Thursday, January 31, 2019

20190131.0430

The end of another month has come, and I'll be shifting my focus again, beginning tomorrow. As I think I've noted, I'll be back to work on my hymns against the Stupid God, and there are enough of its activities about to prompt any number of songs. I do not know that any other voices will take them up, I do not know that they will ever be set to any tune or scored for polyphonic presentation, but I will continue to write the lyrics for them until there is no more cause for it. And the day that there is no more cause for such will be long in coming, I know.
I will not say it has not been without challenge, putting together commentaries--I probably overstate the matter to call what I've been writing here "essays"--each day. I've not always had the time with each piece that I would like, or the uninterrupted time with each that I would prefer; the writing's proceeded in fits and starts, and I worry that that haphazard composition has shown up more than it has not. But I keep in mind that this webspace is a performed practice for me, one that I open to public view but without the expectation of excellence or even proficiency, which I am sure can be read to convey some message I probably ought to avoid. Rather, I would prefer to think of this as a place where I can open myself in some ways to some people, and if I am poked in the parts of me I show, I learn where I can become yet better.
I need to be better yet, indeed. Whatever pride I might or might not take in what I do when I do it, I know that my efforts do not suffice to my needs and those of the people for whom I care. What I do does not bring in what I would have it do, and what I do bring in is not enough to offer those I love the things they want--and I am concerned that it is not enough to give them what they need. I know I am not alone in the effort of maintaining the household, but I cannot help but feel that I need to do more to carry that burden so that others can enjoy themselves more. And if I practice here enough, perhaps I can come to a point where this sort of effort is itself the avenue of support; it might not make me happy, but I can stand to not be if I am ensuring that certain others have a better chance to be so.
In any event, it is time for me to take a break from doing this kind of thing, time for me to shift my focus once again. I am likely overdue, in terms of the quality of what I have been doing, but I try to hold to what I say I will do, and I seem to have been setting for myself the goal of a month at a time. I know the upcoming month is a short one, and I can hope there will be some benefit to that; I know also the month that will follow it is a longer one, and I can hope to be ready to meet it when its own time comes.

Wednesday, January 30, 2019

20190130.0430

It seems I come back again and again to the topic of writing, in this webspace and in others I maintain. It is a fitting enough topic, to be sure; the very fact of this webspace marks me as a writer, and that mark is made bolder and more emphatic by the work I do in the several other venues where I write. Too, I continue to teach writing, although I seem to be doing less and less of that as time goes on; I do not carry nearly the course load now that I once did, and if I do not earn as much money from my teaching as I did, nor am I as dependent upon that money for my livelihood. I mean, I do still need the money, but not with the same kind of hungry need I have needed it in days gone by. And I am grateful for that.
One thing that I am often at pains to get my students to do is revise their own work, either before the initial submission or as a revision of an assignment already submitted. At other schools where I've taught, I've had a liberal revision policy; students could come to me to discuss their papers and what is needed to improve them, and, if they did what needed doing, I would assess the revised paper and take the higher of the two grades earned as what the gradebook reported. My current institution does not allow quite that flexibility, to be sure, but it does insist on multiple drafts of papers coming in as standard assignments, with the later, supposedly more polished drafts offering more reward than the earlier ones.
Such structures should be enough to encourage devoted attention to improvement. Experience shows me over and over again that the students who do act with such devotion do far better, not only on assignments for my classes, but on assignments for others', as well as in other activities outside the classroom. But they are relatively few who will dedicate themselves thus, whether it is because they have not the time and energy to devote to such ends or because they believe it will not matter (and I have been accused of a certain bluntness in my responses that conduces towards the latter belief); I rarely get the opportunity to see students improve in such ways. I lament that rarity, because it is a wonderful thing to see when it is done well; even when it is not done well, it is a thing that gets respect from me, and I try to show that respect in other ways than more points on the assignment itself.
But there is another issue. Much as I encourage revision by my students, and much as I do put my own formal(ish) work though cycles of revision (my conference papers, for example, get worked over repeatedly), I do not tend to revise much those pieces I write for my various webspaces. And while this webspace might well admit of such off-the-cuff work, others are far less amenable to it. So perhaps the students who do see what I write online see that I do not do as much of what I ask them to do as I ought (even as they see more of it from me than from other instructors; how many other writing instructors will write the kinds of papers their students do when the students are asked to write them?), and, seeing that I do not always do as I bid, they decide that they need not do so either, despite the differences in our backgrounds and expertise that allow me more latitude to act as I do and the clear need for me to do more of it, anyway.
I do not know that I can hold them to blame in such an event.

Tuesday, January 29, 2019

20190129.0430

I've noted that I continue to teach, despite my protestations that I will be withdrawing from academe. I've also noted that I am and remain involved in some roleplaying games. That I note the two in close conjunction should suggest that I'll be discussing the two in relation to one another--upon which suggestion I will be acting presently. To wit:
While I was in graduate school, I ran a roleplaying game with some thirteen players at the table at once. Those who are familiar with tabletop play will know already that the usual size of a game is four to six, so a game of thirteen is quite an undertaking. And, to be fair, there were problems at that table. Some of them were the faults of the players themselves, such as one who would habitually attend game sessions intoxicated in one form or another (and while the game was in a part of the world that encourages drunkenness, and while I did not and do not abstain while at the table, there's enjoyment and then there's being shit-faced...) or another who would not or could not pay attention. Some of them were my fault, such as some gaps in storyline and wildly inconsistent character advancement/development.
But there were many good things at that table, too. The story we told together has lived on in one form or another, and one of the games in which I now am is, in fact, an outgrowth of an outgrowth of that story. (A later part of the game, or another game in the same storyline, will be returning to the old table's game more overtly.) I remain in contact with several people from that table, and if we are not as close now as when we were seeing each other for several hours every week, still are we friendly with one another. And there were techniques for cooperative play I developed that helped promote cohesion at the table, which is always to the good.
Those last have occasionally appeared, in some form, in the classes I have taught. When I've taught public speaking or similar classes--and I have done so on more than one occasion, to be sure--I have tended to deploy both the general presentation of problem and persona that tabletop roleplaying games demand and the cohesion-prompting actions my earlier gaming showed me, and it has helped students to be more involved and engaged in the class. In courses where I've been obliged to assign group work--which I do not normally like--I've had similar success, requiring students to report on one another's progress with an eye towards who else in the group has done best. While students in my classes are often reluctant to inform on one another's misdeeds, they are generally happy to talk one another up--which I take to be a good thing.
I might return to this idea in time to come, and I might well do so in a more formal setting than this--but not too formal a one. I am trying to bow myself out of academe, after all...

Monday, January 28, 2019

20190128.0430

Coming up on a month into the new year and my avowed attempt to try to get two consecutive calendar years of daily posts made, I cannot help but notice that my readership seems to be down--and not only here, but also in the other webspace I maintain. I had expected it in the latter; much of my readership there comes from students enrolled in my classes, since I post sample assignments and accounts of classroom activities in the webspace, and I'm teaching fewer students in my current session than I did in my previous couple of them. But I already had smaller reader-numbers here than I might like, given the amount of time I do spend putting pieces together here, so seeing those numbers fall a bit further is not a happy thing for me, and I have to wonder what it was that I did to make it happen. I need to avoid it in the future.
It's not an uncommon thing, of course. I often wonder what I could have done better than I did. Sometimes, it's even valuable wondering. Such was the case not long ago, when, as I drafted one of the aforementioned sample assignments, I was obliged to review and revise a piece of writing I had done for the same class earlier. The changes I made were relatively minor, largely consisting of making my phrasing more concise, but they seemed to have some effect. The piece I had written dropped a grade-level, as assessed by the Flesch-Kincaid scale (and I know there are issues with that scale, but it is a convenient means to assess the writing being done, and it is reasonably accessible to a reasonably large number of people, so it has some utility). Since the class for which I am writing in the present session is at the level it is, the shift in reading level is actually a helpful thing--and for other readers yet, it might serve as a useful indicator that even small corrections make large differences.
For me, however, there is always a danger even in such ruminations. I know myself well enough to know that sober assessment quickly becomes self-flagellation. Instead of examining my past performance for ways to improve, I find myself castigating myself for my errors out of either a sadistic or masochistic impulse that quickly drives me into episodes that might be called depressive but have never received formal diagnosis. They do prove vexatious to people close to me, however, and I have to wonder if I have revealed such a thing in an earlier post to drive others away. Or I want to, but I know I ought not, lest I start myself into a cycle that will not bode well for what I would write or do or be in days to come.
I already have enough trouble finding things that people want to see me write. Clearly. I do not want to make matters worse if I can avoid doing so.

