Be careful what you ask for, because you just might get it

Hoo boy, grad school is not for the faint of heart. I really pined for a return to the academic environment while in Peace Corps, but I'm coming to realize that I did so reflecting on an edited version of my undergrad reality (heavy on the memories of all the freedom and hanging out on campus; light on the memories of reading till the wee hours and having to crank out papers). I'm still very happy to be here, however, especially now that I'm figuring out campus and the many resources it has available. Right now, for example, I'm in the graduate student center, which is a study space available to us snooty grad students who won't deign to study alongside the undergrads in the library. Plus, more importantly, it offers free coffee and evening screenings of the Daily Show.

So now I've got one large mug of coffee coursing through my veins and I'm feeling more up to the day's tasks, including blogging. Lord, I've been doing an atrocious job of keeping in touch with people! All I can say in my defense is that I'm keeping in touch with no one, so if you're feeling ignored, comfort yourself with the fact that so is everyone else. Last night is a perfect example: after attending two 2.5-hour classes (entirely too long to talk about anything, even interesting subjects), I wanted to catch the bus but didn't know where the stop was, so I just walked home. Between the heat and humidity I arrived home exhausted and with quite a headache and just flopped down onto my bed, which had transformed itself into the most comfortable bed in the history of the world. I laid there thinking about all the things I should be doing (eating dinner, mailing bills, reading for the next day's classes) and decided that just this once, they could wait. I first set my alarm to allow for a 30-minute nap, but that felt so good I decided that -- again, just this once -- I was not going to make myself get up until the next morning. So I slept from about 5pm to 7am, and it was FANTASTIC.

You have to understand, if you don't already know this about me, I'm a big sleeper. I need probably 9 hours to feel like a functional human being, though 10 would be better still. You also have to understand that my brain/body is for some reason opposed to going to sleep at a reasonable hour. I would really do well on a 1am to 10am sleep schedule. So, although I am striving to put myself on a sleep schedule, my body is really fighting me on it. I've been making myself go to bed at about 11pm so that I'll (hopefully) be rested and able to get up for school/fieldwork at 7am, but at night I just lay there waiting to fall asleep, and in the morning I have to drag myself out of bed. I'm thinking that the answer is just to keep to the schedule until eventually I'm so exhausted at night that I'll fall asleep quickly and easily at 11pm and wake up refreshed at 7am, but yesterday afternoon my body told me it was time to bend the rules.

But happily, today I'm feeling a renewed ability to attack everything on my plate, and oh what a full plate it is! And to think that just last week (while slightly buzzed, I'll admit) I was considering taking on a part-time position on campus. Ah ha ha ha! Work?! The measly $400 or so I'd take home from a part-time job hardly seems worth it. It barely would put a dent in the rather substantial loans I have to take out for tuition and living expenses, plus it would take away much-needed time for studying. So I'm axing that plan.

But back to my full plate. I'm taking four classes:

1. Foundations of Social Work Practice -- this is the class where we bring in our experiences at our field placements, such as reviewing client cases in class and so on.

2. American Racism and Social Work Practice

3. Human Behavior in the Social Environment -- deals with human development and behavior as it relates to the social environment.

4. History and Philosophy of Social Work and Social Welfare

I'm also spending three 8-hour days per week at my field placement, working in Family Preservation Services, which is a voluntary 12-week intensive program for families with children under 18, who have an open case with Child Protective Services. FPS staff work with families on a variety of issues during the 12 weeks – housing, interpersonal communication, mental health, truancy, and so on – with the goal of the children not being placed out into foster care. Interestingly I learned that frequently staff work not with parents who have had a child abuse report made against them, but rather with parents who made a CPS call themselves because they feel they cannot handle their adolescent children. Finally, in my remaining time I have to complete papers and keep up on readings, which are so far averaging about 50 to 100 pages per course per week, or about 200 to 400 pages per week total. I've always been a big reader and frequent visitor to libraries, but oh my...talk about being burned out. My "fun" books from the library are pretty well untouched.

But now I’ve dinked around for more than an hour and it’s time to get back to some of that aforementioned reading. Boo. At least I can say one positive thing about the heavy grad school reading load, and that is that everything feels relevant. These books are books that I would want to read even if I weren’t in school (though probably not, say, all at once) and that directly relate to the work I’m doing with clients. Unlike in high school advanced algebra/trig, I don’t find myself grumbling, “And how am I going to use this in real life?” And that is a beautiful thing.