Every time I do freewriting, (which should be every day and is not), it’s basically “OMG CHANGE IS SO HARD I HAVE SO MUCH PSYCHIC UPHEAVAL”. Change is really fucking hard. Uncertainty is hard. Not totally calling the shots in terms of where you live and everything in your life is also really hard.
I have funding to finish my dissertation this year, and it keeps me from feeling you know, unemployed and justifies the hours Letty spends in her daycare/preschool. I know it’s somewhat common for people in the humanities to move around while writing the diss, but it’s awful! Being somewhere new, where no one has any evidence that you are actually a productive member of society, much less an intellectual, is hardly worth it. On submissions to a conference recently, I contemplated writing “housewife” as my affiliation.
But that’s the thing about change and upheaval. Going through the motions, saying what you are, even if you hardly believe it anymore, is really useful.
