There is one week remaining in the actual semester, and thus all of us are wrapping everything up as much as possible. I am not immune to this myself, of course -- I've been trying to finish any and all work I have left as quickly and efficiently as possible, even at the cost of sleep or sacrificing time I would otherwise be spending with Daisy or friends on campus. I didn't think I would have any real work to do this weekend, for example, but I do. I'll be spending many hours grading the stack of rewrites I've received from my students, one by one, so that I can get those papers back to them on Tuesday...which is the last day of my class.
As you know if you read my last blog post here, the month of December is a bit of a nightmare for me on many fronts. While I plotted out a schedule for the month then, it is probably going to change here and there as I juggle everything that must be done. In reality, I really shouldn't be spending my overnight hours writing here -- I should, instead, be doing some of the stuff that needs to be done over the weekend while I am awake and able to do so. I've started some of this already; tonight I vacuumed the downstairs of the house and did all of the laundry I needed to do. I'm waiting on the water tank to refill before I run a load in the dishwasher, as well, as I plan to cook a little this weekend if I can. While I do have to grade student papers, I don't have anything else that's pressing. I have a small bit of breathing space, so to speak. Not a lot, but some. I plan to use it to take care of some of the stuff around the house as much as I can, because I won't get the chance to do said stuff again for another two weeks or so. Also, as I'm working on a limited budget of sorts through the end of the year, it's not like I can go out and spend a lot of money on shopping or anything like that. I've tried to keep my cupboards, fridge, and freezer full of enough food to live on frugally for a while, and for the most part I've been successful with that. I do have a few little things to take care of -- namely getting the last part of Daisy's Christmas gift (yes, there are parts to it), but I can do that at any point over the course of the next few days.
The flights back home to visit over Christmas have been finalized; my mother ordered my plane tickets today, and I am waiting to get an emailed itinerary and ticket number from her travel agent, but they've been booked. As expected, I fly out at 6AM on the 21st, and will be back on the ground in Wichita by around 4:30PM on the 26th. Here's hoping that the weather -- just for those five days -- will cooperate. Let it be miserable and nigh-impossible to drive/travel anywhere for the rest of my winter break, I don't care, but I need those five days to be normal, catastrophe-free days.
Upon learning that the trip is now set and that I will be unable to do anything for my birthday (as I fly out at 6AM the next morning -- meaning I'll leave the house around 3AM), Daisy asked me, "so, when are we doing Christmas?"
It's a really good question. I really don't know. My only real "free time" for the month will come between the 13th and the 20th; that one, solitary week, as mentioned before, I desperately need not only to decompress from the semester, but now to prepare for the trip as much as I can. Yet, there's also a dilemma at play here -- Daisy is supposed to come in on Wednesday night this coming week so that she can attend the department Christmas party with me a week from tonight. A week from now is too early to "do Christmas," let alone give us enough time to actually enjoy it, and after I return from West Virginia, the holiday itself will be over. I will also mention that I will not be done assembling her own Christmas gifts by a week from now, as this coming week is the last week of classes -- almost all of my attention will be focused on wrapping things up. That would leave that one open week the only real time we'd get to do anything before I leave, and the logistics of that are somewhat frightening and still up in the air due to those aforementioned trip preparations that I will now be doing.
It would also mean that she'd be driving down here and back two weekends in a row, or barring that, at least twice over the course of any seven-day period. That's a ton of driving for her, a ton of time spent on the road, and expensive for her when she does not currently have a job. Yes, her car is newer than mine, gets better gas mileage, and has four new tires on it, but the cost of gas alone from Omaha to here and back once, not to mention twice, isn't something she can really afford right now. Although I know it's an afterthought to her, a very small issue at best -- after all, she says, it's worth it to see me -- it's not insignificant, and not something I would ask her to do when she's budgeting just as much as I am right now, if not more.
I will also mention as an aside that I've offered numerous times to fill her car's gas tank for her, yet she's never let me do so. In fact, she outright refuses.
As for my own car, it'll be due for an oil change almost as soon as I get back from West Virginia, and if I have the money at that time I'll also have them fix the loud and rumbly wheel bearing -- something that's not causing any real problems currently, but also something that I really, really can't just let go indefinitely, not when I'm putting 200 miles a week on the car. Again, I have to keep it in the best shape possible so that I can keep it running at least through May. While it's not given me any problems as of late, the clock is ticking.
"Well, here's what we can do," I said. "Next weekend, as you know, you won't be able to stay that long anyway, since I'll be grading everything I have left for my students. I don't really care about the Christmas party, so if you want to wait until the semester's over and then come down to 'do Christmas' before I fly out, we can. It's up to you."
Note: all of this is true. As much as I like the department Christmas party, if I can't make it, it's not a huge concern to me. I didn't go last year, either, but that's mainly because I was so swamped that I didn't even think about it, and I wouldn't have gone alone anyway. I also have a ton of work to do next weekend -- the least of which will be grading every single one of my students' final papers in rapid succession. If Daisy decides not to come down, I won't go this year either -- I am hard-pressed to do anything social without her by my side, especially since it takes me great motivation to leave my house unless I have to anyhow. I gave Daisy the option because, as I said, I don't want her to have to make numerous trips, especially not for something as frivolous as a 2-hour department Christmas party. Yes, we'd get time together as well, but the real justification in asking her to come down this coming week was simply for the party; she was just here the weekend before Thanksgiving.
