Motivation

Hey, a guy's gotta have some motivation to finish the dissertation. This may be it. Waaaaay cool. Fuel efficient too. I'll need a new car here pretty soon. Hmmmm.....

Packing Day 1

I finish up my current job in about three weeks, which means that our move to Large State Capital (LSC), is happening in about a month. I officially started the packing process today, which for me involves cleaning of...yes, you got it: the office/prison. It needs another round of de-cluttering, AGAIN. Makes sense, I suppose. I've done A LOT on my dissertation since the last major purge, and the other stuff, like the paperwork from bills I've paid, are in neat, organized, squared-off piles on the floor. Well, they WERE. I have done a good job of cleaning those much of this afternoon. And frankly, I threw out a good amount of paperwork I thought I'd need, but I really don't.

Question for anyone out there who feels like responding: should I throw away my master's degree? I finished it in 1996. It's in the same field as my Ph.D., so I've been hanging onto it. However, here I am finished with coursework, halfway done with the dissertation itself, and I've probably used just a few files from the two file boxes that I've moved three times. I think I'm gonna just chuck most of it, but if anyone else has any ideas on how long to keep this stuff, please feel free to leave a comment here.

It's dinner out, and a friend's coming over. Bye.

Lots on the mind

Lots on the mind these days.

First, we had a great vacation to Undisclosed Location. It’s pretty nice there this time of year, though rather warm. Was a really nice way to celebrate our tenth anniversary. TENTH? How’d a decade go by so fast?? In some ways, though, it seems like a long while ago.

Next, the house. Oy, the house. It’s all going OK. I’m still confused about how the closing of our present place is going to go, but hopefully Realtor Woman 1 will work that out for us. We inspected the new place, and Realtor Woman 2 helped us negotiate our way through that. We’re gathering some more information to respond by early next week. Hopefully both transactions will be finalized after this long holiday weekend. I am getting sick of having various provisions up in the air.

Oh yeah: while there were no deal breakers on the inspection, there was a funny thing that happened. First, keep in mind we’re about to buy a fairly substantial 1965 two-story + basement house from the original owner in her 80s. The place has been vacant since the wintertime. Low and behold, Inspector Man and I were crawling in and out of the attic, the crawlspace, the darkest corners of the place. Then we checked out the fireplace in the basement rec room area to find a LIVE RACCOON or ‘POSSUM or something in there! I ran halfway out of the room, and so did Inspector Man. It was still alive. The flue was part-way open. Sort of a comedy going on with the two of us saying, “Holy SHIT there’s something in there, it’s furry, and it’s MOVING!” We were laughing. The fireplace upstairs had a dead bird in it. Nice. Yeah, we need some chimney caps pretty darn quick! Ah, spring in the Midwest.

New subject. Yesterday, Wife and I attended the funeral of an eighteen-year-old young man we never met. We know his mother pretty well, as she works with the local schools as the preschool coordinator. Her son died in an auto accident last weekend. I’ve never been to a funeral of a young person before. The hardest thing to watch was the number of other young people there who had to learn about death way too soon. Another tough part was hearing about the potential this young man had: someone who wasn’t afraid to argue, had good sense of humor, worked with disabled children, and cared about issues of human rights and equality. He was supposed to be off to college to study political science in the fall. We need more intelligent people who give a shit about these good issues working amongst people in the real world, and unfortunately this guy will never get that chance. Sad stuff. The experience really sucked, and I don’t envy the mourning and recovery process that our friend has ahead of her.

Before I forget, on the dissertation data-collection front (oh yeah, this is a blog about my doctoral program, right?), I’ve been blown off twice this week, but fortunately they rescheduled for next week. So, if all interviews come through, then by this time next week I will have completed eight of the ten or so interviews I need to do. Yahoo! As long as I can get a few more done prior to June 15, I should be good to go for analyzing the data late summer/early fall and then writing up the results before or around Thanksgiving.

OK, it’s getting weekend out. Gotta go.

Interviews

During all the haze with our house-selling and searching processes, I have been conducting interviews for my dissertation. I have been looking forward to this time for about two years now, so it feels good to be on a hiatus from writing and now actually conducting interviews. Feels good to be doing something more tangible for a change.

The interviews have gone well so far, with the exception of a broken tape cassette here. Please don't tell me to use a digital recorder instead, as those are worthless to me for doing my own transcriptions (I have an aged transcription machine, foot pedals and all).

I've conducted five interviews, and I think I have a sixth scheduled for after Wife and I return from Undisclosed Location. Only about four or five more, and I should be good to go. Ten or eleven hours of interview data is plenty for this study, thankyouverymuch.

I just wanted a little reminder to myself in the blog about this process, so this post is short. K, bye.

Into Place, Things Are Falling

Like Yoda in this post's title, I spoke. Probably because philosophical and reflective, I am feeling. A good thing, this is.

Today (or what's left of it) is our tenth wedding anniversary. Wife's parents are here to be with Moose while Wife and I go away to an undisclosed location for a week to celebrate. We've been planning this trip for months, and we're very fortunate to have parents that will come in and help out with Moose when needed (I'm including you on this sentiment as well, Mom). TEN years since the wedding day?? I mean, I guess I can believe that. So much has happened since then, and it does feel like it was a while back. But then we start discussing that it's been "a decade," and then one thinks about the swift passage of time. And philosophical, one gets.

The last day of the first decade of our marriage (e.g. yesterday) was a banner day in the house of Chesterley. We bought and sold a house on the same day! Monday we placed an offer on a house we adore in our new city. The owner countered and actually came down quite a bit further than we expected. Tuesday night after a great deal of discussion, roller-coaster emotions ("can we really afford this?"), wailing and gnashing of teeth, we signed on the dotted line and sent in the paperwork yesterday morning. Then, yesterday evening we learned that the response we wrote to the buyers of our current home regarding a few points on the inspection report were accepted, meaning our house sale was a done deal last night. Needless to say we each had a stiff drink and danced around the house like happy people.

And then we slept well for the first time since the beginning of April. We are very thankful that the house stuff, in particular the sale of this place, went so quickly and relatively smoothly. I know of a few others who have struggled with selling a house, and I can only imagine what a long process would do your stress levels. I don't know when before I've been this stressed out continuously for several days in a row. Not a healthy way to be.

We'll get an inspection done on the new house after we return from our vacation. We do adore this house, though I'm determined to not call it "our house" till after the inspection is complete. Still, it's hard not to be placing furniture mentally or planning improvement projects already. Must stop! OK I won't, but I sorta feel like I should say that here. :-)

So Decade 1 ended on a high note for this family, and may all the remaining ones end equally as high. It's amazing how the various aspects of life can fall into place sometimes. And experiencing all of these changes with the same person right by my side over time is simply priceless. I am one lucky man.

Houses and Stuff

I thought our house-purchasing process when acquiring the residence presently known as Chesterley was rather stressful. We came into town for three days, and thankfully we had a realtor who spent the majority of her time with us. Moose was just under 10 months old, so of course he needed 'round-the-clock care, feedings, etc. We put an offer on one place, and of course we were worried it was going to stretch our budget. We low-balled the offer and hoped they'd take it. And then we LEFT TOWN with nothing definite on where we would live, and no plans to return to this town before actually moving here. Stressful! Fortunately it all worked out, they took our low offer, and Chesterley has been a wonderful place to live.

However, selling this house is also pretty stressful in itself. I think we're finding the prospect of leaving this place more difficult as the weeks go by. During the time we've lived here, our family has been through a lot. Between me and wife we've lost two grandparents and a parent, Moose was diagnosed with autism disorder, and we had the typical growing pains of a growing family, money concerns, low academic and career self-esteem, and other difficulties. We've had some high points as well: good progress through a Ph.D. for me, progress through speech and physical difficulties for Moose, increase in the diversity of types of voices taught to sing by Wife, numerous fun parties and other gatherings, great discussions with a gaggle of good friends, and now landing this job and preparing to move on is indeed another high point that we've experienced while living here. It's hard to leave a place where you've grown so much personally and watched your child transform from "plasma" into a real, live, very active, boy.

The house itself has changed quite a bit these last five years, and the changes are all part of the mark we're leaving on this place. New roof, great gardens (thanks to us, I must say!), new interior and exterior paint jobs, some new kitchen cabinets and such, new dishwasher, different curtains, etc. Wife and I enjoy 'keeping house' together, and I think we've come to be pretty good at it. And we always make sure we can afford it first, which is key. Being house-poor is useless. Big tax refunds are awfully helpful.

When we moved here, we didn't think we'd stay here forever. We figured we'd be here four years, and now we've been here five. There are things we've put up with here that we're hoping to not have to deal with in our new place. We have no separate dining room, and yet we enjoy having friends and family over for sit-down dinners. There are a couple of "warts" in the yard in the way it slopes toward in the house in back. Some other choices in the construction materials (cheap-ass vinyl siding, for example) would not have been our choice were we to actually build a house.

