dissertation anxiety dreams

for those of you--including myself--who had any doubts at all that the process is truly underway (not just another "i'm doing well" upbeat segment followed by a huge setback): i missed my two-day mark on working, since i got home for christmas and got drained by some of the family time, plus just was enjoying the positive family time and the overall non-workiness of the holiday.

well, that night--the very evening on which i missed the two-day deadline, not hours from passing the 48-hour mark--i had a really funny/sad dream in which i had been supposed to go on the job market at the MLA this year, and my parents booked tickets to Chicago so that they could watch me at the MLA, because they are proud of me. come to find out i decided not to go to the MLA and didn't tell them, leaving them stuck with holiday plane tickets and out several hundred bucks. instead we ended up shopping at an Ann Taylor, waiting for me to make up my mind about what i would do next career-wise, and in the meantime i was trying to find cute clothes under $30 that fit me, since i'm a larger girl. in the Ann Taylor, i was juggling my folks, including my sisters, and people from school who intimidate me, like Moriah Hampton.

(note to UB friends: I really like Moriah, just find her intimidatingly smart and professional.)

so, that was funny, because i woke up knowing exactly what the dream was about. we spent the day doing top-secret shower stuff, then i had an even more insanely complex dream that took me all the way back to Bryn Mawr, with a sick update. I was supposed to return to Bryn Mawr and present my work, and when I arrived there was like a bulletin among all the stuff at the English department there that showed a young woman writing a thesis on hip hop, and I realized that my thesis probably gets taught or shown there as an example. (This is actually probably true, as people there were literally living in castles and had never had anyone write on hip hop before.) But the point is I had to prove that I had correctly expanded upon the vision and promise of this undergraduate thesis.

So then I ended up in Sarah Bay-Cheng's class, only it wasn't Sarah Bay-Cheng--she looked more like Catherine, a contestant on last season's Project Runway who I had a big crush on. But her name was Sarah and she was a cute butch girl who made us write papers that confused and frustrated me. I felt stupid for the first time in my life and could tell I hadn't done a good job. I went to pick up the paper and she returned it with really useful comments written on the cover page of a four-page zine "from the desk of a newly tenure-track skater assistant professor," i shit you not, that sentence was on the zine in my dream.

so then i saw that i got a 12/20 and that totally flipped my shit out, and i could see what i had done wrong and what i needed to do as i skimmed the paper, but there were also some deadlines and a movie i really wanted to go see about water conservation showing at 8pm only; it would then leave Buffalo. so i tried to get "Sarah" to explain to me what i needed to do to improve my structure and performance but she was distracted by her cute lesbian friends and her sense of self-direction (seriously--she was busy and had too much work to do to deal with my insecurity).

so then i ended up making up for the grade at this huge public presentation forum at Bryn Mawr for alumnae and families. there was a terrible ice and snow storm going on and i was being incredibly sulky and temper tantrum about having to be there. i was actually lashing out at people, like hitting people and acting like i had fairly severe autism as i was getting ready to make up a speech/presentation at the last minute, convinced that my paper would still be better than other people's because i am smart. people were making fun of me, as in some parts of college; and i was trying to get "Sarah" and someone else who was by my side, probably the Shelby figure, to help me not be so destructive to others. it was hard to see how to get in to the event and to figure out when my showtime was, although i was due to present at 8:06.

anyway, so i never got to present, and then somehow i woke up. i had slept right through my alarm and realized that the dreams were only going to get worse; i had to work right away. so i got some stuff done and felt so much better and more relaxed today.

and the moral of the story is so, so true! no transgressing the 48 hour mark. it feels good to be slightly more committed than i thought i was.

bridal shower preparations are shaping up quite delightfully.