Also note: this makes me sound like I'm getting tired of seeing her or something, and that could not be farther from the truth. It's a long, long drive for her. Believe me, I love her very much and want to see her every day, but it's just not possible for that to happen right now. She understands that as much as I do, and while we may not like it, it's just how things are.
"It's up to you," she told me. "You choose. I'll do whatever you want."
So we made the decision to skip the Christmas party in favor of me being able to rest up a little more and finish all of my grading next weekend without distraction, social interaction, or errands to run. She'll more than likely come down after the semester is over, in that week I have off between the end of the semester and when I fly out the day after my birthday. That'll also let me get everything all sorted out for Christmas, as well -- while I purchased the last gifts I needed to get for her just a little while ago, everything still needs to be, um, assembled. That's the only way I can put it without giving anything away. And that assembly takes time -- time I don't have until the semester ends.
As mentioned before, I turned in my big final project for surrealism on Monday afternoon. On Wednesday night, my professor told me that he'd received it, but hadn't had the chance to look at it yet. I told him to take his time. As you know, the reason I turned it in to him early is so that if he doesn't like it, I can just produce the standard paper assignment. The standard paper assignment's due date has been pushed up to December 12, which will be my last day on campus anyhow. This gives me a little under two weeks to produce a 5-8 page paper if I have to, though I sincerely hope I don't have to. My friends who have looked at the project in its printed form have found it highly impressive, and clearly demonstrative of not only my understanding of the concepts of the class, but in understanding and utilizing those concepts' practical applications. So yes, obviously, I hope he's impressed with it as well. I will be somewhat (read: very) unhappy if he isn't. I'm guessing he'll look at it over the weekend and that I may have it waiting for me in my box when I return to campus on Monday.
Again, at this point, I'll take a flat B in the class if I have to -- I really, really don't care. It'll irritate me, yes, as it would be the only B I will have received in grad school, but I so don't care. The overall result would be the same -- I will have completed the course requirement, I will have passed, and I can move the hell on. Really, as I enter my last semester in the spring, that's all that's important. The end goal is that piece of expensive paper that says I have my Master's degree. Nothing else matters to me, really, at this point, and each class I complete is simply a means to an end.
There have been other issues that have popped up, as well -- today, I received this email from the graduate school:
The level of enrollment used to calculate your 2012-2013 Cost of Attendance and financial aid was based upon being a full time student (12 credit hours undergraduate, 9 credit hours graduate). If the level of enrollment used in determining your financial aid awards is not maintained, the Cost of Attendance may change and this could impact your financial aid eligibility.At the time of this email, your enrollment for the upcoming Spring 2013 term is less than full time. If you remain enrolled as a less than full time student by January 2nd, the Office of Financial Aid will adjust your Cost of Attendance and financial aid assistance accordingly.
Okay. Well, duh. It's my last semester.
However, this is a problem. Because of the way the graduate program for the English department is set up, nobody will ever have a final semester that's a full nine hours unless they've had a semester in the past that wasn't a full nine hours, or conversely, a twelve-hour semester. As of the end of this semester, I have completed 45 of the 48 required credit hours for the degree program, with the remaining three being next semester's other half of my thesis hours. I've never taken a semester of less than nine hours. From Fall 2010 to Fall 2012, I have taken nine hours each semester. 9 x 5 semesters = 45. Were I to take nine hours in my last semester, I would have 54 credit hours when I only need 48, and only 48 will count towards the degree program. As it stands, when I graduate I will have 51 hours "on the clock," so to speak, because I elected to take the visiting writer course in the spring just to stay full time. I was also told that six hours, for a graduate student, is full time, when apparently it's not.
The problem comes in because I've already completed ALL of my course requirements and am taking the extra visiting writer course because I want to, not because I have to. It won't count towards my degree at all. Had I not signed up for that, I would've only had three hours on my schedule for spring.
Like I said, unless you've fucked up and have to repeat something, or have taken extra hours during a semester in the past, nobody has a full-time schedule their last semester on campus as a grad student. For most people this isn't a problem; however, I get student loans because otherwise I can't survive on the absolutely miniscule amount of pay they provide us as GTAs. That money is very, very important. And basically what they're telling me is that they're going to cut it down because I'm not taking nine hours, but six.
I emailed my advisor, the interim director of the MFA program, and asked what can be done about this -- if there's some sort of exception that she/we can file with the graduate school to where they'll realize "hey, this guy is graduating and doesn't need any more hours, but still needs the money" -- otherwise I'm going to be forced to operate on a reduced budget for my entire last semester as a grad student, which will even further throw my life into chaos once I try to move out of here after graduation. I know that some sort of exception or stay like this is possible; my friend Suri got one when she stopped teaching and only took three hours so that she could finish her thesis without having to start paying loans back during that time, or something...which is also something else I'm worried about. I obviously can't start paying loans back while I'm in school -- I can't start paying anything back until after I graduate and find a job. So really, I don't know what the hell's going on, and I'm hoping that something can be set into place to where I can just finish my work and graduate without being forced to be poorer than I already am.
