by Lucinda Ulrich
Daily Lobo columnist
Ah, the first days of a new semester. The only time of year I don't have to suffer through a gauntlet of bureaucracy, technology and everyday life to survive as graduate student at UNM - as was illustrated by the last days of the fall semester.
Files saved to CDs mysteriously disappeared; papers that were painstakingly crafted and saved to the hard drive of my laptop were mysteriously locked the day before most of them were due; research files for a paper that was worth almost 50 percent of my grade in one class was saved in a departmental cyberspace campus network - with assurance from a technical expert that I would be able to access this information from any computer in the universe. Later, I discovered that he meant the files were not accessible on any computer this side of the Mississippi.
I must have done something to incur the wrath of the god of academic deadlines and technology last semester, because every project I worked on crumbled into millions of pixels in my hands. In the last few weeks of the fall semester, with finals looming just around the corner, my technological curse caused every project I touched to self-destruct before my weary, bloodshot eyes.
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A typical day in early December went something like this. After being shocked to consciousness by the sound of my daughter's voice one or five times during the night, I am officially awakened at 7:30 a.m. To say that I am not a morning person would be kind. I stumble through the first hours of the day, squinting painfully into the morning light like someone who had just been sprayed with Mace.
It's a miracle that in this fog I somehow manage to change the baby, give her a bottle, scramble the eggs and so forth. While this may not seem like an amazing feat in and of itself, what no one knows is that mixed in with all the mundane tasks of the day are flashes of thoughts and ideas struggling to be heard. The result is that sometimes I come across a little like a schizophrenic on angel dust.
In between discussions about the baby's morning poop, I contemplate the real definition of literacy. While Elmo sings his la-la song, I outline a paper in my head. While I stock the diapers, clean the dishes and do the laundry, I wonder when, or if, the baby will sleep so I can have time to finish the 50-page reading that is due later that day.
At the playground, I gaze off into the far reaches of space, thinking about how I never have any time to think anymore. -While driving to the grocery store, I wonder if I may be going insane for real this time. In the grocery aisles, while my daughter screams her head off because I won't buy her Dora the Explorer cereal, I run through all the homework I have to complete after she goes to sleep. Eating our way from one side of the grocery store to the other, to pacify toddler screams in a pitch and volume that professional opera singers would admire of protest, I remember that I missed my doctor's appointment last week - there goes $20 I don't have.
I fume about the high cost of living and feel sorry for myself, while I zig and zag the grocery cart toward the car to make baby laugh. I see the baby's beautiful face smiling up at me in the rear-view mirror. I laugh at myself for feeling sorry for my lot in life, for being angry about my circumstances when there are people who don't have any food to eat.
By the way, this week's column was brought to you by the kind folks at the CIRT computer pods, without which, yours truly would not only not be writing this column, but would be $20,000 in college loan debt without any passing grades to show for it. Here's hoping that 2006 and the spring semester brings both peace on Earth and an end to the wrath of the god of academic deadlines and technology.