Sunday, January 27, 2019

20190127.0430

I had occasion to look back over some of the things I've recently posted in other places than this, and I note a strange association between cats and writing in some of the images I've used. I know there's a common coincidence of cats and humanities scholars and creative folks of various sorts--English majors and their cats are commonplaces in meme culture--but I've never really understood the association. I'm not a cat person (though my wife very much is), and I never really have been; I have a cat now, true, and I've had them in the past, but I don't have the devotion to the animals that many do. I'm not a cat fancier, by any stretch. (And, in truth, though I grew up with dogs, I'm not a dog person, either. I have a dog now, and, as with the cat, I take care of and appreciate the animal, but I'm not quite so...enamored of the beasts as many people seem to be of theirs.)
I well understand the issue of attachment. That's not what I'm confused about. What I am and long have been confused about is the specific association of cats with those in humanistic study and endeavor, particularly of the literary variety. Why readers are associated with cats, why writers are, is what eludes me. I understand not having dogs; they require a fair bit of attention, which distracts from both reading and writing. I've not had a dog urinate on my books, though, as I've seen happen to many cat-havers, nor yet have they tried to eat my feet, as cats have done to me. And I think I am not alone among those who have spent much of their lives immersed in reading and writing in thinking that the world already disdains such things enough; I do not know why folks who feel so would devote themselves so much to an animal that often gives the impression of disdain and disregard for me.
I imagine that, if I get responses to this piece, they will be of the "no, cats are love" variety rather than the "I have a cat because" variety. That's fine; as I note above, I well understand that people are attached to their animals in ways I am not, and that I do not share a feeling does not necessarily mean I condemn that feeling. (In some cases, yes, I do condemn the feeling and the acting upon it, but not because I do not share it, but because it transgresses consent.) I do take care of the animals my family has, and I do have some affection for them--which I show with treats and time spent paying attention to them. Again, though, the issue I puzzle over is why there is so strong an association between cats and reader/writers--as opposed to say, hamsters, which require less attention than even cats; fish, which would also seem to do so; or other pets that might make for more interesting stories, like the hedgehog someone I went to grad school with had, or an iguana. Something.

Saturday, January 26, 2019

20190126.0430

Something I have been trying to do in the past weeks is listen to more music of greater variety. I have a selection of albums that I drive with, to be sure, and with which Ms. 8 is greatly enamored, so I listen to them quite a bit. (I had already done so, as well; I've had the albums since my undergraduate days, for the most part, and I am a creature of habit.) But when I am at my desk, whichever desk it is, I try to keep music playing, and I try to keep the selections different from what I've done before. That is, I try to find more things to listen to, and I try to explore what all is available--and I am finding that there is quite a bit more of it than I had before understood.
It makes sense that there is such a "more," of course. Again, I'm a creature of habit, tending to run again and again on the same paths I have trod many times before, and as I sink further and further into them, my vision is more and more occluded. I see less and less until and unless I make an effort to see more--or hear more, as the case may be. Too, it has been many years since I was a music major, and it was as such that I had the most exposure to other music than that I grew up hearing (which was a larger set than many, between my being a bandsman and growing up amid a family of musicians). I was not expected to have a handle on a great many things outside my professed field of study, and I did not. I still do not, honestly, but I am working to change that.
But it is strange that, even as a music major, and even as a member of a family that has produced music teachers and performers who are still making their living by gigging, I was not more aware of things than I was. I should have been more attentive to groups and genres than I was, an inattention I am only slowly addressing as I sit at my desk and write. The music and its varieties help me to get words out onto the page, whether physical or pixelated, and I am glad of it; I have also to wonder if I might not have done better had I had better access to or understanding of such things earlier in my life. I can hardly change things now, of course, but I am prone to such wonderings, fruitless as they are.
In any event, I am working to redress the issue now--even as I write this--and I am benefiting from it. How I can do so with other media than music, I have some idea--at least in part. Finding the time to do it is always an issue, though, as I work here and elsewhere to try to address many concerns.

Friday, January 25, 2019

20190125.0430

Many years ago, when I was an undergraduate, I treated roleplaying games for coursework and a curricular requirement I still make tongue-in-cheek reference to from time to time ("I got into grad school off of D&D"). While doing the reading to do that work, I came across arkelias's "Dice Obedience School" on Gamegrene.com, a site that gets occasional updates but seems not to be terribly active anymore. It's a shame, because the piece itself is an interesting read, one I might return to for one of my more "teacherly" posts, in which I summarize and respond to article others have written. (I've had reasonably good luck doing so with "non-standard" pieces in the past. I can expect that I would again.) But that's not the point of things this time.
No, this post looks at a strange thing. As I've noted, I think, I'm taking part in two online roleplaying games. Both emulate tabletop games in that they are primarily narrative, using paper-and-pencil rules to adjudicate what needs "impartial" adjudication. Those rules call for dice rolls; the online games use electronic dice rollers. And those dice rollers appear to be immune to such prescriptions as arkelias and others make--and which, in my experience, have some value. That is, I've put them into practice with my own physical dice, and they have tended to roll better than average for me--and not for others whom I have allowed to use them. Electronic dice cannot be punished for their failure; they are bits and bytes stored on computers far removed from the rolling done, so they cannot be found by hammers for smashing, and they are not present to watch their fellows suffer. Nor can they be stored in comfort, not being things. Nor yet can they be kept with their preferred faces up, so that they get used to the position and seek to return to it for comfort and familiarity.
No, other methods must be found, and not to command the virtual dice, but to appease the mighty figures that are embodied in them. Pantslessness is recommended when approaching one roller affectionately referred to as the Fortune of Dung. Movements of Carmina Burana are played as audible and outward signs of veneration and the acceptance of fate's machinations and the randomness of outcomes in an attempt to persuade the randomness to greater favor. Ritual readings of Camus cannot be far behind, and I can see my way clear to pantsless incantations recited and set contrapuntally over Orff as the Fortune of Dung is appeased--or not, for the fickle fortune's false factota flail about freely, as they will or not, but never as we would have them who are subject to their power in the small and secluded spheres where we roll dice and tell lies online.
Pray for us sinners, now and in the hours of our characters' travails, and deliver us from the evils set against us, that we might enact others of our own choosing, for our amusement. Amen.

Thursday, January 24, 2019

20190124.0430

Not long ago, my wife bought me a new cell phone, a LG Stylo 3. It had been a thing that we had discussed doing, something prompted in part by my work in social media. (I freelance as a social media consultant, among others.) I was glad to receive the phone; I have tended to lag behind others in such things, to be sure, and although I still do not have a top-of-the-line model, the phone I have now is a substantial upgrade from the one I had previously. So far, I have been pleased with its capabilities, pleased with the ways in which it has made some of the work I do easier. And I am, of course, grateful to my wonderful wife for providing me the equipment.
That said, the phone does have quite an annoying feature. On it, I am inundated with advertisements. The phone will, at random moments when active but not in use, present me with ads for apps--some of which, I already have installed. I may go to check the time on my phone, or exit a timer, or end a call, or send a text message--and an ad for some app will pop up. The individual ad is easily dismissed, of course, but I am annoyed by the fact that I have to dismiss them. They are annoyances only, of course; I am not hindered by them, or even much delayed. But they are annoyances, and, given how I grew up and by what I was nurtured, I am of the opinion that technologies are supposed to reduce the number of annoyances with which I am presented. Perhaps it is a naïve opinion to retain, given the entanglements of capitalism and technological development, but it is still one that informs my daily deeds.
I do not know what setting on my phone it is that allows such things, else I would have remedied the issue, but, since I do not know it, I find myself annoyed by the frequent intrusion of ads into my life. I have tended to try to make my home a place of respite from such; my family does not have television service, and we are careful about the branding on our clothes and the goods we buy. To have the ads pop up on my phone as they are doing--not while amid other apps, where such would be reasonably expected, but at odd intervals during other kinds of use--stands out the more strongly to me, therefore. Maybe, were I less attuned to such or less insistent that such things be minimized in my home-space, I would not find myself so concerned, and I am mindful that such problem as it is is a small one I am fortunate to be able to have. I know more are not able to be in such a situation than are, and not all who are able are immersed in it. But I am attuned and insistent, so I am concerned, and I am not pleased by it.

