Silly Thoughts

As you can imagine, dear reader, there are many posters hanging about the university.  Advertisements of all kinds for different classes, programs and events are everywhere.  Unlike my day, they aren't confined to the occasional corkboard, as there are now electronic posters with shifting pictures, circles and arrows and a paragraph on... sorry.  Started channeling Arlo Guthrie again.

Yesterday was one of those events advertised.  The center where I work held an LGBT all campus welcome jawn in a large sweaty hall in the student union.  It was quite the success, with a lot of people coming, many organizations tabling, and free food (including Swedish meatballs, brie, and chicken amoretto.  Not mixed together.)  There was music as well, but all I could hear was the bass line and drums, as I was on the other side of the room.  

In any case, during the event, I had to run down to the center, which was two floors down.  As I walked, I saw a poster that caused me to pause.

"BECOME AN EMT"

As long time victims, I mean readers of this blog know, in my youth I was a volunteer Emergency Medical Technician (EMT.)  I would eventually become a Paramedic, but that doesn't matter.  I volunteered with an ambulance and a rescue squad.

As I wrote in a previous entry: "Doing this work radically changed some of my thinking back then.  Back when so many people my age thought they were invincible, I looked death in the face.  I watched friends die.  I saw things that hurt and haunt me to this day.  What does that do to someone still in adolescence?  Well, it makes us less fun at parties for one thing.  It puts things in perspective as well.  And for someone who carried the Dark Secret I had inside of me?  Yes, I have PTSD. Not just from the Paramedic days, but from repressing my Truth and swallowing my Pain."

All true.  I still think of what I saw every day.  I think about the people who I tried to help, but couldn't.  When I sleep, I have consistent nightmares of helplessness and failure.  

So why in the world would that poster give me pause... and cause me to consider re-certifying my EMT certification?  My EMT and other certifications ran out decades ago (I keep my CPR current when I can get a course.)  Well, at first glance, I figured that the course might be free, as it would be paid by the University in exchange for  service on the University Ambulance.  Fair trade.  And beside, ambulance work, while not easy, was nowhere near as traumatic as rescue work.  Usually not as bloody.  In fact, in the old days, they were a lot of routine transports.  But here were also heart attacks, births, strokes, and suicides.  The ones that still haunt me from those are the suicides- one in particular.  

I can't say I regret letting my certifications expire.  At the time, I'd met wife, had a steady job, and was ready to move on from that work.  I still stop at accidents when I came upon them (one day I'll have to tell the story of the Christmas accident in Delaware) if no ambulance had yet arrived.  I like to fool myself, once in a while, that I still make a difference.  Heck, I'm considering donating my old helmet to a museum! (Spring Ford Historical Society)

Is it a desire to reclaim my lost youth?  Do I miss the adrenaline rush?  Not really.  The fact is that in my middle age I feel useless.  I want to make a difference  again- directly- in a way that I can see.  

But then those pesky facts get in the way.  I'm really in no physical condition to run ambulance (not that many ambulance people I met are paragons of physical fitness) due to my back, hip, and knees- which were partially destroyed in the rescue days of my youth.  Also, I looked into the program- it isn't free.  Like my undergrad days, they are for-credit courses, which means tuition: $726 per credit hour.  It's a four credit course, so... $2904.  That's too rich for my blood... and bank account.  If I had that money, there are other things I'd need to do first.  Like pay bills.  Or send my mum's ashes to Scotland.  Or...

In any case, I guess my mind is writing checks that my body (and sanity) can no longer cash.  I already have enough bad dreams and flashback.  I think that, in this case, it's best to let this "opportunity" go.

Be well.

Comps II: Oral Boogaloo

On Monday, August 15, 2022, at 10 AM, I started my oral comprehensive exam.  I already finished the written portion (which I wrote about here), so this was where I defended my work and answered additional questions.  

I was allowed to do a ten minute presentation if I wished to explain my answers, so I did (good thing too!).  At this point, a ten minute presentation is nothing.  I worked a few hours on power point slides, rehearsed it a couple of times, and was ready.  All I needed was a good night's sleep.  I took melatonin and went to bed early-ish.  

