Mama PhD

My kids are counting down to the last day of school. This morning I heard the daily update: 9 days left. They’ve had it. They are both exhausted and tired of the grinding routine: wake up early, long day at school, homework, dinner, daily afterschool programs, choir, piano lessons and practice, etc, etc. Swim practices have stopped, as the season is over, but the (considerable) time this frees up quickly dissipates into special end of year performances, practices, field trips, ceremonies, and although a little different, these weigh on my kids too. Summer vacation is looking good in their eyes. I blogged before about how our family is relocating across the country this summer. This will certainly shake things up this summer – a cure to the blahs of long-term, rigorous school routine.

An important topic from Algebra is that of intersecting lines. Equations can be written representing lines on graph paper, and Algebra, especially Linear Algebra, helps find points that are contained on more than one line, where two or more lines intersect. I thought of this last weekend as I watched former students walk across a stage to receive their diplomas, and realized that their lives had intersected with mine. I know that my life is richer for having known them.

Over the years I have blogged about my son Nick and his dilemmas in school, which began when he was “kicked out” of a Montessori program at age three for behavior that the director described as “autistic.” We rushed to a doctor for an assessment, but Nick's autism tests were largely negative. We removed Nick from Montessori and enrolled him in a more structured public school program.

Sometimes I can become so engrossed in a project that I forget to take a break. Or I don’t realize that I’ve been sitting with terrible posture at the computer and have neglected to stop and stretch. Before I know it I have an aching neck or back and can no longer work effectively. Why can’t I just remember to take a break?

As I suggested last week, the first couple of weeks of May were taken up with professional development of various sorts, necessitating large chunks of time out of the office and away from the computer. While that kind of change of pace is good, especially right at the end of the semester, it conflicts with the kind of change of pace I really want in May: the one where I get back to my research full time.

A few years ago, I took a 2-hour music improv workshop at the school where I was studying straight (acting) improv. The teacher, Rob, was first rate, fun and supportive, but were all terrified. (Of course there was no objective danger, but as we know, people tend to be more afraid of public speaking than of death, so imagine the terror involved in spontaneous singing in front of a group of strangers.) A few people abstained from singing through the entire class, which they had paid for, waiting for courage that never came. I forced myself to participate, but it was a real stretch. The payoff was enormous, though. I felt I was exploring areas of my brain that I had not known were there.

One of the concepts I teach in my Quantitative Reasoning class is the idea of “Exponential Growth.” Such growth, where a variable grows by a fixed percent, is found in such things as population growth and the growth of money earning interest. I found myself thinking of this recently as I watch my daughter grow at a rate that seems to be exponential, outgrowing clothes almost before they can be worn and threatening to soon pass me by in terms of height. I am thrilled to see her turning into a healthy young lady, but I have to pause as I realize that, as she grows, she is exposed to aspects of life that I would prefer to shield her from.

Last week, in a formidable and sometimes brilliant treatise, literary critic Terry Castle bemoaned the current state of dependent students at her elite university, suggesting that contemporary college students are missing an important stage of development by not separating (or ‘hating’) their parents. This weekend, in addition to three book reviews on the subject of motherhood, the New York Times Magazine featured an article about a mother whose nine-year old son may be a psychopath. Happy Mother’s Day.