Our new location is a much larger city, and fortunately it's not very far from SCT so we've visited the past several weekends to go house hunting. Lots of options up there. Lots of crap, too. Some expensive, and some not-so. Every time we come home to SCT, it hits us both how much we love this house. It's "home." This is the longest we've ever lived in one place together...heck, it's the longest either of us have ever lived anywhere except for the places we grew up. The thought of moving and starting over with our gardens, painting, etc. gets rather exhausting. And then the emotional side kicks in for me. Will the new owners of this place continue to take care of the yard, or will it all weed over? Will they repaint the "roasted red pepper" accent wall I painted in the kitchen as a surprise for Wife? Do they realize that the best son in the entire world learned how to walk, talk, eat and do most things he knows how to do under this roof? I need to get over these emotions toward this building, I realize. And I will. After all, the "home" is just going to move to a different house. Home is in the people, not the walls.

Tomorrow (OK, technically later today) is hopefully our last day for house-hunting, as our time is getting more limited. The hunting process is getting tiresome now...nothing seems to compare to our current house just yet. A couple of great places have had major, unchangeable things that will not work, like it's in the wrong school district or located on a busy road. The scary thing is, we're supposed to be out of our current house on June 26...ACK! Really hope the hunt goes well tomorrow.

It's tough to leave a place where you've done a lot of living...good and bad times mixed together. At least the family itself will stay together, and together we'll find a new container in which to house Chesterley. It's just sort of scary that in a very short time, life is going to change so much. No complaints though...just a little healthy fear here & there.

Two Important Meetings

IMPORTANT MEETING 1: Dissertation Proposal Defense.
I passed.

You know, it was actually an enjoyable experience. I felt like I had a highly-informed cheering squad instead of a group of adversaries. They treated me like a colleague. DC started off the meeting by saying, "We all want this study to work for you, and we're here now to help you improve it before you start." Can't ask for more support than that.

The end result was a pretty major change to the semi-structured interview protocol. This didn't surprise me at all: Honestly, I really didn't like the first one I had written. The feedback during the defense discussion was invaluable, and DC agreed. After we were finished and I watched them sign all the paperwork, DC invited me back to her office and we spent the next 45 minutes crashing through the edits of the protocol. SHE actually did the typing while I did the talking. Gosh she's cool. After that we decided to add a brief demographic survey that I'll have the participants complete prior to coming to my office for their interviews. I pulled together an Amendment for the Committee on the Protection of Human Subjects and submitted these new things to that office later in the afternoon. All wrapped up in a nice bow. Not really, it was wrapped up in an inter-campus envelope, but I'm just being figurative.

As I was driving home, I had a sudden urge to start packing up my house, in preparation for our move. Wait a minute, I need to do these minor things like SCHEDULE THE INTERVIEWS NOW!!! Oh yeah. :-)

IMPORTANT MEETING 2: Moose's Individual Education Plan for 2007-2008.
This is the meeting where the SCT teachers, therapists, preschool coordinator all come together with us to set goals and objectives for his schooling next year. He will start kindergarten. We're technically a year late, but that's really not a big deal. It was good of these folks to spend the time with us, especially since we're writing this for the new school district in the new city. We didn't finish today, so we'll finish things up next week.

OK, I'm off to officially invite participants to join my dissertation study (at long last) and then it's bedtime. G'night.

Newsworthy Tidbits

Two newsworthy tidbits to share here:

1. My dissertation proposal defense is set for Wednesday, April 25 at 10:00 AM. Please think happy thoughts.
   
2. I will start a full-time job July 1.

I don't write about the details of work here, as this blog focuses mostly on my dissertation process and a little bit on Moose. However, the new job is worth mentioning because we're going to move away from Small College Town this summer as a result.

We’re excited for the move, though it’s bittersweet. We have many, many wonderful friends here, and many of the resources for raising a child with special needs are wonderful. We enjoy the small-town charm, too. Those features will be hard to leave. However, we’re moving to a much larger city, and that will open up different opportunities for Moose’s schooling and for Wife’s career as a classical vocalist.

Basically, it’s a job in institutional assessment situated in a division of student life. This is just the sort of thing I was hoping to find upon graduation. I’m feeling lucky to have found it several months before finishing the dissertation!

The new shop will support my dissertation completion efforts by allowing me some time away in the summer and fall. My goal is still to finish up in December, that is, assuming the dissertation proposal defense process goes OK next week.

It's been a whirlwind couple of weeks. Our house went on the market just over a week ago, and by the end of last week we already received an offer! Now we need to haul ass and find a house in our new location. We went school hunting this morning, and that went very well, so now house-hunting can follow. Fun and pretty darn scary all at once. But we’re really, really happy.

A Basic Question

Last July I officially started my current job, which was essentially a promotion from a 50% FTE graduate assistantship to a 75% FTE graduate assistantship with supervisory responsibilities. The money was "good," and as a result I had no need to take out another student loan. The money was not "great," but for 30 hours per week, I had no complaints.

However, I am still on the student health insurance plan. The alternative, had I been hired as a true 75% staff member, was no insurance coverage at all. So, I was thankful to have been hired on as a grad-student at the salary I'm receiving, and I thought the student insurance plan was OK. Not great, but OK.

Moose wasn't on this plan last year. He was on a state-funded plan for which we qualified because our income was so low. This was a wonderful insurance plan, especially for a child with special needs, as it covered just about everything with no premiums or copay. Don't get me wrong: I'd rather not qualify for the plan due to high income, but I do miss this plan. We took him off the plan January 1.

Today we learned that the speech and occupational therapy (OT) he receives every week has not been covered since the start of the new year. Earlier in the year when we were deciding to switch him to this "student" plan, however, Wife called the insurance company to verify coverage, and they said "autism is covered." However, what was not clear was that they only cover "medical" expenses for autism, and not speech and OT. Speech and OT are only covered expenses if they are restorative. So, if I had been in an accident and needed to relearn how to use a fork, that OT would be covered.

Moose has never been able to speak. OT has taught him how to do things that other kids just learn, like using a fork, for example. My basic question: how is it that therapies provided by a hospital, and prescribed by a doctor, are not medical expenses realted to autism?

We are appealing, and we hope this turns out OK. But, what if it does not? Do we cancel therapies till we hear? The appeals process takes 30 days.

These insurance plans are designed for students, who typically are healthy and normally-functioning individuals. I mean, they got into college, after all. The plan covers prescriptions, doctor's visits, etc. That's all well and good, but when you realize your child has a mental disorder during a five-year stint as a graduate student, it'd be nice to at least be told what questions to ask in this regard. We would have found another plan or found another way to get the therapies had we known...

I may not have taken this job had I realized these essential things for Moose's care were not covered. On the other hand, this job has probably helped lead toward some bigger and better things (more later on those). I'm torn. Am not sure the money was worth it.

Proposing and Recruiting

Hi. I didn't post a follow-up over the weekend.

I did indeed finish up the proposal, and I turned it into the committee. It ain't perfect, but it's done...for now. As I delivered a hard copy to the home of one committee member, I reminded him that I'm a musician by trade. I said, "Just keep in mind: the first time an orchestra plays together, it usually doesn't sound all that good. This proposal may be similar." He graciously said, "Oh c'mon, it'll be fine, Rob," so perhaps that's a good sign that they're not seeking perfection, just completion. We shall see.

Meanwhile, I started my "snowball sampling procedure." This means I've asked about 14 faculty and staff members that I know here at LMU about helping me recruit people eligible to participate in my interviews. I've asked them things like, "Do you know of students who fit these criteria?" and "Feel free to pass this along to others." The hope is that the snowball, or the sample of participants, gets larger and larger the farther it rolls, or in this case the more it's shared. I'm seeking about 8-15 people total, and already I have contact information for 10! Amazing how fast this occurs after getting over the proposal-writing hurdle.

K bye.

Study # 07- 11947

Some quick updates, all of which are good.

First, I received Approval from the human subjects committee at LMU earlier this week, so I am now able officially to start recruiting participants for my study. Approval is good. From now on, I shall refer to the diss as # 07- 11947, the number assigned to my study by the Human Subjects Committee at LMU. Note the required space between the hyphen and the number 1. I am not kidding.

Next, DC came back from a series of conferences, and she gave me a bunch of feedback on the proposal. Feedback is good.

Third, DC thinks the propsoal is just about ready to go to my dissertation Committee. She informed the Committee as such, and now suddenly they all want the completed proposal by...TODAY. Committee interest is good. DC has asked them a big favor by accelerating my time line so I can collect data very soon. She rocks! I'm very lucky to have her.

Thanks to her feedback, and that of a couple of other Trusted Colleagues (TCs), I'm swiftly synthesizing a bunch of edits together into one coherent (God I hope so) document. Later this afternoon, I'll deliver copies to the Committee and then it's outa my hands till the defense date, which will happen hopefully within the next 10 days or so. We shall see.