One of the slides.  On the right is Michel Foucault

And had nasty insomnia.  

When I did sleep, I dreamed of being back in a school setting. Physically, the building was a school I encounter often in my dreams- a random, rambling monstrosity with hills, a multi-level shopping mall, a food court, and hallways that intersect at odd angles.  I had assignments to finish, but it was the last day of school, and the final bell had sounded.  Students were in a desperate rush to begin summer, and the hallways were crowded with kids throwing papers in the air and shouting.  I managed to find my locker somehow (in my dreams, I normally can't) and was putting away books (huh?) worried about the assignments I never did.  

I originally planned to wake up early, shower, do my hair and makeup and read through my written exam one more time before the 10 AM test on zoom.  Well, in the end, I skipped the makeup, and only dried my hair instead of doing anything fancy.  I managed to read through my paper though, as my advisor had technical difficulties so the exam started a little late.

So there they were- the four members of my dissertation committee, each a scholar of note within their field, and each, in my mind, ready to tear me to pieces.  I selected three of these professors as they made an impression on me in class or out.  The chair was my advisor, and also very good.  I gave my presentation, which lasted just a hair under ten minutes (as timed.)  Then the questions began.

I suppose there's no harm in revealing the four questions I was asked to discuss in the written part, as they were tailored to my work.

1) Review the existing academic literature on transgender awareness and inclusion programs (training) for adults, including the types of programs and their outcomes (effectiveness). In addition, how do these programs address the root causes of violence toward transgender people, if at all? Finally, explain how Foucault’s theories of power and knowledge can help us understand transmisogyny and transgender violence.

2) Review the adult education literature on transformative learning, exploring both its central tenets and critiques. How are theories of transformative learning relevant to your proposed study on transgender awareness and inclusion programs? What kinds of verbal statements and actions (practices) would indicate that participants in transgender programs have experienced transformative learning? 

3) Use the gender and women’s studies literature on gender justice to explain how transgender advocacy is related to broader gender justice movements in the USA. How is transgender liberation a disruption or threat to hegemonic and traditional conceptualizations of gender roles, gender identity, and gender as an organizing structure of society? 

4) You have proposed using an ethnographic and autoethnographic approach to answering your research questions. Discuss the central elements of ethnography and autoethnography and why these methods are appropriate for answering your research questions. Consider this a draft of the methods section for your dissertation proposal to include: research design, main research questions, sampling and participants, data collection, and data analysis.

My oral exam focused on these questions as well.  I was sweating like crazy due to nerves.  I didn't want to look like a complete idiot in front of these professors, whom I admire.  That said, I felt like a complete fraud.  I didn't belong in this meeting.  I was a poser- and they knew it.  They were going to fail me most heinously and were going through the motions- I was sure of it.

As I wrote in the earlier bit, there were three possible outcomes of this exam:

1. Pass.  I would then be an ABD (All But Dissertation) and could start work on my dissertation.

2. Partial Pass: If I screw up one question, I will have an opportunity to re-write it and go again.  I get one chance at that.

3. Fail.  Done.  Get out.  Finished.  No soup for you.  Wasted three years.  Go away, loser.  And the horse you rode in on.

I answered their questions to the best of my ability, with only one that was a bit unexpected.  Then, they put me in a "break out room" as they debated my fate.  I was told it would be around ten minutes.  I went to the bathroom.  grabbed another bottle of water.  Organized the desk a little.  Checked the news.  

Ten minutes passed.

                                            

                                            15

                                                                                                        20

After 23 minutes, the break out room closed, and there were the four professors.  I was informed that after considerable debate, I...

PASSED.

However, the debate was on whether or not I should re-write (do over) my answers to questions one and three.  Y'know, the two I was most confident that I'd aced.  Three professors congratulated me and disappeared.  My advisor told me that it was a close thing- and that if I had to re-write, there was still a chance I could salvage a PhD.  