Wednesday, January 23, 2019

20190123.0430

I often turn over in my mind what I would write, were I to actually sit and write a cohesive narrative rather than a string of limericks that connect in some fashion. Such thoughts end up leading me either to a collection of essays or to a memoir, and they soon lead me to defeatist attitudes that strand me in some strange mental space, from which I can do nothing else but trek back to the civilization and routine that is my daily life and resume other tasks. For I tend to think that others think essays are reading for other people than them and that my own life is a dull thing that does not admit much of recollection where others can read it. (That I remember too much, too vividly does not help.)
I do not make such comments in the interest of being told that I am wrong. Indeed, I am occasionally reminded of it when I talk to others and some bits of my background emerge (and I am reminded that I have not appreciated my background and history as much as I probably ought to have done). I may not have lived the stuff of dreams, but I have had opportunities to do some neat things--and I've even availed myself of some of them. (I know I've let quite a few pass me by, as well--more than I've taken, in fact. As I've noted, I'm more risk-averse than reward-seeking. Whether that's good or bad, I'm not sure.)
No, I make such comments from experience. Essays have the stink of academe about them; they still smell of the ivory tower that has gone too long uncleaned. Many who are not themselves in academic pursuits will tend to push against them, or will if they are presented as such--and I do not know how else to present them. I also do not know that the essays I would write, if left to my own devices, would cleave to a single theme or topic in a way that might prove useful. (I suspect not, since the pieces I've put together in this webspace this month have not done so--and a book of them would require more focus, yet.)
The same is true for any memoir I might write; I am not sure that my experiences have formed a coherent narrative, though my career shifts might make for convenient sections of such a book. With a memoir, too, I would run into the issue of other people's privacy. Such stories as I might share necessarily involve others, and I am not certain they would want the stories told--or told by me, re-associating me with them. I have been out of contact with many of the people I grew up with for quite some time, and while there have been a few (a very few) who have reached out, most have been content to let the contact be not. I've made no secret of my presence, after all, either online or physical, and I've heard from nearly none. Sudden re-introductions via lawsuit do not seem good ways to connect again.
With such things in mind, then, I press on in the writing that I do, hoping that I will stumble into something a bit better for me to do and keeping in practice until that time comes so that I can actually do something with the opportunity, should it arise.

Tuesday, January 22, 2019

20190122.0430

One of the things I do to try to keep a buffer built in this webspace is to write two posts each time I sit down to write here. I am not as successful in that as I would like to be; I do not manage to write in this webspace each day, and I do not always write two posts when I do. That I occasionally have late updates is proof of that. But it is still good to have a set goal for writing, both generally and in specific projects. Having a focus helps in navigating the tasks, and having a set objective to fulfill helps keep things from dragging on interminably. Endings matter, and I am not alone in noting that they should have come for no few things sooner than they did or yet have done.
My writing goals with this webspace are two-fold. I've noted the two post/day small-scale, short-term goal, and I've discussed before that it is easier to meet that goal when writing verse than when writing prose. (Indeed, it's partly because of that ease that I am returning to my hymns against the Stupid God next month.) With such pieces as these, I aim for a minimum of 500 words per post, and I more or less always achieve that. And I cannot help but remark in doing so that such pieces seem out of reach for many of the students I have and had, while they are more or less daily warm-ups for me--and if they are, I probably ought to be doing better with my writing in other areas than I am.
A thousand words a day is not much of a burden, to be sure, or it should not be if I am pushing them out every day. It sometimes is, yes, as I've remarked, but I feel it ought not to be for me, any more than running scales should be a challenge for instrumentalists (and I probably should run more scales than I do) or running laps is for track-and-field athletes (I'm not one of them, heavy-legged as I am, but I probably ought to exercise more than I do, and by a wide margin). Perhaps if I were to devote more of the energy I expend in putting words in this webspace to producing writing for money, I'd be better off, or my family would. The latter is more important, in any event.
But I am not yet at a point where I can conceive of and sustain a vision for something that might be of enough value to others that they would pay for it. It likely marks me as a failure in a society that prizes entrepreneurialism and assigns value primarily if not entirely based on remuneration. (The validity of such a society is contested, I know, but that particular subject well exceeds the space I am willing to allow it today.) Perhaps someday I may be a success, but until and unless I am, I will keep plugging away at this kind of thing. Even if I'm not a success, I can succeed at doing what I set out to do.

Monday, January 21, 2019

20109121.0430

There are times I find it harder to write than others. Some days, I can sit and hammer out thousands of words without any trouble. Others, I struggle to write a single sentence. And this is a problem because as much of my jobs depend on writing as do, and many of the leisure activities I undertake--if they can be said to be "many"--similarly rely on my putting words together in order on pages. Today, as I work to write this bit in this webspace, is more the "others" than the "some," although I've already put together no few emails and composed a short rumination in the other webspace I maintain, and I am like to write another bit for yet another webspace I seem to manage. So I do not know why it is that I feel I am having such trouble when, to all appearances, I am not actually having it.
I suppose some of it comes from the fact that the writing I do seems not to go anywhere. Yes, the emails and documentation I develop for my day job go on record, and the work I do commenting on student papers might be of some help. The writing I do for the games I play, narrative constructions that they are, seem also to help. But I am not in a position where I can simply be a writer, and I really do not know how to break into the market of doing so, or at least doing so under my own name. I can pick up freelance work without much trouble, but most or all of that is ghostwriting, and I am not sure that that kind of work is the kind of work I can claim. And so, perhaps, I find myself feeling as if I have trouble putting words together; I feel I have not got much of anything to show for the time and effort I've spent on doing so across the years.
I am not unaware of the irony of bemoaning such in this venue. At least in the other webspace, I outright ask for money, and I might at some point follow through on the plan suggested by a friend of mine to monetize it in the usual fashion. In such an event, I am like to move the writing I do in this webspace to that; I will need to align my work to a single venue in that event. But I feel as if I ought to be working on some larger project more than I am, and doing so seems to escape me. I do not always have time that I can focus on such work, certainly not when I have the energy I might devote to it. The reverse is also true. And I am not at all convinced I have the scope of vision to carry such a thing out. Nor yet do I think I am able to connect with people in such a way. My narrative persona is a bit too uptight for easy relating, and that relation is needed.
All I can do, really, is to keep plugging away and maybe stumble into something that will give me a bit more time and freedom to do what I need to do to write at length and well. But that will be a long time coming, I think, if ever it comes--no matter how hard I might work at the task of bringing it about.

Sunday, January 20, 2019

20109120.0430

I noted in yesterday's post that looking at roleplaying games as narratives--which they are--would take a fair bit of doing, though it would likely be a rewarding endeavor. (Given the generally non- or pseudo-scholarly nature of this webspace, I am not going to go to the trouble of finding playership numbers, but I have the sense that there are a lot of people in a lot of places who play such games, and something that takes up so many people's time and resources seems to invite attention.) And I remarked that one necessary step in doing such would would be to develop an approach to it, since the typical analytical practices with which I am familiar do not seem to suffice. (I will admit, though, that it's been a little while since I've been in school, and it's been a bit since I've been more fully connected to academe, so it's possible there is such a tool in place and I am simply unaware of it. I'd be happy to see it--but it won't change the thrust of what I'm doing in this bit of writing.)
I do know that one of the common claims against academic humanistic study is the reliance on and emphasis of theory in the work. That is, much humanistic study concerns itself with asserting and refining approaches to the human works being studied, rather than attending to the works themselves and connecting them to the commonly perceived concerns of an imagined general public. There is some validity to such claims; there is a damned lot of theory, and the theory is not the thing to which the theory is applied, so that discussions of that theory become exercises in comparative erudition that a less generous person might call pissing contests. And no matter who wins a pissing contest, there's still a bunch of piss on the floor that needs cleaning up.
But that does not mean that there is no place for theory. A detailed disciplinary history is, of course, out of place here, and looking into it makes for some interesting reading, but it will suffice for the moment to note that having a reasonably consistent, discernible approach to things helps in making sense out of them. Humanistic study is, at root, interpretive work, and having a rubric or guide for that interpretation, having an external structure to which reference can be made, is of help in performing interpretive acts and in explaining them to others. There is always the danger of being too restricted by the theory--the old adage about having only one tool comes to mind--but, as with any tool, it is far easier to do the work that needs doing with a more amenable tool than without.
I continue to look forward to having a tool amenable to use in interpreting roleplaying games. I do not know that I have the skills to develop one, myself; I rather expect that I do not, else I might be in a different line of work than that were I now find myself. But I know I would be able to use it, were it ready to hand...

