it all comes down to Priorities. period.

Ah, the irony of the world. I'm finally feeling interested and ready to get back into the swing of dissertation writing, and have made an earnest decision to work at this and finish once and for all, and NOW is the time my adviser has chosen to finally come down on me for my slow progress. Good timing, eh?! I've been nervously waiting during the last 2 years for her to drop me like a hot potato, and yet she's responded to each email I've sent her with patient support. Strange. For those who know her, well, you know her. Enough said. For those who don't, she is a very intense person. She's career/professionally-driven, a respected, committed scholar and intellectual, and she takes few prisoners. She has made being an anthropologist her entire life, and aside from her partner (also a well-respected scholar who co-directs a scholarly institute with her) and a few pets, she has few outside distractions to keep her from her work. You rarely have to guess at what Virginia is thinking, or at least, what she thinks of you. She's pretty much ignored my two pregnancies and has never asked how my children are doing, or if having a family has altered my professional goals. She strives to be a mentor, but only on the intellectual front. God forbid you have other life priorities, or perhaps some unexpected life events, or you may not be in her limelight anymore. I politely sent her an email last week notifying her of the birth of my second child, and also to let her know that I've put Jack into daycare part-time so that I can finally finish the dissertation within the next year. Her response was slightly full of doom. I'm not sure she'll stay my adviser at this point, so I may soon be on the search for a new chair for my committee. At this point in the game that is a difficult prospect for many reasons, not the least of which being that many of the faculty at UI when I was there have now retired or moved on to new universities. I don't know most of the new people, nor do they know me since I'm not even living in IC anymore. For now my plan is to just keep working on my stuff until I find out for sure if I need to worry about this other administrative crap. The fun never ends in academia, folks. Just another reason to finish this thing and run as fast as hell in the other direction.

On the homefront, our father's day breakfast was less than thrilling. How do I sum it up... let's just say that upon leaving the restaurant, the last words I heard (from the mouth of another patron) were, "Now, THAT'S why I never had kids." Scratch La Mie off the list of acceptable public places to take Jack. Childless people have even less patience for 2-year-old antics than the parents of said toddlers do.