Saturday, Oct. 06, 2018 - 4:40 pm.
I'm taking it slow this Saturday, meaning I haven't set any tasks to accomplish today. I do that every weekend, there's always some personal project to work on, but I've had a slight headache for a few days, and I thought it may be due to stress. Here I'm listening to my body, I for one would tell you that the pressure I have is minimal.
Writing has me stressed. I'm stressed by how little progress I make on my thesis, although I know this is how it goes. Progress does happen, but very slowly. I finish the day frustrated because, say, I've only edited three pages, but then I find comfort in the fact that this edition is well done. I know writing is a slow process. Writing takes so long to show itself in its ultimate, readable, publishable form.
I met with my second supervisor this week. My first supervisor had a heart attack(!) a month ago or so, and he's slowing down for a while. I had never met with only my second supervisor for supervision purposes, and it was great, very reassuring. Both my supervisors are brilliant and fully supportive, but their background and personalities, and hence their approaches to (social) psychology, are different; his all formal and old school, hers more critical and non-mainstream. Our meeting went by quickly. All this to say that she, too, said that I'm making good progress with my writing.
Another source of stress this week was finishing the paper I'm writing with Brother #3. We did, thankfully, and submitted it to a journal a few days ago. That was weight off my back. It's an important topic and I'm in a hurry for it to be published. We'll be getting observations for sure, but hopefully the reviewers will deem our paper good enough to be published after corrections.
Unexpectedly, I also got some corrections on the article about bisexuality that I submitted a few weeks ago for a culture magazine in my country. It was only a line that needed to be changed, but it took me a day to come up with an alternative. I think the issue of the magazine with my article in it should come out this month.
I cringed, however, when I learned that the editor of this issue gave a radio interview (to the radio belonging to the digital newspaper publishing the magazine), and she talked about having an article on "bisexualisms". Holy fuck, lady. Just...no. And this is the person editing my text. She fucking read it, nowhere does it say "bisexualisms", Jesus. Thank God she barely touched the rest of my text.
On the short stories front: I'm almost done with a brief submission for a sci-fi magazine. I liked the story when I first wrote it, now that I've gone back to it I realized it is crappily done. Now I'm finishing a more polished version, but I'm not a reader of sci-fi literature, and maybe someone who is will call bullshit on me. Listen, I'm just expanding on the world in my head. I don't have any big aspirations in this genre. I hope it's good enough, but I'm aware it might not be.
I've started to count the days to know if my short story submitted to the city's short story competition won, or at least was shortlisted. This is in two weeks. I go back and forth, I won't win, I will win. I feel very differently with this story compared the sci-fi one. I'm fully confident this one's good, it's winning material. Then again, that's just me, and this little saga will most likely end with me shattering when the judges don't call my name.
Lastly, I'm giving up on my manuscript. Not giving up on it per se, but...I don't know, I'm just so disappointed and tired of waiting. I hoped the publishing house would keep their word of taking three months to review it and contact me in August. They didn't. They haven't to this day. Are they even going to say no, so that I am free to take my shit somewhere else? I'm frustrated, maybe a little angry, at the fact that I'm getting no chances to tell my story (this sounds weird, it's A story; but maybe it is mine).
So after all this, I took a break today. I'm just writing in here to vent. Andrew and I went to the university's natural history museum (more like a little room, but cool stuff nonetheless), then for pizza in a pub overlooking a pond, then for some grocery shopping. It was a great day, never mind the cold, but I don't think he was in the best of moods. Then again, it's his (deceased) brother's birthday next week, so that may explain it.
***
This week I've found quite a few bisexuality references around me. I saw a bus with an ad for The Bi Life (a dating show, but OK); The Bisexual series starts this week; I saw a trailer for Bohemian Rhapsody at the cinema; and I learned that there's a master's student starting this semester who wants to do her dissertation on bisexuality.
This last one bit got me excited yesterday. We had our monthly Friday Drinks for Psych postgrads, and the fellow PhD student who told me about this new master's students said she could introduce us at the drinks event. That didn't happen. I was somewhat disappointed, but then again, whatever. I had planned to go to this event anyway, to socialize and maybe meet the new students. That didn't happen either. I ended up talking to three people I already knew.
One of these three people was the PhD student who was my latest crush. She is not anymore, though. She submitted her thesis and is going back to Mexico in December, even though she'll return for her exam, and hopefully a job, at some point. She got a boyfriend now, too, and she's very happy with him. But that's not why she's not my crush anymore.
I guess time and routine have just done their job. Plus, I got tired of dedicating my daydreams to someone I cannot get involved with, especially because I'm already involved with somebody else. Don't get me wrong, my ex-crush and I are friends.I feel free and less of a stereotype not pining for her, so it's all good. She's still one of my most valuable friends here and it sucks she's leaving. I'm cooking for her (and her boyfriend, I guess) one of these days to celebrate her thesis submission.
Tonight we're having two friends from the Psych department coming over tonight for a nice night in. Food, conversation, maybe a movie or video games.
One these friends is from Germany, he's submitting his thesis and is moving to the US in December. Friends I've made over the course of my PhD are starting to go away. In some time, I'll go away, too, and I'll also leave others behind. It breaks my heart a bit to think I'll probably never see these friends again, at least not in person.
The best we can do is get together while we can, I guess.
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