After that, she gave me instructions as to what I had to do next.  I then dragged my roomie/bestie Linda downtown to Cafe 210 West and had lunch and celebratory Long Island Iced tea pitchers.  Then home for a celebratory nap.

At the Cafe

The next day, my advisor sent me six typed pages of notes about the exam: questions she had but didn't ask as well as critiques.  To read these made me think that passing me was a mercy- a concession because I ticked off several diversity boxes.  One of my fellow students doesn't think so- she thinks I'm reading into it.  Maybe I'm letting my imposter syndrome get the best of me.  

As I type this, it's Friday.  The upper classmen are back, and I'm sure the bars downtown are packed with reunions, summer stories, flirtations, and shots.  Me? I haven't showered in a couple days, feel scummy, and need to shave as the laser I had 12 years ago has worn off.  I'd love to be downtown enjoying the day, and the fact that I'm no longer a PhD Student- I'm now a PhD Candidate.  But the Darkness has me, and besides, I'm broke.  As usual.

So there you have it. dear readers.  Somehow, for whatever reason, I passed.  I feel tremendous relief.  Now it's time for the dissertation proposal; fifty pages of fun.  

But not today.

Be well.

Story of a Flapper

 Once upon a time, I did my best to update this blog once a week, and I felt bad if I didn't.  But depression, then school, etc overwhelmed any desire to write anything.  Right now, I'm in a place where I have the time, and I'm not curled up in bed staring into nothingness and wishing for same.  So, now... what do I write? 

A week from today (as I write this), I take my oral comprehensive exam.  A lot is at stake here, as I wrote last entry.  Do I stay or do I go?  Stay tuned.

I started reading a book called Flapper: A Madcap Story of Sex, Style, Celebrity, and the Women who made America Modern by Joshua Zeitz.  The prohibition era fascinates me, and I'll get to why.  Maybe because it was a time of incredible change in this country.  For the first time, the US took away citizen's rights instead of granting them (like the supreme court did recently.)  As most people know who've been on the planet a while, the unintended side effect was that organized crime became entrenched here in the US, while a majority of the populace gave the law the finger and drank anyway.  

I've read several books on the topic already, but none were female-centric.  In this case, the book centers on several women and how they smashed the Victorian sensibilities of their parents and changed how women defined themselves and society.  One of the women profiled is Lois Long, better known as "Lipstick" who wrote a column for the New Yorker.  I read about her in other books as well- through her writing, readers rode along on her adventures club hopping to all the right places.  For me, the best part was that no one knew who Lipstick was, and she took pains to keep it that way.  She reveled in her anonymity (although many women claimed to be her to gain entrance to exclusive speakeasies.)  Her prose, if you can find it, pops with energy.  Lois Long lived to be 72, passing in 1974.  She's buried in Easton, PA, not too far from where True Colors Makeup Artistry used to be.  

Lois Long (on the right)

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lois_Long)

This leads to a story (you knew it would, right?)  In the summer of 1984, I quit Burger King, worked briefly for a sewage plant, then got a summer job at Montgomery County Geriatric and Rehabilitation Center (it has since changed its name so many times, I have no idea what it's called) doing Summer Maintenance.  Usually that meant painting things, though I also learned how to do locksmithing.  One day, I was taking down air vents in the resident rooms when I met "Beatrice." I won't give her real name.  Bea was wheelchair bound after a stroke, but she wasn't going to let that stop her.  Bea ("don't call me Beatrice, young man, you're not my father!")  Bea was stuck into the home by her nephew, as her son died in Korea in 1952 (if memory serves.)  No one ever visited her as she really had no family.