A little bit stressed, but none of this is "bad" stress. It's all good.

Undercity Weekend

I had a nice undercity weekend here at home. Oh, "undercity" means "suburban." I'm just funny that way. I'm not sure how my neighborhood can be suburban where there's nothing truly urban anywhere nearby. I think I've identified a paradox: How can a suburban neighborhood be truly suburban with no nearby urban area? Discuss!

Anyway, I think this was one of the only weekends since I have been a homeowner (when we established Chesterley in 2002) that I did not feel any school work hanging over my head. Remarkable. We cleaned up the yard and put down mulch on most of the flower beds. So far we've put down 13 of those 2 cubic feet bags of the hardwood mulch. I think we need about three or four more for this one area along a fence line, but we need to wait for the hostas and bleeding hearts to come up first. We're trying a new weed-reducing method (just in a few spots) of laying newspaper down on the beds where we know plants are not growing and then covering them with the mulch (aren't we the little weekend warriors?) (so damn undercity of us). I hate weeding, but I hate how weeds look even worse. So, all of the beds except for one are done...and that one should be done next weekend when the plants start to come up. Feels like we're doing all we can to foster good healthy spring & summer gardens. I like gardening. I especially like it when I don't feel like I REALLY should be doing something else. Wife and I enjoy gardening together. Much fun. We like seeing the results of our work, and hopefully we'll reap some rewards for this work in a month or two when the growing season really kicks off.

This year I'm not going to use regular fertilizer on our lawn. I need to research organic lawn treatments, since Moose may be sensitive to toxins and stuff. It'll be different, but I always felt a little bit strange about pouring chemicals into our lawn and then later rolling around in the lawn with Moose and Chester. Should be a fun adventure, and perhaps less expensive than the fertilizers we'd buy at Large Home Improvement Store Out at the State Highway.

For dissertation work this week, I will edit hither & yon and await IRB and DC approval patiently. I've sent the proposal draft out to a few colleagues and relatives for their edits. Sort of fun to hear what they have to say. I realize this activity of sharing the work is part of my extraversion: I get energy from other people. Even with writing, I need to make it a social process. Otherwise, I'd seriously lose my mind and would probably lay mulch and newspaper over it by accident.

Two Milestones, No Libraries

I'm happy to report this is the first Saturday in a couple of months (not counting weekends out of town) where I will not go into my campus office for the day. The reason: last Wednesday about at 3:30 AM, I turned in a draft of my dissertation proposal to DC, "in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies at Large Midwest University." DC is leaving tomorrow for two weeks, and she won't have time to read it till she's traveling back to town. That's OK: I need a little break here. Hopefully it'll be just about ready to go, and I can set up a defense within the couple of weeks or so after her return.

In addition, yesterday I turned in my documentation for the Protection of Human Subjects (Institutional Review Board, or IRB) approval process. This is to prove I'm not planning on injecting my interview participants with air and then sitting around to see what happens. I got DC's signature on those forms just before she jetted out of here, so I'm glad to have that ball rolling. It's good I have the two-week buffer till DC can read the proposal, because it may take that long to get the IRB approval completed.

So, the light at the end of the tunnel is getting brighter. Heck, the tunnel itself is getting shorter. I CAN'T WAIT to start interviewing my participants and actually collecting data to see where this grounded theory study is gonna go.

Today Wife and I are pondering what we'll do together will all this Time. We're taking a vacation in May for our tenth wedding anniversary. She asked me to go with her TO THE LIBRARY today to check out some books to plan the trip. The LIBRARY? Nooo.....no more books! Maybe we'll go get some mulch for the flower beds, or paint the kitchen, or something....but not the library!!!

Happy Birthday, Chester!

I almost completely forgot that today is Chester's birthday! He's 8. EIGHT?? And to think, he used to fit in the palm of my hand. Literally.

I don't have a more recent picture of Chester than this one, taken last fall with me and Moose. This was just a spontaneous shot...both boys hopped in my lap at once.

Anyhow, woofa woof woof woof (translation: Happy Birthday, Chester!).

Deadline is looming

I’m working on my dissertation from home today. This came after cancelling a trip to visit relatives. I hate cancelling trips. I hate the fact I couldn’t get to my “real” job today. But, if I do not finish the proposal here soon, I will need to wait a year to collect data, and that would negatively impact all fronts: job life, home life, school life. So, no stress. None whatsoever. Ha. I value the rich life I lead outside of my professional career, but for the moment I’m needing to be a hermit. Lovely Wife is allowing me the space to do so, and the relatives we were going to visit aren’t too upset, I don’t think. But man I could use another week alone to get this done. Instead I have two days and the usual juggling of my life’s components. That’s OK…I realize I’m lucky to have components to my life. I just wish a few of them could give me a break for a couple of days…

Anyhow, I’m here in my peaceful home office/prison. I’ve been locked in here since about 8:30 AM, actually. Since the weather’s nice today (76 degrees right now), and since it’s spring break for the local schools, many of the neighborhood parents are taking time off to be with their kids…and I think they are all outside playing right now. One neighbor has a very loud motorcycle, and he is driving it up and down our street, back & forth, each time practically blasting me out of my seat. With the coffee surging through my blood right now and the constant motorcycle engine scaring the shit out of me, lemme tell ya I’m writing wicked FAST right about now.

Looks like it’s gonna rain soon. I hope it pours so I can have some quiet. I’m grumpy!

I am very close to finishing up the one major hole in chapter 2. I have about two more pages to write on chapter 3. Then I need to finish a pretty major overhaul of chapter 1, but I think I’m almost done there too. If this were due tomorrow, then I could stay up much of the night and finish. I’m actually that close.

Perhaps I’ll just stay up all night…hmm.

The motorcycle just drove by again. Pardon me while I peel myself off the ceiling.

Forecast is not as stormy

While the "to be or not to be" schedule isn't panning out as quickly and efficiently as I'd like, my perception of the urgent nature of the proposal defense date wasn't quite right either. My delay does not bring all bad news: I can take the extra week or so I need to get the proposal up to snuff, and then I should still have time to collect data. It may require taking a week off of work in April to do nothing but complete the interviews, but then the data collection will be completed and I'll be on no one else's schedule but my own.

DC gave me edits on chapter 1 over the weekend. This was waaaaay cool. She actually had me come to her house Saturday so she could explain where she wanted me to go with this. I tried to stay up all night on Sunday night to finish up edits to chapter 1. That was a dumb idea. I dragged my ass yesterday at work and didn't get nearly as far as I had hoped. Got 8 hours of sleep last night, and this morning I'm much more bright-eyed. Time to get through these edits before the work day starts at my 3/4-time job.

Details of Moose's Diet

Take a look over at Wife's blog for a very well-written post that describes the new dietary things we're dealing with for Moose. It's been exhausting on many different levels, but now we're gaining energy by seeing him "come back to us" with his personality, after about two months of sort of being away. I guess I just haven't wanted to talk about it much on this blog.

I honestly don't know what I'd do without my wife. I think she's the most patient person I've ever met.

No More Additional Articles or Books!

I hereby place myself on a moratorium on article- and book-obtaining activities. Unless a member of my committee requests I read something different for the proposal, I am no longer allowing myself to obtain any new reading materials.

I went to the library this morning to get one additional article, and of course I came back to my office with THREE in hand. I've read the one I sought in the first place, and now I must finish up chapter three, which is now a day late.

OK, one more time:

NO NEW ARTICLES OR BOOKS!

Thank you, I needed that.

No Colon

This post has nothing to do with my, or anyone else’s, excretory system.

During these last three or four years, I’ve assumed my dissertation’s title would have a colon in it. Something like, “Rob’s Dissertation: An Exploration into the Mind of a Mad Man.” Just kidding. Well, here I am with a decent title in hand, and there’s no colon. I’ll admit, I’m a little bit stunned!

"To Be or Not To Be" Schedule

I am now officially on a tight time schedule, but I think this is doable as long as I don’t lose focus. It’s pretty simple: if I don’t finish this on time, then the dissertation gets delayed for at least a semester, if not a year, since I need to interview seniors in their last semester of college for my study. Yep, either it’s gonna happen, or it’s gonna not. I’m shooting for the former.

Revised versions of chapters 1 and 2 went to DC at our meeting yesterday morning, and she seemed pleased. There is still a small hole in chapter 2, but I know exactly what I need to do, and I have the literature sources to do as such. Now I just need to “do.”

I need to turn a draft of chapter 3 into DC by tomorrow. I thought I had said draft in my hand at yesterday’s meeting. However, I must have dreamed making edits to that. I’m not kidding. I was surprised that the draft I had in my hand during our meeting still related to the old mixed-method study. I couldn’t believe it: rather embarrassing. Fortunately DC just had a good laugh about it stating that she’s been there before. It’s good to not be alone! So I’m madly making revisions to that this morning and cutting out anything related to the old study. It’s rather freeing, I must admit. Hopefully in the next couple of hours I’ll have a decent draft which I can edit later today after I work this afternoon.

