Week 25
View from the houseboats
Well, we are fine but are tired of lack of sun and being stuck inside due to the smoke and the fog. It’s been nice to have Theo back in school this week, even if it’s meant every morning is coming up with 18 tactics to counter the “I don’t like school” narrative. He comes home every day with good stories so I think he does like it. I think I had a lot of small good work things happen this week (positive meetings) but at the end of the week am feeling a bit worn down and wishing I had fewer meetings and more writing time this week. They are mostly working meetings, not frivolous, but I will still work towards more balance in the future.
Gratitude & appreciation
Theo’s daycare/preschool is now mandating masks for kids 3+! I did some advocating about this so I’m feeling like I had a positive public health impact. I also convinced my brother’s girlfriend to set up a website to sell the masks that we bought from her for Theo. Always nice to find a way to both increase safety at school and help a grad student make money.
Family journaling after dinner is continuing and seems to be helping my spouse; Theo sometimes participants, more often watches a meditation while eating his dessert peach.
Theo has been pretending to be a gorilla or orangutan frequently – one night for dinner he refused to eat anything that’s not fruit, because orangutans only eat fruit, so I convinced him his Impossible Burger was a fruit burger.
Simplifying my priorities has really been working well, and I’ve let it infuse my approach to my mentors.
I got out twice for outdoor bike rides this week – nice change of pace, even if not as much exercise as I wanted this week.
(Re)Learnings and observations
Creating an impact with your presence and story. I see this most commonly on Twitter as a meme among Black and other academics of color of how sometimes just existing (succeeding) in a space is an important part of the impact you have on the world. My version of this is much smaller and less revolutionary.
I met with three trainees yesterday and was reminded how important it is to have people ahead of you in the career path with diverse lived experiences – we talked about strategies of kids/breastfeeding on the job market, of not knowing exactly what you might focus on or if you love research before buying yourself time to think about it in a research fellowship, of the feasibility of moving in and out of community-based jobs and academic jobs, of how models of leadership have changed over time, of how demoralizing it is to have your suitability for a field questioned. As a side note, in my first job out of undergrad in bench science, I got the accusation of “maybe you don’t belong here” when I initially refused to perform an orbital bleed on an unanesthetized mouse. I spent two years trying to prove that (male) postdoc wrong before I realized I did not, in fact, want to be doing that job. One of many steps that led me here.
Analogies between grief and public health: This is a different version of the analogy that I’ve more commonly heard about COVID grief. At times when my grief over my dad and stepdad were more at the surface, I haven’t wanted to interact with friends whose fathers are alive and in their life. I’ve recently realized that this is analogous to how I am now feeling with friends whose pandemic behaviors are significantly deviating from ours. I, too, want to visit with family, go to restaurants for more than takeout, go on our 10th anniversary trip…and yet…we are making different choices in order to lower our risks and contribution to public health risks. Most of the time I’m willing to make these choices, but sometimes I don’t want to hear about all ways other people are enjoying the things I am forgoing. It’s not just the loss of the things “before” – it’s the denial of having things that others still have. I’m starting to think about how I will build in “slack” to my calendar for the inevitable frequent iterations of Theo being out of school all winter due to mild symptoms and lack of access to quick testing (I mean, I could be pleasantly surprised but good to plan ahead).
As in past weeks, I invite you to report in on your wellbeing, share your goal of a tiny step towards a passion project (and perhaps a second goal of a collaboration) and report in on your progress from last week's goals.
Thinking of you and hoping you and your loved ones stay healthy and safe.
Krista