Short Term Body Project, Long Term Body

It's been a little tedious trying to get myself to write lately. I've had a weekend traveling for a journal editing training, followed by a weekend where a year on a planning committee culminated in a successful/exciting/overwhelming/joyful two-day conference, followed by a weekend (now) answering student frantic emails around final paper thesis/outlines. All of this is somewhat usual end of the year academic stuff--a burst of hectic before the doldrums of July and August. But it's also made me worry that I will never get any of my own work done. That the prospectus, since it was passed last week, is as far as I will get. Forever ABD.

And I think these feelings are what leads to the advice I recently received from a colleague, passed on to her from a fellow PhD: "The difference between those who finish and those who don't are about those who just keep going."

And I know for me, it's the smaller projects (planning a conference, working on a journal issue, publishing an article, planning a course syllabus) that make the larger projects seem relevant.

It's this realization that led me to make a decision about Project 28 and the new Weight Watchers Chapter. Combine the short term with the long term. Entertain self with somewhat narcissistic projects--growing my nails out (I am a life long biter), growing my hair long (I made a decision not to cut my hair short again until I have passed the dissertation), complete Jackie Warner's 40 minute power workout without dying. Enroll in yoga class, ten sessions.

I've lost my first 12 pounds on Weight Watchers. But here's the problem that I've noticed with myself: I keep thinking of how I can do this faster, how I can reach my "goal" by my 29th birthday. And I've realized that if I don't just make a long-term time commitment, a full year, I will continue to think in terms of the numbers in the program and not the habits. I will continue to think that it's the week to week that matters. And I'm pretty sure that thinking is a piece of what ended me in the clinic ten years ago.

"The difference between those who finish and those who don't are those who just keep going."

What to do when Mental Illness Kicks your Ass

Well, apparently, the answer to this is to get teary in an unsuspecting feminist professor's office.

I'm not sure if its the moodiness of weight-loss, the ebbs and flows of my ssri's (the "prozac poopout") or the stress of the past year where, encountering several PhD benchmarks (exams, prospectus, IRB approval), I'm left with news that my advisor is leaving--my second one to leave in a 15 month period. Likely, it's a combination of all of this.

And I have to say, this isn't a blog so much as just a note. To let you know I'm out here and struggling to stay optimistic about this process of finding balance. Trying to focus on little successes (delicious mint pea soup made, weekly groceries bought within budget, students' thoughtful writing assignment on connections between racism and homophobia half-graded) and trying to remember that support can come in the simplest of phrases.

"I, for one, am glad you're here."

Ode to the Egg: Part II

As it was coming down in sheets-- one of those early May showers (bring June flowers??? I guess global warming will have us revising that particular rhyme) that thunders lightly in the distance, soaking you in your quick dash home from your evening workout-- I wanted eggs.  The comfort food that has always been around in my house, in the form scrambled at the tail-end of a flu, fried in between white bread with ketchup on days my mom had off from work. But to call this blog an "ode to the egg" would be incomplete, because it is also an ode to steamed spring-fresh green beans, boiled red potatoes, olives, capers, and tuna, between bites of crisp cool lettuce. I'm writing now about the tuna nicoise.

As an aside, this is actually the only dish I like boiled potatoes in. I recoiled from potato as a child, which is pretty much betrayal to my french canadian and irish genetics (though I proselytize with poutine and can drink my weight in guinness to make up for it).

I actually just had to google that to make sure I spelled nicoise right (and as my partner would complain, I evidently need to check my spelling on here a lot more often). I don't know how to pronounce it either. I started ordering it in restaurants in my early days of coming out as a meat-eater. My partner, in her quest to eat all things fancy-brunch, brought me to classic americana-goes-locavore restaurants and I tried various pronunciations. Vish-ee-wah. Vish-wah. No one ever corrected me. I'm relieved I never tried to pronounce the S.

What's fun about ordering tuna nicoise in restaurants is that it always looks different. Because there are so many components, the plating is hard to predict: delicate bites of tuna and capers cupped in lettuce leaves or a pile of potato and green bean mixed with flaked tuna and boiled egg yolk. I think it depends on the politics of the restaurant. Are you with the  99 percent? More union = bigger pile.

And it's just as fun to eat. Boiled potato, caper, tuna. Tuna, lettuce, olive. Lettuce, potato, green bean. You get the picture.

So earlier this week, when I found that this dish could be made a. cheaply and b. with relatively few ww points, I planned for it. The weather made me gravitate to egg. I put on a pot to boil water as I showered. I thought that this dish would be relatively easy and simple. But in a kitchen with only 12 by 6 inches of counter space, it was a  bit of a juggle.

Out of shower. Water boiling over. Frantic rummage in fridge for potatoes and eggs.

Pull out directions. Forgot the part about making the dressing.

Dressing calls for chicken broth.

I only have veggie bouillon and not another pot to boil the water to make it.

I use just water.

I don't have red vinegar.

I remember a woman on my last bus trip to chicago talking about the chinese medicine philosophy of joint health and apple cider vinegar. I use that instead.

My partner's horse radish mayonnaise (how old is that???) falls out of the fridge as I reach for the dijon. Cats run as if that was a beckoning fog horn.

I whisk.

Cats on table. I have learned the art of the one-handed cat-toss.

Cats re-emerge with tuna can.

Shit. How long have the eggs been on?

Shit. I have to cut the stems off the green beans.

Shit. The cheap produce I bought last weekend gave me have-rotted green beans. Cut the rot off too.

Toss in dressing.

Rinse lettuce.

Capers. Olives.

Peel egg.

I'm too exhausted to find a fancy way to plate.

But this plate of textures is exactly perfect.