DC will read everything over the weekend and give me feedback Monday. I will incorporate her feedback early next week, and I’ll fill in the hole in chapter 2 then as well. By the end of next week, March 9, I must deliver the completed proposal to my committee. This gives them two weeks to read it. I'm supposed to defend the proposal sometime after spring break and before DC leaves for big conference she’s running at the end of the month. This should leave me just enough time to do the interviews I need to do before the end of classes this semester.

The Mozart CD is on repeat and I’ve been cranking away since 8AM here at the home office-prison. It’s either going to be late nights or early mornings from here on out. But at least it’s the home stretch for the proposal, at long last. Nothing like the end-of-the-line push to get the work done (I hope!).

It just takes a little Mozart...

...for me to find focus. One of the first CDs I ever bought was a recording of the Mozart Piano Concerto No. 26 in D-Major performed by Murray Perahia. This is the CD I'd put in whenever I was in crunch paper-writing time in college, graduate school the first time, and now graduate school the second time (TEN years later...ugh, age, where are my cane and vitamins?). Why I don't remember to put this CD in every morning, I'll never know. I always focus and get a lot of work done when I hear this piece. It's benign enough that I don't just space out and listen to the music. It helps me filter out the rest of the world and do nothing but write. There are three movements: faster, slower, and fast (my translation of the Italian). During the fast movements I write, and during the slow movement I read and proof. I don't mean to do it that way, but that's just the rhythm I've established. I think it's subconscious. Many times I just put the CD on repeat mode and so I can crank through a big paper.

Guess I'm going to have this tune running perpetually here in my office for the next couple of weeks. I've just burned the CD to my office computer.

Chester is Flatulent

Get out of my office, smelly dog!

The poor thing. I wonder what he ate.

Elusyve letter y

Y am seryously thynkyng of removyng all ynstances of the letter “i” from my dyssertatyon and replacyng them wyth the more elusyve and less-frequently used letter “y”. Wouldn’t that be nyce?

OK, Y realyze that’s probably not the best ydea. But yt would be pretty funny nevertheless. You can tell Y’m goyng styr crazy wyth dyssertatyon-wrytyng these days. Perhaps the upcomyng snow storm wyll bryng me back to a mode where Y can be more productyve? Y hope so.

Friday Haiku

My friend & colleague, Jon , and I wrote this today after a meeting at work.

Our meeting is done
The decisions have been made
Let’s go home and drink

Dude, that's a Haiku.

Chemistry Experiment

We took Moose to a specialist yesterday because we have him on a gluten-free casein-free diet (GFCF). For those of us not in the know, that's basically wheat-free and dairy-free food. Apparently, many autistic kids have a high sensitivity to these foods. There's gluten in a whole bunch of things, more than you'd suspect. We're thankful for a good organic food section at Chain Grocery Store Near Our House (CGSNOH), along with a natural food store elsewhere in town. Autistic kids' food sensitivities manifest themselves on two ends of a spectrum (this is my own lay-person's representation of the problems [I need visuals], so it may be incorrect):

physical gut problems <----------------> aloofness or spaciness

Moose falls, of course, on the "aloofness or spaciness" side of things. The specialist would argue that he's essentially getting high on drugs from consuming gluten and casein products.

For a long while, Wife and I balked at this entire notion because Moose didn't have any of the gut issues, which is the more-common problem. He eats a variety of foods, and his digestive system was always just fine. He sleeps through the night consistently. We were skeptical of anyone trying to say that a diet will "cure" autism.

But we decided to try the diet anyhow because we just didn't want to leave a stone unturned in this journey. This specialist agrees there is no cure for autism. However, her Asperger's-syndrome daughter has had a great deal of success on this diet, and the doc has been working in this area for more than a decade. "Success on the diet" is defined as a reduction of autistic-like repetitive behaviors and an increase in communication skills (in addition to getting rid of any physical problems, that Moose doesn't have, fortunately).

The visit to the doc yesterday was very interesting. After reading Moose's history (Wife has had to write out the details of her pregnancy and Thomas's entire life at least 15 different times, by hand, no exaggeration), the doc told us WE'VE BEEN DOING EVERYTHING RIGHT. I think this is one of the first people we've met who believe in the "the environment is out to get us" sort of stuff who has said that to us. Wife needed to hear that. Along the way others have questioned us about vaccinations, rho gam shots, flu shots during pregnancy, and other stuff...all of which were things our doctors told us to do. This is one of the first people "in the know" who told us we hadn't done anything wrong. Very refreshing.

Next, she immediately saw a few things in Moose and pinpointed the likely cause. "He grinds his teeth a lot," she observed. "Yes, he's done that ever since he grew teeth," I replied. "Well, it's probably due to an overdose of yeast in his system, I've seen that a lot." Who knew? So now he'll be on some drugs to help clear the yeast out of his system. OK, we'll see how that goes.

There was an iodine test. That's the yellow liquid stuff that stains your skin for up to 12 hours. The test was that if it absorbed into his skin in less than 12 hours, then his body is craving the stuff that's in iodine. (side note: his skin was back to his normal color in less than four hours, so I guess he's deficient in that area, ya think?)

And then they drew blood. Six vials, for all sorts of chemical tests. Apparently he's a walking chemistry set. After I had to gently, yet firmly, say to the nurse, "He won't understand you when you tell him to hold his arm still," we worked out a system where Wife held Moose down underneath her, I held his free arm, and two nurses helped to draw the blood. We had him in a sing-a-long/scream-a-long, and I think it helped to calm him down, a little. They had to stick him in TWO separate places in the same arm, but they eventually got almost as much blood as they needed (god I hope it's enough). A few hundred dollars later (I suppose he's worth it, haha), we were driving back to SCT peacefully, Moose was sucking down juice and GFCF pretzels, back to his normal self. Wife and I, while shaking, were at least relieved that we feel we've found a specialist who really understands all this stuff. Moose is really a trooper, truly. A very brave kid.

I feel like we're at the bottom of a very steep hill and are learning how to get the car into first gear without rolling backward. But I think it's the right hill, and we've been searching for the this hill for a while. We shall see. We'll try anything that has no potential of hurting him. I just hope he doesn't have to have another blood test anytime soon.

Dissertation? What dissertation?

Good stuff

The last post was a bit gloomy. There are a few good things that have happened in the last day or so that bode well for successful dissertation profection:

1. The weather is finally behaving by being cold! I shoveled the driveway yesterday along with a few of my neighbors. It felt very homey and neighborly. I actually enjoy shoveling snow.
2. A good friend from my master's program is expecting a baby after driving a particularly difficult road to get there. I'm VERY happy for you!!!
3. I want both Super Bowl teams to win the game (though deep down I'll probably cheer for my Bears at my home turf).

Focused, motion toward completion, getting the darn thing done...

Re-shifting

It's been a while since I've done a real post here. Let me start this off by saying that I'm just about done with my dissertation proposal. I have about another 4-5 pages to write in chapter 3, and I just received a good amount of feedback from DC on chapters 1 and 2. I'm working on a big revision of things right now, and I'm on track to defend the fucker in the next few weeks (that is, if I can get my committee finalized by then. I'll save that for another post).

But there's been a fairly significant re-shifting of my dissertation this past week. I am a big-picture thinker. In many situations I consider this one of my greatest strengths. However, when writing a dissertation, it goes only so far. One must focus a dissertation topic and go with it. At the same time, one must gain the approval of others in order for the topic to gain the support and "Miracle Grow" it needs to come to fruition. Finding a topic is not entirely an independent process.

I've mentioned here that I've had multiple dissertation topics throughout my time at LMU. If I weren't a big-picture thinker, I probably would have focused long ago. I may have been further (farther? I have no idea) along in the march toward completion than I am now, though I really can't say that for certain. Still, I hold true to the fact that I like my present topic a great deal, and I'm glad I felt free to switch topics along the way. I've identified a significant gap in the literature, and there is a group of researchers 'out there' that is now starting to work toward filling in the gap. This is a good time for me to be working on this particular topic.

I thought I had a solid plan for collecting data. I was going to administer a survey to a group of students, and out of the respondents I would choose a handful of them for in-person interviews to help provide data for a theory I'm developing.

After a long meeting with DC this past week (almost 3 hours...I have a good DC!), I decided to drop the survey portion and find participants in another way. Instead of running a mixed-method study, it will now have a straight qualitative methodology.

Compared to my initial idea, the overall design is more streamlined. The survey portion of the study was getting too large, and DC said it could have stood on its own as a quantitative study. My intent with even administering a survey in the first place was to find students to participate in a qualitative interview process. Clearly, my big-picture thinking was running away from me again. Streamlining and sticking with one methodology is the better way to proceed.

