Feb Photo a Day Challenge Day 2 - Words

This is the textbook for my current (and last!) class, History of Feminism in the Western Tradition. As you might gather, it's kind of a heavy course. The textbook is 587 pages in total; I am currently on page 545, which means I am so close to done I can almost taste it. I am not looking forward to the 5,000-word research paper I will have to write next. When I finish that paper - and the course - I will get to apply for graduation with a Bachelor of English - a degree in words.

Friday Five

1. It really is awesome to have a potty-trained child. Arguably, we have traded one set of inconveniences for another: instead of leaving the house with diapers and wipes, we now leave with at least one change of underwear/pants, wipes, and a folding toilet seat. We also have to suggest (sometimes strongly) that Gwen use the potty before we leave home, daycare, Gramma’s, or anywhere else we happen to be. This still seems easier to me, and I am very happy not to have to change (or pay for) diapers anymore. This new regime has slipped rather easily into our routine, and I am really proud of Gwen and happy that we took on this onerous task.

2. I read this incredible book called The Total Money Makeover: A Proven Plan for Financial Fitness which was recommended by a dear friend of mine. Ever since reading it, I look at money in an entirely different way. It’s been very eye-opening and definitely not always pleasant. I encouraged Chris to read certain sections of it too and we are working on our own money makeover now (made slightly more challenging by the unemployment and the unknowns surrounding his EI eligibility, etc.). The way I look at it, the next 1-3 years are going to be incredibly hard for us no matter what we do. But if we take some positive steps during that time, we will be in a better situation than we were before this crisis.

3. On a related note, I spent about $800 last year on weight-loss products. That doesn’t count my gym membership, either. I don't regret any of that spending but I can't afford it anymore, so I am working on finding new (cheap or free) ways to deal with my disordered eating and my love of sitting above any other activity. I do not currently have a goal to lose weight or even fit into a particular outfit. I just need to feel like I am looking after myself, without spending a ridiculous amount of money to do so. I bought Just Dance 2 for the Wii on Boxing Day which I have been calling my “cheap gym membership”. From Dec 26 until Jan 11 I danced/worked out every single day, then I got that nasty cold and stopped, and of course I have not yet resumed. That’s a pretty short-lived habit, even for me. Like anyone else, sometimes I need to say things out loud/publically in order to stick with my commitments, so I might be putting some of that stuff here. Here’s what I’ve got so far: Starting immediately, I'm back to dancing 6 songs/day, 7 days/week. Starting January 24th I am going to add sit-ups. In the Spring, I will start walking to work at least twice a week. I am not ready to make any chocolate-related commitments yet but I can see possibly giving it up for Lent.

4. I am just about finished my “Psychology and the Mass Media” course and will soon be starting “Understanding Media Literacy”. Electives are fun, but challenging: social science courses require a completely different set of writing skills from that used for humanities courses, which is my major. (I have finished the core English requirements for my degree, so I have to take some different stuff for my last few courses.) My recent term paper was about the power of advertising: I got to analyze ten different ads of my choosing to determine what types of persuasion techniques were used. I choose to examine ads from a parenting magazine because guess what, I have a few of those lying around. The results were interesting (perhaps only to me) and can be summed up thus: advertisers will use any and all persuasion techniques available to sell their products through the exploitation of the parent-child relationship. You knew that already, though. My exam in this course is next Thursday, please wish me luck!

5. I still really love my new job, which isn’t all that new anymore since I have been here for 10 months. For a long time I didn’t want to write or talk about anything negative about my job because it was so much hype and upheaval and hand-wringing to come to this position from my last one, and I thought any negativity would be met by “I thought this was your dream job?!” But I’ve now come to realize, even in your dream job there are bad days. And those bad days don’t make it any less your dream job. Kind of like how fighting with your partner doesn’t automatically mean you’re in a doomed relationship or that you don’t love that person. Unfortunately, lately there have been several bad work days close together, and that has not been very enjoyable. The weird thing is that despite the badness, I really do love this job.

Pro-School

Today a really lovely box arrived at my doorstep.

It's just like thousands of other boxes all over the country, maybe millions of boxes all over the world. It's just like dozens of boxes I've received before. But this one is different for one simple reason.

I first started my degree in November 2002 as a result of reading the book Happiness by Will Ferguson. The protagonist of the book is an editor who - get this - gets paid to read books and tell his boss which ones are worth publishing. He also gets to make snarky comments about the ones that aren't. This sounded like a good job, and I figured an English degree was a good step towards getting a job like that. But as I couldn't afford to quit my job and do school full-time, distance learning via Athabasca University was the best solution.

Since 2002, a lot has happened in my life. I left my first husband and moved to a brand new city - that was the first time I took a break from school. I re-married, got pregnant, bought a house, had a miscarriage, got pregnant again, all while continuing to study. Somewhere in the midst of all this it became clear that a degree in English would probably not affect my work life in any way, so finishing the program became valuable merely for its own sake rather than as a means to an end. I took a year off both work and school when Gwen was born, and returned briefly to my studies in early 2009 - only to discover that trying to balance school, work, motherhood, volunteer duties, and the ever-elusive "having a life" didn't seem to work. School was the thing to go, and though I felt it was the wrong choice I didn't know how to correct it.

Now it's 2010, and I have 15 credits left to earn. FIFTEEN. That sounds like such a piddling little number, doesn't it? Full-time students could earn that in one term, maybe two. Alas, I am not a full-time student. I am a full-time employee, I am a full-time parent. It takes me about six months to finish one 3-credit course. That means that finishing up those last fifteen credits will take me about two and a half years.

Do you know what the date will be in two and a half years? November 2012. Exactly ten years since this ridiculous, amazing, misguided, inspired, brave and crazy dream began.

You guys, I'm going to do it.

That's why today feels different. This is the first time since I started my degree that there is an end in sight, a firm(ish) plan for when and how I will complete this program. It means that I will be studying non-stop for the next 2.5 years, and because I have already reached the maximum number of prep and junior-level courses, I won't be able (as Chris suggested) to take straightforward and easy stuff like Basket Weaving 101. All my courses have to be above the 300 level, so I'm taking stuff like Popular Culture and the Media, Psychology and Women, and Literature and Hypertext. No, it won't be easy. But the thought of finally being done, of having at last reached this lofty goal - and the poetry of having done it in some arbitrarily-defined time, like a decade - is immensely appealing. I'm going to do this.

I've contacted an advisor and confirmed that the degree requirements have not changed in the intervening decade (!), and that the courses I plan to take will fulfil them. I'm working on a study schedule and wistfully fantasizing about ways to take some time off work to get this done.

When I became a mother, I struggled with the feeling that spending money on my own education - which, as it seemed it would not genuinely affect my career, felt like a vanity project - ultimately took away from any money that could be spent on Gwen's future education. And who knows, maybe Gwen's education would actually be in the right area and at the right time and able to do her some genuine good, so how could I take away from that? It was my wonderful husband Chris who put me straight, pointing out what a great role model I would be for Gwen if I followed through on my plan and completed this goal. This new aggressive plan for completing my degree will mean sacrifices by all three of us, so it genuinely will be a family victory if - no, WHEN - it comes to completion.

Wish us luck.