Visitors and Brains!
Lovely impromptu visit was had last night with very dear people, some of whom live entirely too far away nowadays (you know who you are!). It was so good to see all of you, particularly beautiful Aurora! Apologies for not being able to stay awake past 11-ish; I really am regressing into toddlerhood. Heaven knows it can't be age, because old people are notorious for not sleeping (though I'm certain that has something to do with the proximity of death).
I'm still busily playing catch-up with two days off of work. Technical difficulties continue unabated, but help, I am assured, is on the way.
Can I even begin to express how excited I am about the upcoming semester?!? It would stretch all of my creative faculties, and they are a bit out of shape, so I don't really want to do that to them. Certainly it's not as if they deserve it. There will be a whole new set of undergrads for me to amuse myself with. I find that the first week or two is the hardest, because the shrill of it all is pretty grating... but this eases into a very comfortable place, and I end up having a sort of maternal fondness for all their drama. Perhaps I'm overly sympathetic, but I think it's adorable.
I admit my opinion may be influenced by the fact that they like to bring me chocolates and are convinced that I'm really twenty seven. (Therefore so very much older and wiser!) I admit to being low enough to enjoy such cheap flattery. Can't be helped.
But let's be serious for a moment here: it's not my classmates that keep me coming back for more. It's the studies. It's the incredible joy of finding connections in unlikely places, the urge to keep digging that more often than not unearths the rewards that go only to the insatiably curious. It's the knowing that great minds have come before you, and all you have to do is marinate in their juices a while on the off chance that maybe some of it will become encoded in your own system, and you can use it to build something new. For as much utter bullshit that's churned out in the name of academics, there are moments of pure brain buzz, generated from a core passion for finding stuff out. It's a beautiful high.
At least, that's why I'm there.
I'm still busily playing catch-up with two days off of work. Technical difficulties continue unabated, but help, I am assured, is on the way.
Can I even begin to express how excited I am about the upcoming semester?!? It would stretch all of my creative faculties, and they are a bit out of shape, so I don't really want to do that to them. Certainly it's not as if they deserve it. There will be a whole new set of undergrads for me to amuse myself with. I find that the first week or two is the hardest, because the shrill of it all is pretty grating... but this eases into a very comfortable place, and I end up having a sort of maternal fondness for all their drama. Perhaps I'm overly sympathetic, but I think it's adorable.
I admit my opinion may be influenced by the fact that they like to bring me chocolates and are convinced that I'm really twenty seven. (Therefore so very much older and wiser!) I admit to being low enough to enjoy such cheap flattery. Can't be helped.
But let's be serious for a moment here: it's not my classmates that keep me coming back for more. It's the studies. It's the incredible joy of finding connections in unlikely places, the urge to keep digging that more often than not unearths the rewards that go only to the insatiably curious. It's the knowing that great minds have come before you, and all you have to do is marinate in their juices a while on the off chance that maybe some of it will become encoded in your own system, and you can use it to build something new. For as much utter bullshit that's churned out in the name of academics, there are moments of pure brain buzz, generated from a core passion for finding stuff out. It's a beautiful high.
At least, that's why I'm there.