So why, then, do I feel like a failure for quitting the mixed-method study? Perhaps the better question is: Why did I feel a need, in the first place, to do one of the the toughest dissertation methods on the planet when this could be relatively simple? Don't get me wrong, there's nothing simple about any dissertation method, but mixed-method studies are essentially two different dissertations merged together. All the advice I received going into this doctoral program was similar: "pick a topic you like and is simple so you can finish the dissertation quickly." I didn't listen. Why isn't something relatively simple good enough? I dunno.

At least I'm not starting over, and I'm grateful that I didn't get too far into this thing before realizing I had created a monster and that I'd spend the rest of my thirties as a graduate student. I should be happy about a simpler methodology, but it's not yet sitting well with me. I'll get there eventually.

Yang

Most of these words describe me, except for Summer. I don't like that much heat.

I Am More Yang

Masculine Creative Angry Spring Summer Morning Sun Space Active Wood Chocolate

Are You More Yin or Yang?

Update on The Tree

I have an update on the recent post where I discussed our Christmas tree. I feel a little embarrassed I'm even spending more time on this topic, but I'm beaming with pride for my wife right about now. You'll see why if you keep reading.

We were heartbroken and felt guilty when we disposed of said tree. I mean, we killed A TREE so we could hang a few ornaments and lights on it for about 7 days. I still can't believe it. We paid money to have someone chop it down for us, exposing its innards and taking an oxygen source away from the world, specifically for this purpose. Wow. So when we were disposing of said tree at the recycling center (the proper, environmental thing to do, of course) (oh my God), we pretty much decided then and there that we'll never do that again.

Wife said she often has heard of major after-Christmas sales on the nice fake trees that come with lights already strung on them. They tend to cost in the $100 range, but she wanted to wait for a sale. Sales are good.

Last week Wife was at Chain Grocery Store Near Our House (CGSNOH), and she saw those trees on sale for $25. Not too bad. They weren't quite the fullest-looking trees, and it was pretty easy to see the trunk. Still, it's JUST a plastic Christmas tree, and with ornaments and other crap covering it, it should look OK. At least it was pre-lit, and at least it was only $25. But neither of us thought about it again, and we forgot about it till today.

Today, the trees were on sale, marked down again. They were only $10. We now own said tree. Loving the wife's financial savvy and patience. I feel like we beat the Christmas machine at its own game. Too bad we had to commit a cardinal sin against the Earth before we learned our lesson, but that's OK. Someday I'll stop feeling guilty about it. Maybe.

Horoscope

I hardly EVER read my horoscope, and I don't know what prompted me to do so today. However, I found it helpful and frighteningly close to being relevant for me right now, so figured I'd put it here.

Taurus (April 20-May 20) - Conditions looks exceptionally good concerning a project that has suffered a loss of progress lately. If you get back to it now and are tenacious, you can make up for lost time.

Last week was not my best week in terms of dissertation progress, so this was relevant. So, I took its advice and buckled down today in my campus office.

I finalized two sets of questions. First, I decided upon the ones I'll use for my questionnaire. I've reduced a rather long extant questionnaire to something more manageable. What took me a while was developing my "theoretically-sound rationale" for choosing these particular questions. Second, I wrote the 14-or-so questions I'll use in my semi-structured interview protocol (Patton, 2002), when I interview a handful of the higher-scoring respondents to my questionnaire.

Now I just have to write chapter 3. I got page 1 done today...that's hopefully the hardest part. Yeah, uh keep dreaming Rob.

Sometimes I feel like this is actually going really well. And then for some reason, that gets so overwhelming that I literately need to leave the room for a couple of minutes. I used to think that was a really silly way to react until I realized I'm not the only one who feels this way. I have a colleague who understands these feelings, only her reaction is that she thinks she thinks she's going to throw up. Last week, I said to her, "I think this is finally coming together." Her response: "That's great. Do you feel like you're going to throw up?" "No," I said, "but I had to leave the room and put this latest draft in the freezer." "Oh, OK," she replied, as if this was all just normal behavior. Well, if more than one person understands these feelings, then in my book it IS normal behavior!

My Window is Open

It's January 5, I'm in the Midwest, and I just opened my office's window because it's 63 degrees. What the f#$%???

Zoo in December

I completely forgot to post our pictures from a mid-December trip to the zoo. Click the pic below to see the rest of the online album. A few really good pictures of Moose and Wife in there (a few of yours truly as well).

zoo

That day we traveled up to Large City to the North to hang out with a friend who was in from out of town. Then we got Moose's hair cut and went to the zoo. Good trip!

Happy New Year

Happy New Year!

We had a fun time with some friends over here at Chesterley last night. Laughed and ate and laughed and ate till we kicked everyone out at 12:15 AM since Moose has been waking us up extra early lately. A good time was had by all.

Check out Wife's latest post for a good description of our trip out for lunch with the same group of friends. I no longer really care all that much about others' reactions to Moose when we're out and about. I'm proud of him and I'm not afraid to show him off, odd noises and funny hand motions and all. I'm also thankful for the good friends who understand all this stuff and a few accepting people we happen to meet when we're out & about.

The tree

We're taking down our Christmas tree sometime tomorrow. Figured I'd post this short album of tree decorating pictures up before then.

A funny thing happened: I was crawling around on the floor trying to water the tree the other day, and I pulled on the base or something a little too hard. Next thing I know, I hear my mother-in-law shouting "Tree! Tree!" I'm not aware that the darn thing is falling over on top of me till needles and ornaments start coming down like a hailstorm. Fortunately, Wife was only a couple of steps away and was able to save the thing from going completely horizontal. That's a first for our family! After we up-righted the tree and re-decorated it, it never really quite looked as good as it does in this album. It has a pretty good lean to the left. Oh well.

Anyhow, here's the album.

christmastree06

Mappy Chrismakuh/Herry Hannumas

When I was younger, my bi-religional (bi-religional?) family would use these phrases to ring in the winter holiday season. Herry Hannumas was my personal fave.

Speaking of which, I completely missed Hannukah this year. This is unfortunate because for me Hannukah is more of a celebration of God than Christmas is, even though Hannukah isn't all that "important" in the Jewish faith. Don't get me wrong, I think the American Christmas is a whole bunch of fun, but the part one celebrates at home is essentially a big birthday party. Doesn't do much for me in the god department, but that's just me. The home festivities themselves are fun, I love the music, and my wife does a wonderful job of decorating our home with festive things. So, I'm thankful for the season and the various tidbits therein, but I'm kicking myself for not at least taking out the menorah and lighting a candle or two. My own darn fault on that one. Bah humbug. At least we'll hit church tomorrow (twice, I think?), so there will be some religion in the season tomorrow. This is good. I don't mind a little liberal religion one bit.

I've not written here in the blog most of the month. But the dissertation is going well, believe it or not. Chapter 1 is revised already, chapter 2 is into DC (the ball is in her court to give me feedback), and I've created much of the interview protocol that I'll write about in chapter 3. That chapter should go smoothly as soon as I find time to write it. Finding the proper balance among dissertation work, family work, and work-work continues to be a challenge, but overall I've no complaints.

Wife's family arrived here last night and will stay through Christmas. Then wife & I head to see my family in Chicago for a few days while parents of wife stay here with Moose (a VERY nice Christmas present!).

We actually got a "real" Christmas tree this year that was chopped down yesteday. It just went up in the livingroom/dining room/music room, so I need to run and help decorate. Bye.

Happy Christmas, too!

Moose hung out with Santa

I completely forgot to post this last week. The day after Thanksgiving, Wife and my mother took Moose shopping around SCT (not at any of the big-box stores at 5:00 AM, mind you).

They had a chance to stop & see Santa. If they hadn't taken these pictures, I never would have believed that Moose actually interacted with this strange man in the fake beard. He's making a ton of progress lately - very exciting to see.

santa2006

Writing and Holiday Preparation

I cranked yesterday, thank God. Got lots of writing done, and am attempting to do the same this afternoon. In the past hour or so I've only written another paragraph and done a bit more moving around of other paragraphs. I guess this is part of the whole deal. It may never end, but if it does I've certainly come much closer to it in the past couple of days.

I also have the warm fuzzies I usually experience preparing for the winter holidays with Wife. We decorate the house a bit, play some of our holiday music that we only take out in December, that sort of thing. We sang "O Come O Come Emmanuel" at church this morning, which reminds me of college and fun times singing in the Christmas Carols & Scripture concert each year. No doubt about it, it's Advent out. I do enjoy this time of year.

It's funny: I now associate these Advent weekends with the time when I hunker down and write final papers till my wrists hurt. For some reason, today's afternoon solitude in my home office/prison is actually adding to the warm fuzzies. Well that's sort of messed up, isn't it?! But, this is my fifth December in a row doing this sort of thing, so it's becoming sort of a tradition, I suppose. And I actually don't mind it this year - it's that "do or die" time of year with my academics. Not that anything academic could really ever KILL me, but, well you know what I mean. Life's pretty simple right now: I just have a SHITLOAD of work to do in the next two weeks.