Bea  loved to talk, and was a dynamo of energy.  I spent more time taking down that vent then I should have (and caught hell for it) and went back at my lunch to visit some more.  Bea was a flapper, "quite a dish," and full of stories.  She was a Main Line girl, and attended Bryn Mawr College (so she says- I never verified any of her stories, nor did I want to).  She told me about the parties and the speakeasies in Wayne, PA, and Philly, of dancing until dawn then going with her date to a diner for coffee.  She loved telling her stories, and brought the era to life in a unique way.  She told me of a "juice joint" being raided and her getting stuck in a window with her butt hanging out.  As a flapper, her skirt was quite short, and, well, she'd neglected to wear underwear, "so the police got quite a view!"  She managed to escape with a little help so her name didn't end up in the newspapers (the embarrassment!).  

Another favorite story was her "cake eater" (ladies man) of the moment trying to teach her to drive, and running his brand new Stutz into a ditch, which tossed them out over the windshield into a creek (she showed me a scar on her arm, which she claims was from that accident), shredding her "glad rags."  He didn't ask her out again after that.  Bea married "a mouthpiece from Yale" (lawyer) with whom she had her son.  She had her son's medals and showed them to me.   Her husband died in the 60s, so she'd lived alone since.  

1925 Stutz model 695

(https://www.conceptcarz.com/valuation/17247/stutz-model-695.aspx)

That fall, I went to Drexel.  When I came home for Thanksgiving break, I learned that Bea had another stroke, and that this one took her at age 83.  I attended her funeral, where I was one of maybe ten people.  She had no one left.  I had a writing assignment after break, so I wrote about Bea.  The professor liked it so much, she entered it in a contest, where it won an award.  I guess standards for writing at an engineering school were low.  

I wonder what she would think of my transition.  She wasn't exactly conservative (she considered Reagan a "flimflam artist").  I'm guessing she would've encouraged me to hike up my skirt to show off my "pins" and enjoy myself.  And then smiled that sly smile she had.  

I think of Bea once in a while, and the life she had.  We are all people of our time: she of the Roaring Twenties and myself of the Eighties and Nineties (that's when I was free to "gad about.")  I assume that all the flappers are gone now, so there is no living memory of that time.  Eventually, there will be no living memory of World War II, then the Sixties, and, someday, the Eighties.  Maybe that's why I tell stories now (like in this blog) so someone, somewhere may read them and learn a little about my time (and yours).  

Be well, and "don't take any wooden nickels."

Summer's Stretch and Sixty One

Summer enters its final stretch here in August, and soon the students will return to State College as an unstoppable wave of energy, curiosity, and lust.  I remember when I was an undergrad I couldn't wait to get back up here- away from parents and their rules and back on my own where the possibilities and parties were endless.

Today I'm really not thinking of that though.  Today marks my dearest sister Lisa's 61st birthday.  Nine years ago, this day was marked by a huge party in her sister's yard in Baltimore which was a combination of her 52nd birthday and "coming out" party.  I was one of the lucky few to be invited, and it was one of the most fun days of my life.  

Me, Lisa, and Ally: August 3, 2013

As I wrote of that day:

I started walking toward the back yard and I saw Lisa.  She was dressed in a white floral dress, and holding a bouquet of flowers.  Absolutely angelic.  She saw our group coming and smiled broadly.  I would find out later that she was feeling extremely nervous until we arrived, and we were like cavalry coming to her rescue!  I can't blame her- that had to be so incredibly stressful meeting so many relatives as a Woman for the first time.

It was a long day- 18 hours and a LOT of driving. Also that day, I met a statuesque beauty who would become one of my dearest friends: Ally.  

Special people and special memories.  Bittersweet.  Lisa is still 52, and always will be.  As those who have read this blog more than a little know what happened.  Lisa committed suicide a little more than a month later.  She deprived the world of her incredible light, and the privilege of watching her and Sandy grow old together.  I think of them both today, as I do every day.  

And so, this last chapter of summer (so to speak) is hot, humid, and haunted.  The hot weather now continues into November, so it's like we skip autumn chill and go into a short winter before summer begins again.  (Spring and fall were cancelled to bring higher profits to oil companies.)  In any case, today I reflect on what was, who she was, what could have been, what is, who I am, and what now?  No matter what, I hope that wherever she is, I'm making Lisa proud.

Happy birthday Lisa!  I will always love and miss you.