While I'll be okay if I have to operate on a reduced budget, it will not be ideal in the least -- if it wasn't for the spare money I had in September, I wouldn't have been able to fix the car, for example. On a reduced budget, money for very important things like that simply disappears. I'm not independently wealthy -- all the money I have comes from somewhere, and most of it comes from those loans while I'm in graduate school. If I made $20k a year from being a GTA alone, this would not be a problem -- but I don't. I don't make even half that, sad to say. And it's expensive just to survive.
Regardless, there's not a lot I can do about it. I'll either get a stay of execution (so to speak) or I won't, and if I won't there's no use in wringing hands over it, especially not when it's the last two weeks of the semester and I already have enough to do, worry about, and take care of. It's just frustrating. If there's anything I've learned about being in graduate school, it's that nothing is easy and that everything is much more complicated than it should be, especially one's finances. On the plus side, in the spring I will at least get a bit of a boost from my tax returns when I file them and they come in, and I will have some money to work with.
Of course, a good chunk of money between now and then will be spent on getting books I need to read for my comprehensive exams, so...
Anyway. So there's that.
"Are you stressed?" Daisy asked me.
"...no more than usual," I replied after a pause.
"So, yes then."
She knows me so well.
In the midst of everything else going on, I had a stroke of genius on Thursday night. As I knew my parents would finalize the plane tickets, I began thinking of ways that I could actually carry my gifts for them back home. I'll be there for five days, and I have a small backpack. Well, it's not really small, but it's too small to carry much of anything but my clothes in when I travel. I don't own a suitcase because I don't want one, and any suitcase would have to be checked and stowed whenever I do travel, which is quite rare. I don't check bags. Ever. I use the overhead compartment or the under-the-seat storage for my stuff. Not only am I not going to risk losing any bags, but I also don't need much when I go anywhere. A few sets of clothes, a few packs of smokes and my DS/mp3 player, and I'm fine. Everything else, I carry on me -- my wallet, watch, keys, etc. I pack remarkably light when I fly back home, as I do my laundry when I'm there (which eliminates the need for lots of clothing).
This creates a problem, however, when I'll be flying back home for Christmas this year. While I pack lightly, it is a small backpack and will be full. Not too full, but full enough to where I won't be able to fit the gifts I've prepared for my parents into it along with everything else. So, I came up with a plan.
I repurposed one of the boxes I've received from Amazon over the past few months, all of which I save (as I'll need boxes when I eventually move). I took off all the markings, blacked out all the box-printed UPC codes, and readdressed it to myself...at my address at my parents' place back home. Inside it, I stuffed their gifts, and sealed it up. About three or four days before I leave, I will take it to the post office and mail it back home. By the time I arrive on the ground when I get home, it'll be there, and I will have been able to avoid carrying it with me onto the plane. I will then be able to wrap the individual gifts (none of which cost me any money and/or are otherwise of concern) once I get there. Anything else I acquire between now and the trip I will do the same with. The box I have now will probably cost me about five bucks to mail, which is perfectly fine with me. Whatever works, I say.
I'm excited about the trip, of course, though I am a bit apprehensive about it with regards to money and to the weather back home (or here, really). Even though it's during the holidays, it should still do me some good mentally -- provide me with a bit of decompression time and quiet solace. Due to the actual dates of the trip, I doubt I'll be able to see any of my friends while I'm back home (with the exception of Wayne and Jane, who I'll probably be able to see when I fly in), but it will still be good to get out of Kansas for a few days, and it will be the first Christmas I will have spent with my parents since 2005.
This weekend will be spent watching football and grading a stack of my students' rewritten papers. In a sense, I'll basically be doing the same thing this weekend that I'll be doing next weekend to a much greater degree. I'm trying to finish everything I can while I have the time to do it. Granted, I'll have a bit more time this next week to do more work, as Daisy won't be coming down, but I'll also have the itch -- the itch to be goddamned done already. On Monday, I'll only be there for my Playwriting class. My least teaching day is Tuesday; I collect my students' papers and they'll fill out their evaluations for me. On Wednesday, I'll be going in late because I don't have formal office hours (since the class will be over), and I'll be there for Playwriting and for our last Surrealism class (thank CHRIST that class will be over). After that? My semester is really finished, with the exception of finals week. From now until the semester officially ends, I will only make five trips back and forth before everything is finished. I told my students yesterday that next Thursday at our normal class time, since we'll be done, I will be at home in bed dead asleep. And this is true -- I probably will. I'll give my students their final on Monday the 10th, and will return to campus on Wednesday the 12th for our last "meeting" for the Playwriting class at 5:40 that night, but this coming week wraps up everything. And it couldn't come soon enough.
As you folks know (because I've written about it here many times), fall semester sucks on all levels. To have the last one of my graduate school career coming to an end is nothing short of wonderful. There are many things (and people) that have gotten me through it. Daisy being by my side has been a huge help. But now, it's almost over. Finally, finally almost over.
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