Guess I should get back to it, then. Just had to share these weird thoughts & feelings of "comfort & joy" along with fervish writing. I am SUCH a nerd.

Behind, yet thankful

We had a thankful holiday weekend here at Chesterley. My mom came in from Chicago and we all a lovely time. My mom is a very good photographer, and she attempted to snap several shots in an effort to help us get find a greeting card photo. See the album linked here if you're interested. Only a couple turned out OK, but of course either my eyes are closed too much, open too much, or Moose is looking the other way. C'est la vie, I suppose. Wife looks fantastic in all of the pictures, of course!

SCT has a neat tradition of lighting up the courthouse square for the holidays on the night after Thanksgiving. We went for the official lighting event for the first time this year. Pictures of that are also in the album linked here. Really is quite beautiful.

I got a little bit more done on the diss, but not as much as I had hoped. So, I'm feeling behind, but I suppose it's understandable. I'm thankful for many, many things, and this weekend was a time to celebrate those. Sure the damn diss is still hanging over my head, but I'm not really stressed about it today. However, my sense of awareness is heightened that time for the completion of the proposal is running out quickly if I indeed want to collect data next semester. So, I guess I have a mixture of emotions today, but remarkably none of those involve stress. Guess we all needed the holiday.

Thanx2006

Any thoughts on which picture(s) to use for the holiday photo? Speak up!

Geeky part: Also, am still deciding whether or not to keep using the Google Picasa feature for posting these, or if I should fork over the $25 for a Flickr "pro" account to share pictures more widely. Hmm...

Feedback Received on Draft 1

...and it was good! And now I know I need to kick my @ss into gear, FAST, if I want a chance in hell of collecting data by the end of the year.

Tasks:

1. Tweak chapter 1 (glad I'm in the tweaking stage now)
2. Finish chapter 2 (she told me I don't have to do as much as I thought...but I do still have a bit left to do)
3. Draft chapter 3 (this won't be nearly as tough as chapter 2)
4. Get a committee together (oh yeah, THAT)

If I can get a draft of all of this by November 27 (um, that would be 10 days from now), I'll feel MUCH better.

The light at the tunnel has gotten a bit brighter. Can I really pull this together between now and the end of the year? Well, I've had more end-of-semester work to do in the past, so if I can kick up the work gear just a bit for this final push, I should be good to go.

Keep your fingers crossed.

Thanksgiving is Next Week?

I shudder to think that we're already nearing the time when seeing holiday decorations is appropriate and not too early.

I was out of town at the end of last week and into the weekend. It was a stellar experience, truly one of the highlights of my doc student career. I attended a conference, well more of a workshop, that explored creating a new research domain around the notion of creativity. The focus was on participation in the arts when in college: right up my alley. And I'm making a pretty major connection between creativity and some other concepts in my dissertation, so this was a WAY COOL experience. I have much more to say about it, but I'm not yet ready to share those thoughts here.

Now I need to synthesize all this information and get the damn lit review done. I think I'm almost there, and I meet with DC on Friday to get my first round of feedback on the first 20 pages I gave her a few weeks ago. Since then I've written another 15 pages or so, and hopefully that will increase by a few more pages between now and Friday as well. Gotta get these thoughts out of my head and get the literature cited.

The looming Thanksgiving date is a bit daunting. If I don't finish the proposal by the end of the year and start collecting data next semester, then I'll either need to change my entire topic or wait an entire year to collect data: I'm attempting to research seniors in their last semester of college: um, that sorta starts in two months. I don't want to wait a year.

I suppose things could be worse. As far as I know, I'm not dying anytime soon from some unknown disease (except maybe Wife may wring my neck if I don't get this done soon). But I am so sick of having this hanging over my head. Just want it done.

I'm glad the weather has finally turned cold. Makes me want to hit a pub and drink several thick beers with friends and wife. There's no time for this, I realize, but it's what I like to do on rainy cold grey Midwestern days like today.

Wait, it's only 10AM and I'm thinking about beer? This is bad!

Elekshun Dae

I haven't really ever posted anything political on this blog. I guess expostulating on the state of world affairs isn't my strength, so I don't attempt to do it very often. However, I vote in every election and feel very strongly about doing so. I come from a line of relatives who were highly involved with various civic responsibilities, though thankfully (my opinion) none of them ever really ran for an actual political office. My parents and grandparents always seemed to be volunteering their time for the betterment of society in some way shape or form. My grandmother, especially, continued this sort of work until just before her death at age 98, earlier this year. I have yet to meet another with the same sort of "do it to improve society" determination that she had.

Growing up in this "engaged" family (ack, did I just say engaged?), I always thought it was normal for people to get involved in a cause, even if it meant working with those who held different political or religious beliefs (hell, my family had, at minimum, two very different religions within itself). Disagreement was just a part of a good conversation. Not only was it acceptable, in fact it was expected. Discussing where people differed in their views was a crucial part of my childhood education. Don't get me wrong: this wasn't always easy, and sometimes it really sucked, but this sort of thing taught me a great deal.

I realized something sort of funny a few weeks ago while hanging out with a buddy who was the best man in our wedding. If I based my friendships on agreement in political affiliation, I literally would have had NO groomsmen! These are four of my very closest friends, two from high school and two from college. I don't think it occurred to any of the five of us that our friendship was somehow impacted by my "different" political views. I guess we're all able to see a little bit of both sides of political arguments, and we don't let it get in the way. I can pick right up with any of these guys at a moment's notice, no matter the time, place or situation. In spite of their unfortunate thoughts on certain issues (and they're all WRONG! haha), I can't imagine not having these four guys as good friends.

And yet it seems this country is completely torn apart by politics. Why? Is it turning into a civil war of sorts? I'm not sure. What I do know is that I think our society needs to learn how to have a good, healthy argument without completely losing its cool. We all need to be more comfortable disagreeing with each other. Where's the joy in a good discussion unless there's disagreement leading toward growth? I don't think I'm being too idealistic when I ask this last question.

Well, the election coverage on the network television station I tend to watch started about 50 minutes ago, so I should go see what's going on. I hate this part of the night, but I'm looking forward to the end of the political advertisements and telephone calls.

The Deadline Loomethed and Passethed

Earlier today I turned in a draft to CPA Kim, the one who works across the hall from me and is helping me find the extrinsic motivation to kick ass on the proposal. She gave me an "incomplete," which was appropriate, but I was grateful for the deadline to actually make myself progress. Being accountable to someone else (funny word choice in "accountable," since she's a CPA) (I digress) is what made all the difference.

She moved the deadline back to next Wednesday, the day before I go out of town to confer at a conference. I now have only two sections left of Chapter 2 to write before going back and trying to make better connections between the sections. The goal is to have the two sections written before the end of the morning on Wednesday. Shouldn't be nearly as tough as the first portion I've already completed, because these last two sections deal with areas I've already read about. The first two sections involved exploring some new territory. I anticipate doing some editing on the plane to & from the conference and in the late evenings at the hotel.

"It" is getting easier. Finding the inner energy to get this done and not take it so damn seriously is how I'm defining the "it" in this case. The light at the tunnel's end is getting brighter each day, and I think that's my main motivation at this point. I can practically taste what life will be like when I'm done. That sort of sounds pathetic, because it seems these last four plus years are culminating into an attitude of "just get it done!" Not sure I like that too much. On the other hand, it's a hell of a lot better than sitting around and basking in academic masturbation, i.e. having great thoughts but making no progress whatsoever. Tee hee.

"It's Friday out," and I need to finish up a project at work before going home to mow the lawn/rake the leaves. Just thought I'd get this thought out of my head before the day's end. K, bye.

National Novel Writing Month

Well shit. I mean, isn't a dissertation nothing more than a really really organized novel? Perhaps I should join this group on the National Novel Writing Month. I could be done with the proposal before December hits.

What's ironic is that I clicked on the web site for the organization (www.nanowrimo.org) and the page isn't working. How am I supposed write my dissertation in a month if the site is down?? It's almost the end of November 1 - I only have 29 more days!!! ACK!

OK people, gimme a fuckin' break and let's get real. I mean, are we expected to quit our jobs and do nothing but write a book? Are we living in fantasy land? Oh yeah...oh SHIT. I quit my job over four years ago to start this degree. Forgot about that detail.

[Rob goes to crawl into a hole now and ponder this fantasy land life he's been living much too long...]

Looming Deadline

With the exception of the post from last Tuesday that just went up, I realize I haven't written in a while. So, hi.

A work colleague, who has already finished her higher education profection, is wonderful about checking in on me just about each day to help me be accountable that I'm actually getting things done on the diss. I'd say it's working. I turned in about 20 pages of the diss to DC on Monday. It's a large portion of chapter 1 and a medium-sized portion of chapter 2. Sounds like I'm ordering fries: I'd like a large please! Oops - digression. Anyhow, that experience was sort of scary in some ways, but cathartic in others. At long last, the feedback loop has been opened. I won't hear from DC for a while, but knowing she has a good chunk of the first two chapters is making me more comfortable with the possibility of sharing it with other colleagues I trust. Feedback would be a welcome change.

