QOTD: "Nothing we do as adults is wholly based on our adult reactions; it's always to a greater or lesser degree - depending on how deep go our roots to the past - an echo of our childhood." - Harlan Ellison
Reading: Laura Childs, Gunpowder Green
Listening to: Ofra Haza, Fifty Gates of Wisdom
Decluttering accomplishments: mailed three packages, did hand laundry
Today was somewhat better than yesterday. For one thing, my computer at work managed not to crash all day. Well, except for Netscape deciding not to work somewhere around noon. But I can always use my alternate web connection via our corporate network, instead of via the Air Force base network. I also spent much of the day reviewing a particularly badly written and poorly organized document, but that's par for the course, and I got through it without having to stay all that much later than normal.
The big event of the day was my morning interview for the job in Washington that I'd had a prior phone interview for. I'm clearly in the running, since the director of that office came all the way out to L.A. primarily to interview me. (Well, he was going to talk one other applicant, too, but the point is still that I made that first cut.) The interview went well enough, I think. I should hear within the next couple of weeks one way or the other.
I did the one thing I always do for things like job interviews and briefings at conferences and other situations where I'm trying to be impressive in front of people who don't know me. Namely, I wore my brass rat. I can't underestimate the talismatic power of the One Ring. That power is only real when you deal with other M.I.T. alumni, of course, but there's some psychological value in being reminded that I survived to wear it.
Actually, I am hesitant to admit it, but the M.I.T. experience was not all that horrible for me. I 'm not going to claim it was easy, but I graduated with a lot of confidence in my abilities. Some of that was probably because I was so fortunate in stumbling across something that I liked and was good at (namely, control theory) while I was just a sophomore. There's nothing quite like the experience of rushing home after class and immediately setting to work on a problem set out of the sheer joy of seeing if it really makes as much sense as you thought it did.
Obviously, I didn't experience that with every class. There were plenty I struggled through, though often that was because of unrealistic expectations. For example, I took an acoustics class that would have made a lot more sense had I had a course in continuum mechanics first. I'd had (and done well in) all of the prerequisites, but they weren't really sufficient.
I think there are a few reasons why my experience was better than that of many other M.I.T. students. For one thing, I didn't think I was a failure if I didn't get straight A's. For the most part, I think I got the grades I deserved. The one C I got (in linear algebra) was karmic revenge for having taken the class on the grounds that my friend, Mark, told me it was an easy A. He'd had a different instructor, though. And he ran into similar karmic revenge by taking a writing class I'd told him was an easy A and getting a C in it.
Another thing that helped was that I'd already been in situations with other good students. I didn't have any significant competition in high school (not that I actually competed) but I'd spent a summer at an NSF biochemistry program and spent Saturday mornings at the Columbia University Science Honors Program. So I knew I could hold my own, but that I might not be at the very top.
Finally, I did things besides schoolwork. Mostly I danced - mostly folk dance club and jazz dance classes. I was also active in Hillel (brunch coordinator one year, treasurer another year), read at least one novel a week, and made a point of going to a movie the night before a final exam. The logic for the movies was that I wasn't going to learn something then if I didn't know it yet, so I was better off relaxing.
There are some valuable lessons there and those are what the brass rat should be reminding me of. It's still good to remember that I don't have to know everything, that I don't have to be the best, and that work is not all there is in life. I can look at my finger and remember that keeping my perspective is the real way to earn prestige.
The people I'm dealing with are, however, perfectly free to treat it as a ring of power.
Copyright 2002 Miriam H. Nadel