Saturday, January 19, 2019

20109119.0430

I am once again amid an online roleplaying game--two, actually, playing in one and helping to administer another, both of which concern the exploits of magical samurai. I am once again immersed in creating stories collaboratively, working with others to present and negotiate challenges, developing characters and pushing forward plotlines--and, given the online media, leaving behind me and my fellow players records of what is being done and how. It marks a difference from what Daniel Mackay describes as an ephemeral performance, which also opens the possibility that the games I'm in could be studied by later researchers.
I've worked on such things before, whether in reviewing products (as here and here) or acting in a pseudo-scholarly fashion (such as herehere and in preceding work, or here and in its predecessors). And I've received at least a little favorable feedback on the work I've done so far; some of the players I'm with now have seen at least some of the work that I've done, and they've approved of it, for which I am grateful. Consequently, I have some idea that more such work might be done well, and I've opined about it in previous posts, noting my desire to return to doing such things, since I have not the burdens of formal academe under which to labor anymore. (This is not to say that I would do the work well, of course; did I do such things as well as I might like, I'd likely still be in academe. But that's another matter entirely.)
What approach might inform such work is not clear to me, however. Considerations of medium and content development obtain. While the narrative in the games I play starts at a fixed point of in-milieu time and moves forward from that point, it does not do so consistently. In the game I am helping to administer, days begin linearly, but they do not end in linear fashion. Additionally, motion through the days themselves is not linear; bits of gameplay do not start in the in-milieu morning and move smoothly forward, but begin at various points in the in-game day and fill in from those beginnings. And there are many people starting and adding to narrative threads throughout. As such, while each narrative thread is linear in itself, the emergence and development of those threads is not so neat, and following the lines of narrative from structural and related perspectives is therefore more complicated than might otherwise be the case.
Addressing each narrative thread as a separate work would not work, however. The threads are too interconnected to permit of such easy untangling. They might be regarded as being analogous to chapters in a book, each treated as such, but that would also run into problems as threads run into and emerge from one another. Nor can one character's progress be taken as a focal point, given the relatively egalitarian nature of most such games. But even the notion of coming up with a rubric or apparatus to make sense of the game as a whole would be quite an accomplishment...I hope to see such a thing someday.

Friday, January 18, 2019

20190118.0430

I am perhaps late in commenting on millennial burnout, which seems to have been much in the news in the past few days (as of this writing, which is earlier than its publication, to be sure). I'll leave it to my readers to read others' words about such things; I do not need to rehearse them here as I move to offer something of my experience. And I do so knowing that I speak from several positions of privilege; I do not doubt that many people have it far harder than I because of factors utterly beyond their control and mine. I do not discount the ways of which I am aware I am, to borrow phrasing from the internet at large, playing on easy mode. But I am also a damned poor player, not doing well even in the lower difficulties, and I cannot claim to be a noob. Not at this point.
Because I occupy the positions I do, I find myself in a certain persistent tension that adds to the more explicit stresses of the current socioeconomic climate. That is, I do have the identified-as-persistent-across-generations stressors of trying to support a household, to which are added the more recent expectations of fatherhood (because there are differences in expectations of parenting between now and when I was growing up, at least for the socioeconomic group with which I identify and am identified), the specific demands of my jobs (yes, plural, and yes, stressful in particular ways because of the populations with which I work), and the prevailing local cultural expectations of how "real men" behave (several of which are good things, but many of which are pernicious and insidious despite their local dominance). I reiterate that I am not calling for any special treatment, simply reporting, if perhaps only in gloss, on my situation.
But I think there is something in the very act of reporting, of making the comment, that makes something of a difference with the issue. Dominant narratives assert that previous generations did not make so much of their problems, even when those problems were worse (as sometimes has been the case). That is, they shut their mouths and plodded onward, and if they said anything, it was either in situation or penitence or in state of inebriation. The healthiness of either option can be debated, of course, and issues of accuracy of recollection and thoroughness of recording have to be considered. Even so, the acknowledgement of difficulty or of pain is seen, at least in my specific "here," as being weakness, and weakness in that "here" is to be hidden, redressed, or ridiculed. The last is most likely, being easiest and most likely to allow others who are more successful in concealing things to feel virtuous for doing so.
I will not ask why it is so; I have an idea of an answer, flip as it may be. I will acknowledge that it is so, and that I have more thinking to do on the matter of how to negotiate the tension it introduces. Again, I know others have it worse than I; I do not deny it. But I also know that I have to deal with what is mine to handle, among which is this.

Thursday, January 17, 2019

20190117.0430

Over the past few months, I've been pursuing a different project in this webspace with each month. The current month is as it is; previously, I responded to newspaper articles or did much the same thing as now, writing rambling pieces that may or may not connect to one another across days in some way that makes some semblance of sense. Next month, I'll be returning to my hymns against the stupid god; indeed, I've already been at work on the project a bit more, though not in a way that sets up work in this webspace. That will come soon enough, however; I just need to get more framed out for it before I put it into the buffer (because I do still want my posts to come up regularly, and I do dislike having their schedule disrupted because I forgot to do something or other).
There is some comfort in having an idea of how I'm going to move ahead, at least in the short term. That comfort offers another justification for my continued work in this webspace, when I could and probably should be attending to other projects (not necessarily those in my more professional webspace, though that would not be unwelcome). I've noted before that I am a creature of habit, seeking to have my days be more or less predictable so that I can meet well what presents itself to me. I know I cannot have complete certainty; even aside from clichés about death coming at any time, I have a four-year-old daughter whose personality continues to evolve, and that evolution sometimes takes unexpected paths. I value them, but they are not always easy for me to deal with, and so I take what constancy I can find--or else I make it.
I suppose it might be said that I am closing myself off from things by trying to regulate and manage my time the way I do. And I suppose there is something to such comments; I am aware of having missed out on things, of missing out on things even now, and not because there are necessarily things going on at this moment of my writing that would be more invigorating or entertaining. No, even after I am done with this and done with the tasks I have for the day, I will return home to a quiet life and work through motions I have gone through before. Were it a martial arts practice, I might call it kata, but since it is not, I do not know what word to apply to it. The "boring" that some might call it, I abjure, partly because I have foresworn being bored, as such, and partly because it is not laborious; it simply is, even if it is not exciting for others to watch.
But I am not performing for other audiences in my home life. Those who share my home, who make it a home for me, are audience enough, and they seem to approve. After all, they pack the house every night...

Wednesday, January 16, 2019

20190116.0430

It has occurred to me that I am perhaps overly apt to bring up old pieces of writing I've done in this webspace, with the Skyward Sword piece I reference being perhaps the chief example. While I remain enough of a scholar to feel compelled to cite my sources (when I remember them; I do not write much in the way of formal essays here anymore, and keeping track of sources requires more apparatus than I usually put into play when I am typing into this webspace), I also know that harping on a single subject day after day does not do as much to endear me to readers as I might like to have happen. (You are few, O, readers, but beloved.) So if I keep bringing up old pieces of writing, if I continue to talk about the same topics, I run the risk of generating boredom--or more of such risk than had already been the case, since, as one erstwhile colleague put it, "reading is for suckers," and, as another I've known put it, "reading's for when you're old and wrinkly." And I know my readers are smooth-skinned and young, of course.
If I do tend to repeat myself, and I acknowledge I likely do, then it describes me as having a fairly consistent life. There is not necessarily anything wrong with such a life, to be sure; being able to be reasonably certain what I'll be doing next helps me to be able to do it well. Knowing it's coming, I can do something to prepare, and, being prepared, I can do a better job of things. But, yes, it is a bit of a rut, and I seem to wear it deeper with every pass, until the track that I have cut through the grass has become a ditch, perhaps a ravine or canyon--though that would assume far more power from my feet, and far more passes with them than I can claim to have made. And it is not without reason that I have been, not rebuked, but questioned about my general unwillingness to step outside the track I have worn for myself, the more so since matters are as they are with me. (Which is to say, reasonably good, though they could be better. But that last's true for most everybody.)
I am not complaining. I know better than to do so. But I am acknowledging that there is another area in which I might be said to need improvement. I have mentioned before (here and here, if not elsewhere, too) being like the pre-Bilbo Bagginses, and there are certainly in-milieu populations that would have seen them act otherwise (and did, else it'd be a different story), though there seems to be a broader expectation that they will continue to do as they are known to do. And I wonder if there is such an expectation of me, that I will do as I have done--and if there is, who has it, and am I in a position such that I can afford to disappoint them?