Anyhow, said work colleague from the preceding paragraph has set a firm deadline for me and another doc student for a draft of the entire proposal, or dissertation chapters 1-3, on her desk at this time one week from today. This is a good thing: I need the extrinsic motivation (even though it's "weaker") to fuel the stronger, more crucial intrinsic motivation (Deci & Ryan, 1985). Will I ever again be able to write something without citing it (Harvey & Katz, 1985)?

Guess I'll be focused this weekend in my on-campus office. Oh joy. But it'll be worth it if I can actually get something done by next week. Perhaps I should start chapter 3? YIKES!!!

Deci, E. L., & Ryan, R. M. (1985). Intrinsic motivation and self-determination in human behavior. New York: Plenum Press.

Harvey, J. C., & Katz, C. (1985). If I'm so successful, why do I feel like a fake? The impostor phenomenon. New York: St. Martin's Press.

Writing Sojourn

I wrote this at 10:00 AM last Tuesday, but I wasn't connected to the Internet at the time, and I haven't had a chance to post it till now.

canopy

Today I’m at the cabin of family friends in the next county over from SCT. They are new friends, actually: he is our minister who moved to town July 1 of this year. We quickly struck up a friendship and are still getting to know each other. Jack has his Ph.D., and the minute he realized I was working on my dissertation, he and his wife offered their cabin in the woods to me as an occasional retreat from it all…to write write write and get this thing done.

It seems to be working out just fine. I rearranged my schedule to take some time off from work. 45 minutes later, here I am in the woods. Beautiful time to be here, with the fall leaves and such. The location is the top of a hill covered with tall trees, accessible by a small gravel road leading to an even smaller gravel driveway that splits off an even lesser travel fork of said driveway, and you need to just know just which fork to take to find the place. It’s truly quiet and peaceful, therefore. No internet access, my cell phone hardly works, nothing. All the comforts of home, otherwise: running water, heat, & electricity. I’m glad it all works.

My grandmother lived in the woods for so many years, but I was never alone at her place till just before she died and I stopped by to take some pictures. Being alone here is a bit odd, I’ll admit, but also very nice.

First of all, I could literally walk around naked and not worry about being arrested for indecent exposure (and believe you me, that would truly be indecent). Can’t see another person out of any window. Nothing but trees. Ah, nice. Second, I suddenly have a very heavy reliance on my car, and I realize that I’m in desperate need of an oil change and the like. I wouldn’t neglect my car if I lived out here all the time, that’s for sure.

Third, it’s nice to just be completely myself and completely alone. This is a rare thing. Even the writing retreat in Chicago was in the middle of suburbia, and there were some distractions. The only distraction here is nature, which is quite attractive I must add. But life is simple today. Write write write, and then hopefully have time to reward myself by taking a hike or just looking out the window. I sorta like this.

But I sorta don’t. There is a lot of pressure to finish this up and “move on” with life. Frankly I’d rather be out here to relax instead of work. Wife wanted to come with me, saying she was jealous of my time here alone in the woods. I said to her that if she wanted the pressure of having the family rely on me to finish this up, then she could take it. Probably wasn’t my finest moment, but my point was that this isn’t all that fun. I would rather be here with her. Coming to the woods to work is about as much fun as traveling across the world to see a new country, only to fine oneself confined to a strip mall doing the same old thing you always do.

I have no complaints about this opportunity to work here in the woods, and I look forward to another day when I could come back to do so again. But I really look forward to just coming here for a day of peace and quiet with my family in tow. Now THAT will be nice.

Fun Ride

Below is a link to pictures from yesterday at a horse show at the theraputic riding place where Moose goes once per week. He did a stunning job, and he even clapped for himself at the appropriate moment (picture 14). I couldn't believe it! Many of the pictures are blurry since we weren't allowed to use the flash.

By the way, I'm considering switching my picture storage over to Picasaweb from Flickr, since I'm reaching my limit at Flickr and would have to start paying if I want to store more stuff. I really like Flickr, but why pay for picture storage when there are other options? Anyone who has more insight into this stuff than I do, please share your thoughts. Oh, and enjoy these fun, but blurry pics!

pals_fun_ride

Blemish

If I'm 35 years old, then why do I have the biggest zit of my entire life just left of center at the end of my nose??

Circle of Support - 1st Meeting

On Wednesday night we had the first meeting of Moose's Circle of Support. I wrote about this a while back. It was an amazing experience. One of the many things Wife and I recall from our wedding was the incredible feeling of support we felt from our families and friends who gathered from all over the country for the event. In many ways we felt a similar feeling the other night when the Circle got together for the first time.

Similar to the wedding invite list, it wasn't easy to determine who we wanted to invite to the circle group. Many of our good friends are not in this group, and it was tough to make that decision. But we wanted the members to have developed a good relationship with us AND with Moose. There are a couple of exceptions to this. A woman at our church has a 40-something-old son with Autism. She doesn't know Moose very well, but her words have always been inspirational to us. She raised her son here in SCT, so we figured she'd be an interesting addition to the group. She was true to form in the meeting: truly inspirational! About 18 people came to the first meeting, and the ages range from 14 up through about 80. Really fascinating group of people.

What's been sticking with me is this picture and the meaning behind it:


We ALL have circles like these around us. The first circle represents those closest to us, like our close relatives, our partner, or our very closest friends who know all the deep secrets about us. The second circle is our group of friends. The third circle represents the activities in which we participate; for me this is my church choir, the office where I work, organizations I belong to, and so forth. The fourth circle consists of those you pay to be in your life, like our doctors, dentists, the plumber, the dude I need to hire to clean my second-floor gutters this fall...

So who's in your second circle, and even in your first? How did you meet them? Aside from your family members, you met your people in your third circle: the things in which you can participate.

For an autistic person where social skills are comprised, the ability to join in a third-circle participatory activity is compromised as well. How will Moose make friends? Will he date? Who will hang out with him? And MUCH later on down the road (hopefully), who will join his circle of intimacy after Wife and I die? Well, let's face it, he would have to rely on Circle 4 folks: those we'll pay to help him out along the way. That's all well and good, but his caregivers will want to go home at the end of the day and be with their own circle 1 and 2 people, so where would that leave Moose? What kind of life could he lead?

The main point of the Circle of Support, therefore, is to help create a life of better quality for Moose. It's to create a group in which he will be able to participate, eventually. It's to help him build up that crucial Circle 1 and 2. And, frankly, it's going to allow Wife and me to maintain a Circle 2 ourselves. There are times we feel our closest friends are Moose's caregivers, because they "get it." But we realize the more friends we can have on board in this circle, the more they will "get it" too. And that will make all the difference for us, and for Moose.

We are blessed with a fantastic facilitator, a woman who has been part of numerous types of these Circles for many years. She anticipates our questions and can go with the flow no matter what happens. And the funny thing is: she already knew four or five of the members in our Circle, mostly due to personal friendship connections and not just her own professional ones. Amazing, the coincidence of that! She's quickly becoming a good friend to us.

So it was a very big, very emotional evening, and we're excited for all the possibilities. The group will meet only about once per quarter, but we'll keep in touch regularly via e-mail and our every-day lives. I'm not sure we'll ever want to move away from SCT, since this Circle of Support would take years to create in a new town. We feel like we're in the right place at the right time. Not quite sure how that happened, but I'm not going to question it one bit!

Defining the Bricks

I guess I never realized how technical the literature review construction process is. Had I realized this earlier, I may have completed this chapter long ago. Oh well: such is the learning process for me. I need to experience something to really learn about how I'll handle it.

I enjoy thinking in the abstract, but for some reason my confidence level with synthesizing constructs between works of literature has been low. Horribly low. Perhaps I'm a slow reader and felt behind others in during my time in coursework on making these connections. However I'm usually able to meet, and dare I say exceed, expectations when it was time to write papers, take exams, and so forth.

What's odd is that when embarking on a paper or other writing project, I first feel more comfortable writing about something straightforward and technical. Perhaps it's the "check it off the list" factor. When I've written something technical, there's a logical beginning, middle, and end, and when complete I can check it off the list.

However,when writing papers for courses, there was usually the assumption that the professor had already read most of what I'll be citing in the paper. There was very little need to be detailed in the literature review process for smaller papers. Otherwise I'd receive a comment from the professor like, "I already know this! No need to explain it here!" So instead of writing down the basics and editing them out later on, I would procrastinate on papers because I wouldn't know where to start. I would try to be conceptual right off the bat, though I'd rather start with the technical and move toward the conceptual. That would always throw me off kilter till I actually got into the writing process.

