Inconsequential

I am amazed that academics have time to blog, tweet, all of that social media AND do their jobs well.  Some obviously do, but I am definitely not one of them.

So, I sort-of read blogs and occasionally do a crappy blog post myself.  The result is that this blog doesn't quite capture who I am.  But then again, I'm not sure that documenting myself accurately would really be all that interesting.  I don't know.  Maybe I'll try to change this. 

The other thing about it is that we all change over time.  So what this blog was three years ago reflects my need for a blog 3 years ago, and this blog now reflects the me today, who sort-of needs a blog but mostly needs the outlet of reading other people's blogs and feeling connected to people who have some similarity with an element of my life.

Much of what I talk about is the reproductive side of my life.  But the me of 7 years ago, 4 years ago, 2 years ago, and today, well, we are very different women.  This is a good thing, I think.  Life is an evolution, and I am starting to embrace that more and more as I get older.

The child-issue became overwhelming for me for a while, and it is now the part of my life around which other things happen. I know (hope) that my daughter grows up and lives her own life, which won't really include me on a day-to-day basis.  So, the wanting-a-child stage of my life is now a having-a-child stage, and that will become, if all goes successfully, a having-an-adult-child stage.  And I am pretty sure that other day-to-day things will overwhelm my thoughts then.  I don't really know though; we'll see when we get there.

But all the while, as my mama-life evolves and morphs, I am a scientist and an academic.  THOSE issues are much less in flux.  And when it comes down to it, I am an academic.  I love it.  I hate it.  It is in my blood, and no matter how much I might think about doing something else, I can't look away.  I'm here.  I love the thrill, the passion, the everything (even the things I hate).  The last couple of weeks of time in my office and lab have made me very happy. And last night I caught the edge of an internet storm that I am amazed that I almost missed.  If I were amazing, I would follow twitter, but my god, how do people have time for that???  This reminded me how much I love the world of academics.

The storm?  Henry Gee.  I know Henry Gee.  In Henry Gee's world, I too am inconsequential.  Years ago I got the most ridiculous review of my manuscript, it just made absolutely no sense and clearly indicated that the reviewer didn't know the first freaking thing about my discipline.  But when I very politely outlined this to Gee, I got the response many would expect -- who was I to second guess his and a reviewer's determination that my research was inconsequential and irrelevant? 

So it was with jaw-dropped that I jumped from web site to web site reading about Gee's insulting and gleeful outing of Dr. Isis, calling her inconsequential and saying that Nature was "shaking in its boots" at the thought of her boycotting that journal.  I loved reading all of the brouhaha around it (e.g., here).  I love the bloggers who called Gee out for this, for all the right reasons.

And I loved running across Steven Pinker calling Gee out on his misunderstanding of p-values.

See, if Gee had listened to what I said when that reviewer rejected my research all those years ago, he wouldn't have made the mistake about p-values. It all comes full-circle.

I wish I knew who Dr. Isis is, as she might technically be outed, but not all that much.  THAT is one gutsy woman.  I love her, and we only just met.

I'll try to blog more about my academic life from now on.  I think I'm getting out of my anti-academy funk. 

Let there be research!  (and some academic-y politics too...)