Tuesday, January 15, 2019

20190115.0430

I've noted that I have a number of areas in my life wherein I might improve. Several upon which I focus in this webspace concern my writing, which seems appropriate enough. This is a construction of written words, even if the medium seems to demand more than merely words. And perhaps that is something in which I might make some more adjustments to effect; perhaps I ought to integrate into this webspace, as I tend to in others where I work, visual and other multimedia elements. Perhaps the Skyward Sword piece that pops up again and again in my work could involve images of the characters I discuss; indeed, some of its past readers have made such comments, and they have not been wrong to do so. Perhaps other essays that I've written in this webspace would benefit from similarly illustrative images, or embedded video links, or songs. And perhaps I ought to write more of the pseudo-formal essays that I have in the past, posting them here.
Perhaps. But likely not, for reasons I have discussed. I mean to keep this space open more for musings and more creative work than for more formal discourse. (And I am recharging, as it were, for a return to more creative work. I think I may resume the hymns against the stupid god next month, since I'll have had a chance to calm down and get some things going.) Because I do the kind of writing I do here, or try to do so, I work more with words than with their interactions with other arts--worthy as they are or may be. I have not the skills to make much else in the way of art; terrible as my pen-hand is, my drawing hand is worse, and while I do decently enough on my horn (on which I need to practice more, but I ever have had that need), the parts I play are generally not the sort that admit of playing alone for an audience.
As such, I will not likely be including visuals, as such, in my entries into this webspace, or not often doing so, and other media are less likely to occur. But that does not mean I have no care with how the words I would write will look upon the page. I have been working to enforce a fairly consistent paratext on what I write, making sure that like things look alike; not only the words, but the situation of the words, means that they go together in specific ways. I do not do much fancy with them; the coding involved does not always work well in the present platform. Sizing up and color-coding capitals at the beginnings of entries and paragraphs is the extent of it, anymore. I used to do more, but I think it was a mistake to do so. It made the entries busier than was warranted. The present practice suffices, I think, and, if it does not, I'm sure I'll stumble onto something that does, in time.

Monday, January 14, 2019

20190114.0430

As I write this, I have a piece out under review at what is becoming a notable venue. I do not yet know its status, so I am not going to be more explicit about where the piece, if accepted, will be placed, although those close to me (which will include many who read this entry into this webspace) already know--largely because I have a big mouth that seems rarely to shut. Still, having the piece out and thinking about it, as well as about the things I've written for release on the days leading up to the present piece's publication, does bring to mind one of the challenges I face in making the jump from writing for my own edification to writing under my own name for money. (I've gotten paid for freelance writing in the past, but that has been done under different circumstances than trying to get something larger published, as if I were a "real" author or a "real" poet.) Because it should be clear I've not done much of that; indeed, my non-scholarly publications are few and unremunerated. Not that my scholarly ones are many and lucrative...
Having the piece under review, having it subject to the tastes and decisions of others, is not an easy thing for me. Given that I tend to view writing as, in many respects, an outpouring of myself, I tend to bristle at the comments many others would make about it. (My wife, who reads much of what I write before I send it out to more formal publication venues, is an exception, of course, but that is because I know her well and know that she values me as me. She must, or she'd not be my wife; I'm neither attractive enough nor rich enough to prompt allegiance despite non-esteem.) It is a commonplace, I know; I have read the attestations of many to that end, that they bleed in black upon the page, and that comments about the words recorded are taken as comments about those who write them. I am not claiming any special status, but there is some strange comfort in being able to align with the usual.
The thing is, I ought to be past that with my own writing at this point. I do have articles out under my name. I pushed through a master's thesis and a doctoral dissertation. I do have other publications out, entirely. It should be business as usual that I get reviewed, and I should be at a point in my life and writing that I can accept comments about my work as being about the work and not the worker. Yet I am not, as I know many whose work I read and comment upon are not. I continue to strive to keep that knowledge in minds as I make comments, trying to balance how the work can be improved with not attacking the one who will have to do that work. It is an area in which I still need to improve quite a bit, I am certain; most areas of my life are such. But that does not mean I should not be trying to do so.

Sunday, January 13, 2019

20190113.0430

One of the joys of writing such pieces as I have been writing this month is the freedom to treat topics as they come to me. I am not yoked to one idea or another, but can range freely across them, weaving disparate things together in ways that I hope illuminate insufficiently explored aspects of each. I can address matters as they arrive in my mind, working them out as much or as little as seems prudent to me and moving on to the next at a time and in a manner of my choosing. Constrained only by medium, location of writing, and available time, I am able to write as I will, which relatively few have luxury to do and fewer still indulge, and I am aware that I am fortunate to be able to do so as I do, and largely to this point without penalty--though, again, peril looms, and I know that what I have written may not be read well by those who may be able to do something to voice their discontent.
One of the problems of writing such pieces as I have been writing this month is that same freedom. Because I am not anchored to one topic or another, I drift among topics as they occur to me, and while that may well be revelatory for those who want to psychoanalyze either the writerly persona I adopt in putting these pieces together or the actor who performs the role, that does not necessarily make for the easiest or smoothest reading. Nor does it prompt the deepest and most detailed investigations of individual ideas, which is necessary to be able to get from them what they contain and make some kind of potentially useful conclusion that can be used, in turn, to aid the understanding of yet other ideas. Without the structure imposed by adherence to a single, central idea, the writing is apt to grow disconnected and dissolute, traits which are no more prized in a piece of writing than in a writer who would make them--or anyone else, for that matter.
The tension is one that I have seen reflected in the classroom no less than in my own writing. In class after class after class, students chafe both at having their topics restricted and at having freedom to choose their topic; they both want structure and reject it. And I cannot blame them for feeling the tension or being frustrated by it, not since I am, myself, similar in feeling and being frustrated by the tension. For me, though, writing in multiple venues and for multiple audiences (some larger than others, to be sure) is an aid in negotiating the tension. If I want to write freely, I write here. If I want to record events in my life, I write in my personal journal. If I want to wax eloquent about some idea, I put it in the other webspace, or else I set it up for presentation in one of the few conference appearances I still make. Depending on the topic, it might go into another webspace, entirely. But, again, I have outlets that others do not--and I have the time and resources to make use of those outlets, which are also luxuries.
My solution is not a panacea. I doubt anything is. But I will still use the salve available to me, and I will hope others find the balm they need.

Saturday, January 12, 2019

20190112.0430

I noted in yesterday's post that I have a persistent fantasy about getting a couple of days to myself to recover and to write. It is not the only writing fantasy I have, of course. There is still some part of me that hopes someday to revise my dissertation into a fuller monograph, for what little that will matter now that I am so far off the tenure track that I cannot even see the stadium anymore. I may, perhaps, put the limerick sequence into print, although the more I think about it, the less likely I think it to be that I will; I have no re-read it in a while, but I do not think it is the best work I can do. The hymns against the stupid god are likely a better candidate for printing, although, given the way things look to be going as I write this, their publication might become something of a danger to me; dictatorship looms.
But more closely akin to what I discussed yesterday is the thought that I might sometime take a writing retreat. I have seen no few of them advertised, but I know them to be directed towards writers who are in a position to focus more fully on their writing than I can afford to do--whether that is because their professional lives are more conducive to such things than mine or because their personal lives are, or both. I cannot take a week away from work simply to sit and write, or I feel I cannot, though I earn paid time off in my current position and, with enough advance notice, can make arrangements for it. More, though, I cannot take a week away from my family to do so; they need me, and I them, far more than I need to spend isolated days with pen in hand or keyboard under fingers (and, as I've noted, the distinction matters).
It is not a weakness, though. There are many things that call to me to do, some more strongly than others. That I acknowledge more of them than I can achieve in the short term, and likely even in the long term, does not mean I am a failure; it means that there is always room for me to improve, always a way for me to get better, always something new to which I can turn my attentions and efforts. I am never done, and that is good, because it means I never have to be done; I always have something else to do. I always have a means to move ahead, even if "ahead" occasionally shifts direction. And that is something worthwhile, I think.
While I will not pretend that having an ever-open set of tasks to accomplish is a panacea, I do think it has helped me to avoid some of the missteps I have seen others make. And if I can learn from others instead of the pain of direct experience, I think I am better off for it.