In my mind, the dissertation literature review chapter was this huge wasteland of philosophy and theory, connected by bits and pieces of literature that I'm supposed to be able to recall off the top of my head. Now I realize it's silly to think this way. After reading some other dissertation lit reviews and considering the audience of a diverse committee of professors, I realize I can (and NEED to) include the details. As a result, I am flying through this chapter now, and it's due to the fact that I'm building the foundation of it brick by brick with summaries of literary works, many of which I've already read, some of which I have not. Even my reading rate is speeding up, however, because I have a direction. The process is pretty technical right now, and I like it so far.

I really look forward to the next step of being more conceptual, though, and I'm preparing for it. In the back of my mind, I keep asking myself, "why are you including this summary in here?" I take a few notes separately to answer that, knowing that later on I will need to go back, move the bricks around, and connect the concepts in a logical manner. That's where my favorite part comes in: being able to think in the abstract and use the basic concepts to bring out another idea.

Eureka, I think I've got it! Assemble the materials for building up the wall, but don't lay the bricks and fill in the mortar till later on. It seems so obvious now. I thought I would have learned this stuff before the 23rd grade?

On Aging

A while back I posted that my favorite cafe in town is closing. It is still slated to close and turn into another extension of our local food co-op, but for now it's still open and functioning as ever. I'm back here again for the first time in a while, and things are going well. Am probably on a roll to write another page or so before I have an eye doc appointment later this morning.

Near me sits on older man with a large book on his table. He's intently reading, and yet seems relaxed and secure in his old age. Here I sit at age 35, writing as quickly as I can to get this chapter finished, thinking of how much the completion of the degree will change my daily life without this large orangutan on my back. This gentleman doesn't seem to have a care in the world. Just having breakfast while reading a book. I mean, look, he's probably a world-famous endowed professor who has to run over to a seminar he's teaching, and he just read the entire 400 page book on his table in one sitting. But STILL: he looked serene. There are times when I can't wait to be old and settled in my life. I don't want to rush along the life process or anything (can you tell I'm writing about identity and self-authorship right now?), but there is something appealing to me about being in the later years of life and have "things" all settled. Ya know?

Don't get me wrong: I enjoying being "young" and I attempt to live in the present day. I guess I'm just acknowledging I have something to look forward to later in life.

Back to writing, feverishly.

Finding a rhythm

I wish this post was related to jazz, but alas it is not. Though I am listening to some cool vocal jazz radio right now, which is pretty damn cool.

I'm back in my on-campus office getting back into the rhythm I established last week. This should be good. Of course I left my flash drive at home (laptop is there too), so Wife just had to e-mail me my chapter 2 document from said flash drive. Nice going, Rob. Oh well, at least I got off my assets and get myself here early today.

I'm glad it's rainy & dreary today, so I can focus (ack, the sun is coming out...go away, Sun!). When I start working at work-work (i.e. my job) later this morning, I'm amazed to see that I don't have any appointments. [sigh of relief]

And away I go to keep on writing.

Writing Retreat 2: Complete

I'm home here in SCT again. I was up in the air about if I would come home today or tomorrow, but I decided I needed a fully 24 hours here at home before going back to the work routine. Man it's nice to come home to Wife and Moose. Moose was sleeping when I got here, and I think he's managed to grow a foot during the past week in my absence.

All in all, the week was a great success. I do not have a finished draft of chapter 2, but I'm pretty much done with the Identity section, and I have the rest of the chapter mapped out. For me, the hardest part is over. The rest now is just writing, and I can do that. I do need to continue to kick some dissertation ass in the next few weeks if I want an entire draft of the first three chapters done before Thanksgiving. Doable, certainly. The proposal ain't gonna be perfect, but it just might be done. Finally. Then the real fun begins: conducting interviews!

Onward and throughward...

Retreat 2, Day 4: Continuation of Identity stuff

But I'm almost done with identity....really! This is definitely going to be more than just four pages per section, but somehow I don't think this will be frowned upon by DC and others. Wrote a few more pages today, and I obtained a copy of Erikson's Identity and the Life Cycle to help out rounding out my theoretical knowledge. I'm finally feeling like a "scholar" with this stuff. Not trying to sound snooty or anything, but my brain is HUGE this week! haha.

Tomorrow will be one last push, and I'll decide if I'm going to stay here Saturday through the night or head back.

Had a nice dinner with sister & her family this evening - kind of spontaneous. "Rob, c'mon over and bring a salad." Who am I to turn that down. Sis even made brownies with gooey caramel on top (I am NOT losing w8 this week). I could get accustomed to living closer to them. This would require a well-paying job (it's CHICAGO) and a good special ed program for Moose. I'll keep dreaming...

To bed I go, high ho, high ho.

Wife's Blog

I now introduce Wife's very own blog site: http://chesterleyschild.blogspot.com/ . Already she has two posts as of last night, and I'd say she's doing quite well.

Retreat 2, Day 2: Identity Day ... again

True to form, "everything always takes longer!" That quote comes from numerous doc student colleagues who consistently say that any writing assignment takes longer than originally thought. So, ignore the days I assigned to the schedule in the previous post. I continue to work on the identity "paper" today. It's OK, I'm sort of enjoying it.

Sort of.

I realize I cannot write about every single identity theory ever written. I do think I'm going to end up erring on the side of writing, or at least researching, too much and then narrowing down. We shall see.

Saw an old friend last night after dropping by my sister's place. While I do enjoy living in SCT and the friends I've made there these past 4+ years, I miss having friends who have known me since, well, since I had hair! I value these long-term friends a great deal, so it was good to have the opportunity to have made the connection yesterday evening.

OK, back to it, then.

Retreat 2, Day 1: Four short papers

Greetings from Chicago, where it's five degrees colder than SCT, but at least it's sunny.

I've decided that I'm writing four short papers this week. I have four sections of the lit review to write, each on a different, yet related, topic. So, the goal is a rough draft per day for each topic. The topics are:

1. identity development (today)
2. creativity (Tuesday)
3. purpose (e.g. finding your life's purpose) (Wednesday)
4. engagement (e.g. involvement in the college experience. Not "engagement" as in diamond rings and all that) (Thursday)

They may not stay in this order in the final version of the lit review. I'll need to write an introduction and then later find good ways to connect the concepts together. Shouldn't be too tough once I get these basics written down.

I'm settled here in my mom's place. There are articles strewn about the floor (in neat, orderly, piles), and my box of books is nearby. All signs I'm getting something accomplished.

OK, it's time to profect the identity section now through the rest of the afternoon. Then, I'm hanging out with my sister and her family this evening, which'll be nice.

Rain and Preparation

Big-ass rain drops falleth down. But I'm content in my house, as is Lemming today, with Chester in his typical position sitting on my feet and Wife and Moose downstairs playing. I'll join them in a few moments.

I'm getting all geared up for the writing retreat, phase 2, which will start tomorrow assuming tornadoes don't blow away portions of the Interstate between here and Chicago. For a while I hear fear, trepidation, angst, and stress about this week. But hell, if I could write two quals questions in four days each, two weekends in a row, and still manage to pass, then surely I can take 6 or 7 days alone to nail out a good literature review draft. It doesn't even need to be a good draft...just a shitty draft.

Wife and I have a date tonight, just the two of us. We need that before I leave; am looking forward to it. Dinner out, and then we'll see "The Illusionist." Should be a good one. Do I really look like Paul Giamatti? Lots of people I know have said this to me recently.

I'll post again from Chicago in the next couple of days.

Writing

I think much of the problem with why I'm not writing (frankly, I'm just not doing it at this moment) is that it's so damn technical. For me, writing is more organic. Just start the fingers typing or get the pen in hand and see what happens. I've never had a problem with the creative process, but writing to someone else's specifications just pisses me off.

I know, NOT a good attitude when writing a dissertation! But in my blog I do what I want. So there.

How much more am I really going to learn between now and when I finish the study? Probably not a great deal. I will have jumped through the hoops and will be eligible to join The Club, though. I realize the benefits associated with this. But when there are days that I'm not entirely certain what I'll DO after joining said Club, the motivation to push onward is slim to none.

Groan.

This writing retreat next week will really kick my ass (and my ass needs a couple of good kicks), but I'm looking forward to a simple life of having little else to do but this research. Of course, I just realized some of the simplicity went out the window. I'm also going to be a caretaker of the place I'm staying in, and did I mention it's for sale? They scheduled a mid-week open house while I'm there. HELLO?? Little do they know I sit around in my boxers when I write, so boy are they in for a show.

Oh yeah, my minor advisor stopped by my office yesterday, not to see me, but because he was on the wrong floor of my building. Nice. Of course he very loudly said, "Rob! How's your dissertation??" I tried to avoid explaining my procrastination and go more with the "life happens" excuses, but this is a man who has been a professor in three unrelated disciplines during his career. He basically looked at me with the, "What the fuck? Just write the paper!" expression that I knew he would. He's right though. And deep down in his own little way he is supportive. He did give me some good advice in his own little way.

Groan.

Does anyone else besides me see the relationship between procrastination and masturbation? The process of doing the activity is fun, but in the end you're still right back where you started.

OK, I can't believe I just wrote that.