Jacquelyn's Space

So much to do so little time. I have the Sigma Tau Delta Induction coming up. I have the Psi Chi Induction to plan…plus about 7 papers and projects to work on before the semester is done next week (Monday!!!), not to mention poetry to write, and 3 exams to study for (and a party! gah!)…agh!! I need a break. I can’t wait until the semester is over. I can’t wait to go to Mackinac. And maybe on a few other adventures once school is done.

I have to write a paper for Health Psychology so I have been studying mindfulness and meditation – well I have been trying to anyway – but what I learned so far has helped me and made me realize I need to study this stuff for real. I have lost touch with my calmer, go with the flow side. I need to get back in touch with that and beyond….because there will always be too many things to do in not enough hours.

So most have heard, “All the world’s a stage/And all the men and women merely players” from Shakespeare’s As You Like It. But a few years later Shakespeare, in Macbeth, wrote this: “Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player/That struts and frets his hour upon the stage/And then is heard no more./It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury/Signifying nothing.”

Wow! Love it… but what the hell Shakespeare? What the hell was going on with you when you wrote Macbeth? Methinks thou wast suffering from melancholy madness.

For my Shakespeare class we have the option of doing a performance project instead of a final paper – no brainer…performance. This younger girl (almost half my age, ha) and I are working on a project together. In our script we have flashbacks…while we were together today writing our script I thought maybe we should do the whole Wayne’s World flashback hand wave  going in and out of our flashback scenes. I was going to ask my partner about it but I had to stop first and ask her if she had ever heard of Wayne’s World, hahahaa. She had not! SO I had to demonstrate a Wayne’s World flashback and look up an old sketch as soon as I got home….

Wayne’s World

http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/video/x8bl6e
WAYNE’S WORLD SKETCH 1990 featuring Madonna by kervez
http://www.dailymotion.com/embed/video/x8bl6e
WAYNE’S WORLD SKETCH 1990 featuring Madonna by kervez

I helped out with the Sigma Tau Delta Creative Writing Conference on Friday. I didn’t get a chance to enter any of my papers (too busy, stressed, and tired at the deadline in February) but I offered to help out because I enjoyed the other writing conference I attended  a couple of years ago and thought it would be fun and a great experience. The conference was a modest success yesterday – not as many papers presented as we would have liked but we had a nice turnout and some great discussions; I enjoyed myself and helping out. Most of all I will treasure the email that my professor sent me:

Jackie

I wanted to say that I thought you did such a magnificent job moderating panels today.  I was most impressed by your gentleness and the seriousness with which you took your job.  It’s not always easy to think of appropriate comments and questions.  However, I believe that it is very important to encourage conversation to give the presenter the feeling that they’ve been heard and that what they offered was interesting.  You handled these situations masterfully and showed a generosity that is really inspiring.

Thank you for your work.  Are you free to go out to breakfast this coming Friday.  I want to reward the conference committee and the secretaries.  We thought we’d all meet at the crepe place.  I wanted to see if this seemed possible before I settled on that day.

 I hope you have a good weekend.

 All the best,

Mary Jo

*

I am so thankful she noticed and acknowledged my contribution. The conference experience and my professor’s comments really make me want to pursue becoming a professor and making my life’s work center on higher education.

Yes, my days keep getting busier, ugh! I like days where I can chill, go with the flow, relax. I am not really going to be able to relax until May, if then. I am penciling in a breakdown for the first week of May actually. I’ll have to see if I have time.

Today I was up early after barely sleeping. I was at school before 9am to work on some stuff for Psi Chi, which I had to hurry so I could meet my scene partners in the theater for Shakespeare class. Only one other person from the scene showed but we ran through our scene – Act 3 iv of Hamlet. I played Queen Gertrude. It is a pretty interesting scene – Hamlet confronts his mother with his feelings over her marrying his uncle, showing his ‘madness’ or at least his anger; his father’s ghost appears, which shows his ‘madness’ even more. Fun!

I had to run up to Classic Greek and Roman Lit.  – I was late. After that was Shakespeare and the scene performance, which went well, though I was unable to produce real tears… I thought I could, given my emotional state lately, but my nerves got the better of me; I used ’em though. People seemed to like our performance and we were told it made them uncomfortable (which it was supposed to) and someone said even though I didn’t cry I was convincing.

Before and after Shakespeare class I had to discuss yet another project with a classmate. I think we have a good idea for a project (our final project) involving The Taming of the Shrew.

I had to run off to wind symphony, which rehearsal went pretty well today but I still have lots work on – we have a concert coming soon, a little over a week away! Once wind symphony was over, I ran back up to the Psychology Office to do some more work for Psi Chi – it is induction time and I had to enter the applications of the new inductees online so the main office would have the info in time for our induction next month. I also had to record and ready the payment information for deposit. I took all that to the Cashier’s Office in the Pavilion (far from the Psychology Department -I was all around school today but it could have been worse) and chatted on the phone with my dad on my way back to the office to pick up my stuff (backpack, computer, and trombone – too much to carry). I ran into my friend Jeannette on the way back too so I got to touch base with her. She, like me, is having a rough semester. 😦

Left school around 5:30pm after being there for more than a full day without stopping. I had to stop by the credit union on my way home, then the grocery store, and finally I was on my way home. It was after 6 by the time I made it home and got  anything like a meal to eat. I had only had a cup of yogurt all day. Didn’t have time to rest though. Touched base with my husband and then my dad stopped by to pick me up for an appointment. Finally I made it home half past nine to catch up on emails and facebook, and write this very busy day in my blog … though it is not over yet. I still have much homework to do and stuff I could do for Psi Chi and Sigma Tau Delta (there is the Writing Conference this Friday). I am freaking exhausted.