Friday, January 11, 2019

20190111.0430

I've not been getting the writing done I'd like to be doing these past days, as I think has been obvious. I had the recent lapse in my buffer--a second in too short a time, to be sure--and I do not think the quality of my work in this webspace has been all I would want it to be. I know what I've been setting up in the other webspace has not been the quality I would prefer, and my buffer in it is growing perilously thin, as well. Work on another project continues fitfully, as well, and if its publication cycle is longer, I really ought to be doing still better work in it than here, where I strive to have a post every day, or my more professional webspace, where I post two to three times each week (with occasional exceptions for special events and the like). If I have longer to work on it, I ought to be better with it, or so the thought goes.
The thing is, I don't have longer to work on it. Yes, there's more time between when I do the writing and when it goes public, but that does not mean I can afford to spend that time working on the writing or the rewriting and revising that I really ought to be doing. The work I do here, maintained for reasons I've discussed ad nauseam and beyond, and the work I do in the professional webspace, done for other reasons I've also explained at some length, take time, and the time I spend in attending to those writing tasks is time I cannot spend attending to the writing in larger, longer-term projects of any sort. Nor am I necessarily in a position to set aside the smaller tasks in favor of the larger, tempting as that is; indeed, it often seems that the only reason I get any work done on the bigger bits is because I take the time to work on the smaller, the small tasks reminding me of the larger that need attention.
I continue to have the feeling that, if I can but get two days to myself, I can get quite a bit done on the matter. I say two because I feel I need to take one to rest up a bit; those who know me know I work more days than I don't, whether at my day job or at one of the side-hustles I run or at some other task, and the strain of doing so adds up. Clearing it out would be welcome, and, cleared, I would be able to take a day simply to sit and work as I would like to do. But I know that such fantasies are not likely to come to pass; in the meantime, I will continue to do what I can to do the writing I can get done, and I will hope that the persistent practice will come to have some benefit that will make the whole worth having done.
As something of a side-note, this post is the 2100th in this webspace. It is nice to have the marker, even if the number is not so high as I think it ought to be for the time I've spent at work on this blog. But that's as it is.

Thursday, January 10, 2019

20190110.0430

I am running again into the issue of finding it challenging to find things about which to write in this webspace. Given the orientation of my other webspace and my desire not to duplicate work, I am not working on even casually scholarly projects here, things like my Skyward Sword bit (that gets used as a sample in my classes) or one of the occasional pieces I've written on L5R. I still dabble in that work in other places, of course, but much less frequently than I used to do--and not at all here, since this webspace does not speak to the same purposes as the others I have maintained have and do. As I've noted before (though where does not emerge so easily for me as I might like), this webspace is for more personal reflection and occasional artistic endeavors than the other. It seems a bit off to have my more scholarly musings here.
The reverse is also true, I find. There have been times I've tried to post more "artistic" work in the other webspace, whether things that tried to become serial novels or snippets of verse meant to laud other authors through sincerely flattering imitation. They have not gone as well as might have been hoped, and not as well as similar efforts in this webspace have gone. My limerick sequence may not have been ideal, but it did attract some favorable attention, by report; the hymns against the stupid god got a lot more consideration. So I have to think that it is not a matter of skill so much as how that skill interacts in my own mind with the specific online locations of writing. (And I know I've been on that topic before, considering my lone CCC publication back in the days when I thought I might actually be a full-time academic, as well as pieces on my office spaces [here, here, here, here, here, here, and here].) That is, something about the different platforms prompts different responses from me in them, and trying to work against those prompts goes less well than might otherwise be the case.
I am not sure why. There's not much of a difference in the physical locations where I access the different online locations; I write in both while seated in the same chairs, working at the same keyboards. Sometimes, I even attend to them on the same days. So, if the circumstances are largely the same, I have to wonder why it is that I can write decently (I know "well" is a stretch) in one form in one venue but not another, while doing decently in the other form in another venue but not the one. I do not know that finding an answer will do me any good, because I do not think that having an answer will make a difference in how I act. I'll still write what I write, where I write it, and I hope I will stumble further into proficiency as I do so.

Wednesday, January 9, 2019

20190109.0430

Today marks nine years that I have been married to my remarkably wonderful wife. The day we got married was a cold, blustery Saturday in the Texas Hill Country, and she and I were both down from The City for the event. (We'd have to be, of course.) Many from our families and circles of friends gathered with us, helping us to begin our married lives together in joy and surrounded by love. Vows exchanged in Old English (her idea, but one I endorsed), a live band playing standards (courtesy of a now deceased great uncle), much food and drink (more than there were people present to eat it, in the event), resplendent cakes, and no few other things stand out in my mind from that day--but none equal the joy of seeing my fiancée arrive and cease to be my fiancée, becoming my wife.
Cliché as it is, the wedding day, of which this is the anniversary (I didn't forget, clearly, and Happy Anniversary, Honey!), is one of the best days of my life--the second-best, to date. (I think myself justified in noting that the birth of Ms. 8 supers it.) Some commented that it made little difference; my wife and I were already living together, and had been for a while, before we got married, and our apartment in The City had but the one bedroom. But I, at least, perceive a difference, though I cannot articulate it. Indeed, I cannot remember what life was like before it anymore; I remember events, to be sure, but I seem to me to have always been married. That is, I don't have the feeling of not being married--and happily, I might add--in mind or heart anymore. And that's probably for the best, all told.
I've made the note about our anniversary repeatedly before (here, here, here, here, and here), although not as often as should be the case in this webspace. Nor have I always given the event the note it seems to me to be due. But I am trying to improve, and not only in the writing with which I mark the event for the public. I know I am not always the best husband I can be; I am not always as supportive of my wife as she deserves, and I am certainly not as willing to go along with her ideas about fun and things to do as she would prefer, curmudgeon that I am. I know, too, that she deserves more and better from me, and so I try to provide it. If there is anything like a resolution for the year that still is new, it is that I am trying to be a better husband in such ways. My wife deserves it for herself; our daughter deserves to have a home full of love that does not hide itself or have to force its way out from under a thick layer of...whatever it is I seem to be coated with.
So, again, Happy Anniversary!
May we have many more!

Tuesday, January 8, 2019

20190108.0430

After yesterday's lapse, I wanted to be sure I got something out where others could see it. I do not like that I flagged in my attention, even if it was for good reason and was addressed as soon as could be done; I do not like to be reminded that I am, in fact, human and subject to failure, or that it might be the case that I will not meet all of the commitments I have made. I work hard to be a man of my word, to do what I say I will do, and I have said that I will be continuing this blog for a while, so it behooves me to get things set up such that it will continue. Finding myself having failed to do so sits ill; indeed, I was out of sorts for most of the rest of the day yesterday, having had the shock of screwing up so soon after I stumbled out of sleep. There are other ways I would much rather wake up than with such reminders.
I was able to get my feet under me, though, and to get through the day with relative aplomb. I have been taking on more job duties as I prepare to step into a higher leadership role--which overstates matters, in truth; the agency where I work for my day job has a whopping four people employed. I will be taking overall leadership soon enough; the current head is retiring soon, and I will be succeeding to the position despite being the most junior of the current employees. But the other two are counselors and do not want to handle the administrivia that has been and increasingly is my lot, while I have no problem handling it and do not think I would do well in the position of having to absorb as much from the clients as they seem to do on a daily basis. So there is not really any strife involved in my taking on the higher role, at least not from my fellow employees.
It will be a bit strange to be in a management role, though. I've spent so long as a worker--longer than not, at this point--that it is hard for me to think about being the boss. Similarly, I come from a family of working folks, and if my mother currently manages a tax preparation office, that's been a  relatively recent thing, and she still has her own higher-ups to whom she must report. So being in charge, being ultimately responsible, is a new thing for me--and, like many new things, it is not entirely comfortable yet. I know I will grow or shrink into it, and that, in time, my mind will shape itself to the role. It would not be the first time such has happened, of course, and I managed, in time, to accommodate myself to most of the reconfigurations. (I am still having trouble thinking myself out of academe, for reasons I've noted extensively in other venues, but that is my own fault; masochist that I am, I keep going back for more.) And, in truth, I largely look forward to the challenge. I expect it will be a rewarding experience.

