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Situation Normal: All F*cked Up.

 If you've ever used the term SNAFU to refer to a difficult, chaotic, or messy situation, you know that it is an acronym.  It is now 2021, and I guess this is normal.  If you're reading this sometime in well removed from when I'm writing it, this is the week after a group of rioters stormed the Capitol Building disrupting the certification of election results, injuring scores of people, and leaving 5 dead.  I'm more than a little shook.  But life goes on.  


I ended up taking a prolonged break from writing this at the end of 2020. I was really  struggling, some with my mental health, some with classes.  As I mentioned back in August, I've been frustrated with my classes.  It's not that I dislike learning.  No one would be in grad school if they did.  I've just reached the point where I'm frustrated with coursework, and the inordinate amount of time it takes up.  Between that, the stress of living in a pandemic, and some personal issues the projects I was working on slowly walked back from 3 plus a blog to two, and then one plus a a blog, to just the one, and even with that there were things I was putting off.  I described it to my friends as being at the red flashy low battery warning.  Then there I took a few days off at Thanksgiving, and that helped, but I was still at the yellow flashy low battery warning.  Now, after Christmas and New Years, I'm still kind of exhausted.  Everything that's happened in politics the last few days have been exhausting, and I'm still trying to find my footing.  But for once, I feel like I can.  Oh, I'm still struggling to get as much done as I think I should be able, and probably doing less than my advisors want me to be doing, but I am getting a little bit more done each day, and right now, I'll take the wins where I can find them.  

With the start of the new year, and a new semester where I am (FINALLY) done with classes, I'm actually excited to be tackling problems.  I won't lie to you, it's daunting, knowing it's your job to figure out and solve problems that no one around has any idea what to do with, but I enjoy gathering up different bits of information and trying to put them together to come up with new ideas and hypotheses.  It's why I love doing this, and for the first time in nearly two years, I feel at least a little bit excited about doing that to, even if I do have to keep beating my head against a brick well of experiments that don't works.  

I'm sorry I don't have any jokes, references, or snarky quips for you.  I just don't have any in me right now.  My sense of humor will come back. It always does, eventually.  Til then, I'm just gonna keep going, get what I can done at whatever pace I can make it happen, even if it is less and slower than it should be.


Stay safe, be well, and always look at the data.

Faxe MacAran

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