Well, it’s not the weekend, it’s Wednesday. And it’s no party over here – we have a sick Bub, a sick Hub, and an exhausted Wif.

We have been pretty much MIA on the blog, which is surprising because you’d expect that for an academic like me the summer would be free and easy with all the time in the world to write. Ever since I finished my dissertation, writing and I have stopped being friends. Even writing an email seems daunting at times.

To be honest, I’m not sure what to do about the blog. I like the idea of it, but it takes a lot of work. I’m starting a new job in August as a full-time faculty member and I’m running some initiatives that take a lot of effort, probably some of those efforts in the writing and promoting area. We have an active and wonderful toddler who deserves every second of our attention when we’re not at work. We have a marriage to work on, because as those of you who are married know, it takes effort. I started exercising again after long last – up to running two and half miles! I thought I’d never run again when I was sick, but I really started missing it hardcore and made a commitment to myself that I could start running again. And we have goals we’d like to meet – maybe start saving for a vacation house, maybe even take a trip by ourselves.

Hub told me not to throw in the towel on the blog, to just give it a second, and so that is what I’m going to do. Maybe when I have enough distance from the dissertation I’ll feel more like writing. It’s funny that while writing the dissertation I could post. I initially started my first blog to help me write and think about educational policy issues while working on my graduate degree. So it makes sense that in my mind the two things are related.

I feel like I’m coming out of a tunnel. It feels ungrateful to say that with all that’s happened in the past year for me professionally, I feel apathetic at best and downright depressed at worst. I completed my doctorate. I got a faculty appointment and will get to create an amazing (well, that’s the plan, anyway) educational experience for every undergraduate student at my school. People call me “Dr.” now. I really want, with all my heart, to be happy about this but I just feel nothing… and scared that I’m not going to live up to the challenge. Chalk it up to impostor syndrome – which I thought was supposed to be done by the time you actually walked across the stage and they read the title of your dissertation.

 

OH WAIT, they didn’t read the titles of our dissertations at our graduation. I know, I know, I’m being random. BUT STILL. They could have read the stinking title of the thing.

I’m going to aim for perhaps starting to post again once a week or so, just to give it the ol’ college try before I make up my mind about what to do. And maybe writing about feeling sort of “meh” about finishing my doctorate and having all my dreams come true (seriously), I can regain my sense of gratitude that the universe has been so good to me.

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