Monday, January 7, 2019

20190107.0620

I know that I missed my usual posting time in this webspace. I had intended to take some time during the weekend now ended to write and build up my buffer; that clearly did not happen. But since I got to spend Saturday tooling around the Alamo City with my wife and Ms. 8, having a great deal of fun with them at a trampoline park and a mall, and I got to spend yesterday in the company of family at my parents' house, I think I had good reason to do otherwise than I might have intended. I tend to enjoy my family's company, after all, and while I also enjoy writing, it can be delayed or deferred to times when fewer are awake. Time with my little girl cannot. Hence my not having an entry made ahead of time today.
I'll try, of course, to build up some more material. It does me good to do so, easing my mind and helping me maintain some kind of regular schedule. And that schedule has shifted slightly as of today; a new teaching session has started, so I will be doing some adjusting to it. Mondays will be my long days for the next several weeks, and that after two weeks away from teaching and a previous few weeks of having Wednesdays be the days I was longest away. So my office time is shifting from Monday to Thursday, and I'll be able to take Ms. 8 to both of her weekly dance classes, instead of just the one. (She has also had a couple of weeks off, so it will be interesting to see how she slips back into tap and tumbling.)
I look forward to being more engaged with Ms. 8, of course. I look forward more, perhaps, to matters settling down a bit again. Regular time has resumed, but that after several weeks of disruption; it will take a bit of adjusting to get back to where I expect to be. It is clearly needed, as the delay in this very post bears out. But it will get done, and I will have more to say on a more regular schedule moving forward. I think.

Sunday, January 6, 2019

20190106.0430

As I continue to work to post in this webspace daily, I find myself considering the things I have already written. I note that much of what I have put into words where others can see them, however few may look at them, consists of responses to others. That is, I look at what others get published and write about those publications, whether as summary and response or as review, rather than putting forth my own ideas and expounding upon them. It is not only in this webspace that I do so, either, as shown here. And I have to wonder what kind of writer it makes me that the writing I do is of such sort, that most of what I do is engage with others' words without any attempt at hiding or adapting my sources.
I tend to think it is not wholly to my credit that what I write takes the form it does. I still do it because it helps me process my own thoughts and feelings about things, and there is value in that--though I am not sure that value transfers to other readers than the actor animating the writerly persona I adopt when I am working through such exercises. And my students do benefit from the examples of doing so that I offer; a class I often teach has summaries as explicit assignments, and almost all work with summaries and responses to them to undergird the intellectual work actually intended as the courses' projects. But while being present as a teaching tool is a better thing than being only an onanistic exercise, that I do it as much as I do suggests I am doing it for more than the purposes of teaching. And I generally do not pull from here into my classroom, in any event. (This is perhaps the most notable example of what I do explicitly bring into my teaching from this webspace. And it does seem to help. But it is a rarity.) So I am not sure it helps much that I write what I do.
Then again, much of what this webspace is for, for me, is the opportunity to practice. Reading and writing about what I read is what I trained to do, certainly, and doing the one helps me do the other. Doing them where others can see offers me accountable practice; if I go too far away from what I ought, I will hear about it, I'm sure. (It's happened a time or two already, though not often. I'm not sure if that means I've generally done decently or that people aren't paying enough attention to note it--or if they see and do not care.) And doing them, generally, helps me when the time comes to make examples for my students' use--which I know they and others see. (Readership statistics are available, which is nice. I like to feel like I'm doing some good.)
Too, occasionally, I come up with something that seems to be worth reading on its own here, whether in responses or in what making the responses clears a path for. I do not know that it happens often, but I know it does occasionally happen; people have told me so. So if I get to do this on the way to making that happen, well, it is inside work with no heavy lifting, so I oughtn't complain too much about it...

Saturday, January 5, 2019

20190105.0430

Ms. 8 is getting to go to the bank with her mother and me today. Owing to a rather impressive holiday gift, as well as a smattering of others Ms. 8's picked up along the way, the time has come to set up a bank account for her. Our plan is to establish a savings account that we can let sit and grow, slowly but more or less stably, until such a time as she is able to manage it herself and direct her own affairs. It will be a few years, at least, before she can do so; she's only four at the moment, soon enough to turn five, but even that leaves quite a while before she will be earning wages and handling more than basic finances. By that time, there ought to be a fair amount of money waiting for her, gifts to her from parts of her family and some small contribution that I can make to her future well being.
I am well aware of the adage about buying happiness. I am also well aware that happiness is hard to find without a decently full belly and with worries about whether or not a roof will stay overhead--and that having money helps to sate the belly and secure the roof. I also know that I could set aside a portion of the family funds for Ms. 8, rather than setting up an account for her--but I know myself well enough to know that I might well spend the money now rather than saving it for later if it is in the general accounts, not because I am profligate (eating out took up only 2% of the family's expenditures last year, for example), but because the demands of keeping the household going amid paychecks that sometimes stagger irregularly prompt me to dip into savings more often than I would like, and the incidence of paychecks and regular bills tends to dissuade me from putting money back in as much as I ought to do. Having a separate account for her will not only give her a bit of a nest-egg and later practice in money management, but it will also help insulate her from what happens to the rest of the household.
There will be mixed opinion about that last, about the idea that Ms. 8 can or should be insulated from the doings of the household. I will admit that I often demand more of her than she should be expected to give; I often forget just how young she is because I am often impressed by her intelligence and insight. But when I think about it, I know that I am wrong to ask more of her than a young child ought to be asked to give. And I know that others feel similarly. If we are going to maintain the concept of childhood as a distinct thing instead of a miniature adulthood, if we are going to "let kids be kids," as we are often exhorted to do, then it follows that a number of concerns will be kept from them. And as far as money and the demands of householding go, there will be enough time for her to learn them, enough time for her to get a handle on simple arithmetic and what it takes to coordinate keeping food coming in and utilities on and a roof overhead and maybe, though for fewer people than perhaps ought to be the case, a little bit of leisure now and again. I'm her father, after all, and if it is part of my task to ensure she grows able to face bravely and well any challenge that presents itself to her, it is also part of my task to give her the space she needs to grow into the kind of person who can do such things.
I have every expectation that she'll keep on being great. And I mean to help her to do it, even if only in a small way now and again.

Friday, January 4, 2019

20190104.0430

It is clear at this point that I am going to try to keep my blog going. I remain a creature of habit, after, all, and that of posting to this webspace is pretty solidly established at this point. There are ways in which writing here is easier than writing in other venues, perhaps because the expectations are somewhat lower. I do not feel compelled to work toward the same production value or quality of content that my more professional online venture seems to me to demand. And by that I mean that I do not have to support my assertions here with the same rigor that I do in the other webspace. Nor yet do I feel obliged to attend to paratextuals quite so closely here as there (which is good, because I do not have the same control of them here as there, owing to platform programming limitations). And while I link from here to there, I do not much go from there to here. I am freer here.
I feel I've been exercising that freedom to better effect here recently than in previous attempts to write prose in this webspace. My posts have been longer, running a hundred words of more longer than their earlier counterparts (in the main; there are always exceptions, but general tendencies are useful to identify). I feel I've been thinking in more depth about things as I've made the more expansive responses; though the Express-News does not have the heft or institutional history of the New York Times (not that that paper hasn't been having its own difficulties of late), the articles I've read and responded to in it have gotten more from me than the paper of The City. Perhaps it is because I am a more mature writer and person now than when I worked from the Times; perhaps, too, it is because the Express-News is closer to home for me, even if I still regard myself as being in some ways in exile from the Big Apple. And even in those posts which have not grounded themselves directly in the readings I do (not do enough of), I am seeing more and better words. Or I think I am; I do not know that I want to know if I am not.
Part goes to my composition process, I suspect. While I do have some buffer set up, a set of posts written ahead of time and made ready to go, I do not have as much as I might like. (I can have more of posts like this than of responses to news, given the turnover of news; I cannot get too far ahead of myself when responding to the newspaper, lest what I write about cease to matter before what I write of it emerges into the world.) Even when I have had more of one, I have maintained it against the certainty that there will be days in which I cannot write; that maintenance helps me feel accountable, which helps encourage me to write at least one post to this webspace each day. (This is in addition to the work I do in the other webspace, where I also strive to maintain a buffer despite lower publication rates, and the personal journal I keep.) Persistent practice, of which I never seem to get enough, does seem to help--as is a commonplace, and in other work than writing. Indeed, had I been so diligent in practicing my saxophone as I was and am with my writing, I might well be a band director today, my initial adult professional goal fulfilled.
That would be quite a different me, though, and I am not sure I'd like him better than the me I know at the moment. That me, at least, will keep on writing here for a while.

