plan to have a bite to eat with to-be-ex-GF every Monday evening, when she comes over to pick up our Divorce Child, Mr. K., for the week. (I will have him Friday-Monday, she will have him Tuesday-Friday, when I'm in Uni City.)



I'm happy to have her plan to come and visit me shortly after I move for this job. Of course, there will inevitably be complications if either of us ever becomes seriously involved with someone else, but we will cross that bridge when we come to it. To me, it doesn't seem to make much sense to cut someone so important out of my life when there's been no transgression or betrayal.

- I have to go away again, on Friday, to last year's Uni City. I have some relatives there, and friends, and my huge extended family is having the Family Xmas Party there on Saturday. Which is also my birthday, and I'm really freaked out at spending my birthday and New Year's without GF for the first time in five years. I don't know why so much anxiety is settling around this...it just is. Anxiety is also being caused by the fact that I will have to answer lots of "Where's GF?" questions, and do not feel like explaining anything, and so will have to make up excuses and lies. Ugh. Anxiety is also coming from the fact that I have to travel there with my mother, and spend a lot of time with her there, and I'm just not good at doing that well, am I? Um, why did I decide to do this, again?

- I wish all you MLAers the best of luck, and much fun at blogger meetups, etc.!



5 comments:

Sfrajett said...

I tried to post this but blogger wouldn't let me. I just wanted to say that you need support no matter what decision you make. It will be a good world when there is as much support out there for NOT taking a tenure track job as there is pressure to take it. Congrats on what is only the first of what I know will be many opportunities for you. You deserve them all!

Hilaire said...

Hey, thanks, Sfragett! You are right - that would be a good world. I don't feel pressured on any day-to-day level, which is nice - but it's because I've told almost nobody...Although right now I'm thinking I can do the job for a couple of years, I am famously indecisive. My mind may well change - and it is nice to hear that people would support my decision not to take the job, if it does change. I'm certainly not pushing the job offer types; I'm hoping they'll take their sweet time to get the offer together.

What Now? said...

Having posted before about turning down a TT job, I want to post again to say "good for you!" if you decide to take this job. Honestly, there's no right answer -- which sucks -- but of course there's also no wrong answer, which is maybe kind of freeing.

I'm glad that you and GF had a good time in NY, although of course I'm sad that the trip represented the end of this phase of your relationship.

Hilaire said...

Thanks, WN. :)

Pantagruelle said...

Happy Birthday to you too, Hilaire! I hope you have a good day tomorrow and that things go well with the family. I'm really sorry that this is the first one in a long time that you have to spend without GF, as I'm sure that must be hard (I got to spend my bday with my GF, but not xmas), but it is nice to hear that you had such a good time in New York, and I hope that you still have a fantabulous bday celebration with your family in Uni City. Big b-day hugs!