Thursday, January 3, 2019

20190103.0430

I've not made any secret that I am active on social media, and in several capacities. I am, admittedly, not as active on all of the platforms where I have a presence, and I am not as diligent in pursuing updates to some of them as I perhaps ought to be. Even so, I am reasonably well engaged with it, reading a fair bit that comes across my feeds on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. As I was looking at the last recently, I noted that there are a damned lot of motivational posts or posts that seem meant to be motivational, and it occurs to me that if the purportedly professional world works so hard to encourage itself and its participants, there is something strange afoot. If so many need so much motivation, it seems that the practices otherwise espoused are draining.
Even cursory thought on the matter leads to the notion that professional life is inherently demotivating, draining of energy and vivacity. If it is to be accepted, as is true for many, that private sector work is more efficient than public sector, then what participants in that work spend their time on has to be accepted as necessary and vital for the continued operation of whatever agency is doing that work. Additionally, if it is to be accepted, as is true for many, that private sector work thrives on identifying need and meeting it, then it follows that whatever agency is doing private sector work will be devoting its time to meeting a need. If those working in the private sector devote their time to finding and espousing ways to motivate themselves, each other, and those who work for them, then it follows that such devotion is needed, that motivation is needed--and that it does not proceed from the things being done.
Revealed thereby is a tacit admission that work is not the intrinsic good it is often purported to be. While it might be argued that the workforce as a whole is lazy--and those who work with millennials and younger people yet often make such arguments, spurious as they tend to be--such lines of argument cannot reasonably be applied to the entrepreneurs and business leaders so often lauded in mainstream United States culture. After all, in such reasoning, the entrepreneur is the most driven and motivated person to be found; the entrepreneur is supposed to be the one whose work makes jobs available to others and whose innovation drives economic and social advancement. The entrepreneur is supposed to have a burning passion for the work; entrepreneurs are often described in such terms. Yet LinkedIn abounds with posts of entrepreneurs cheering each other on, exhorting each other to do and be more--something clearly needed, even if the need is at odds with popular perception and even the same lines of argument that the motivators themselves profess.
If work is fulfilling in itself, if the reward of a solid day's work is the work itself and that reward is worth the effort expended in acquiring it, then there should be no need of extrinsic motivation. Yet there is clearly such a need--and one extending beyond the occasional bit of encouragement that might be expected as needed by people who are, at least to all outward appearances, people and subject to failure and fatigue. No, there is far more motivational material made than is accounted for by occasional flagging; the prevalence and abundance speaks to a great deal of concern about motivation, and not only for the rank-and-file floor worker. It speaks to overriding anxiety about the value of what is done and of continuing to do it. Listening to it might reveal something of interest.

Wednesday, January 2, 2019

20190102.0430

I have still not decided upon an answer to the question of yesterday, of whether or not I will press ahead in this webspace as I have since 18 October 2017 and make a daily post in it. That I post today does not mean I am certain I will post tomorrow. I am inclined toward it, to be sure, since it is a developed habit at this point, and I am very much a creature of habit. It does not always work to my advantage to be so; I am still pre-Bilbo Bagginsian, and while there are advantages to reliability, to predictability, there are also drawbacks to being so. Some of them have been pointed out to me recently, and rather emphatically, by people for whom I care deeply. I do not know how to avoid the disadvantages while retaining the advantages; I do not know how to reap the benefit without paying the cost. I do not know yet that I can afford to keep paying it, so I do not know that I will maintain the habit of this webspace yet.
There are other habits I'd like to develop, though, or redevelop. I suppose they move in the direction of resolutions, though I announce them later than I ought, and I am not so committed to them as resolutions typically present themselves as demanding. In any event, they include me giving more time to practicing my horn; I have been working to that end recently, and I have been hearing better playing from myself as I have done so. I'll never make a living as a musician, I know, and I'll likely not do much to pull in extra money for my family that way, either, but I do enjoy having the horn in my hand again, and that enjoyment seems to be helping me enjoy other things, to be helping me to be a better person and therefore to be a better husband and father. I think I can continue to give it time and attention.
Another habit I'd like to redevelop is reading. Time was, I was rarely found without a book in hand. Anymore, I read a fair bit online--which is still reading, but in a medium that promotes a different kind of attention than reading from a printed page develops. I have found it harder to keep my attention on a single thing for an extended period, which was not the case for me earlier in my life. I miss being able to focus on things in such ways, and I know that being able to do so was a result of my spending so much time with my nose in a book as I did. Too, Ms. 8 will benefit from having the studious model to follow, and I am certainly interested in offering my daughter good models to follow. Oughtn't I to be? So there's that.
And, as part of offering better models for behavior for my daughter, who still does things she sees her parents do in a loving child's attempt to be like those she esteems, I need to be in the habit of getting out more. Yesterday, for example, my wife, Ms. 8, and I went to one of the local parks, where Ms. 8 got to ride on a bike she got in the past couple of weeks. Ms. 8's parents walked along behind, and while it was a bit chilly, it was also quite nice to do so. I, at least, felt better for the exercise, and I know that my wife valued the time together. Much of my time is spent inside and at a single station, and it tells on me; I think it always has, and I've noted being an indoorsman more than once. I don't think I'll ever be outdoorsy; I think I am too much embedded in things to change in such a way. But I can still make sure I get out and do things regularly with my family, making doing so a habit from which I think they and I will derive some benefit. And that, I definitely think good.

Tuesday, January 1, 2019

20190101.0000

It is, of course, the new year according to the dominant calendar in force on the planet at the moment. I doubt that the heavens themselves make much of it, and I know that other calendars are in use among smaller groups of people than the whole of them that reckon the days and months and years differently. But I know that where I am, when I am, this is accounted a holiday, and I am taking the day off from my regular job. So there is that much.
The turning of the year is often a time that promotes reflection. I am often reflective already, so it does not take an annual commemoration to provoke such responses from me. And I am wary of it, if not as much as I ought to be. I am too easily taken by nostalgia, and not to good places; I do not tend to look back on what I have done and who I have been with great gladness. But some few notes might bear making as I move ahead here.
I am pleased that, nearly 2100 posts into this blogspace, I have completed a year of daily blog entries. (It actually happened in October--18 October, in the event. From then on, I've had a blog entry post to this webspace every day. And, in a strange coincidence, that was the 30th anniversary of my maternal grandfather's death. I am sure some will make more of it than it is; the coincidence occurs to me because I track dates, is all.) But I have tried for some time to have a full calendar year of blogging; the closest I'd previously come was in 2014, when I missed only 11 days out of the year. 2018 finally saw me succeed, even if a great many of the posts were short things, lines of verse doled out in small packages. I am more proud of the hymns against the stupid god than I am of the limerick narrative; I had and have a clearer vision of what I want to do with the former than the latter, and I feel that I write better sonnets than limericks, as a rule.
I am not done with the hymns, though I am not publishing more of them in the short term. The stupid god has servants in plenty, and decrying their works and those of the power to which they are devoted could occupy a lifetime. But I have other things to occupy my time for a while, and the anger that informs so much of my hymnal work tells on me in ways that I no longer find desirable to maintain. At least for now; I am sure I will come back around to the idea of being deeply angry at things, and that I will spend time in effort in raging at them, though few will read my words and fewer still will heed them. Even among those closest to me, the former are not great in number, and the latter are yet less--and I cannot hope for more from further away.
Having succeeded in a goal, having seen that I can do a thing that I had set out to do, I find myself faced with two options. I can take a break, let myself relax a bit and not attend to this webspace so much as I have been. There are other projects to which I have turned my attention, to be sure; this and this are the primary examples, and I have more than enough in each to keep me busy for a long time, indeed. They are also not the only examples of other things I get to do--yes, get. Or I can press ahead and see how long I can keep this webspace posting daily. Having filled out one year, I can see about filling out two, for instance, or I can look yet further ahead.
At the moment, I do not know what I'll do. I'll figure it out, though, I'm sure. And, in the meantime, two things:
Happy New Year!
Thank you for reading!