Acknowledgment r02

You were cruel to me,

rancorous in singling me out.

As I worked more and more,

in excess of 80 hours each week,

you advised me to seek counseling

instead of treating me with respect;

you contributed to my waking dread

through every sneer and disdainful stare

and howl during weekly face-to-face dress-downs.


I don't know why you needed to treat me

like dirt--if it was the pressure of being

a new faculty member, or the shadows cast

over you by your partner and other young faculty,

or if it was the stress of motherhood in the academy,

but it showed me a wonderful way not to treat

any person I will ever come into contact with,

especially those in my care or supervision.


Investigation capability in spades does not make

one kind or understanding or capable of managing

effectively. I only wish that I had not worked in your lab.

I could have learned what I did with significantly less pain

and without worrying that my confidence would be ruined

forever. A shame you needed to crush my dream with your insecurities.

Wrinkles like these don't quickly smooth--don't fade with time.

You can't always get what you want

...but you just might find that you get what you need.

It's graduation season.

GVSU is already done, Calvin finishes up soon, Unity will be a little bit yet. Fine.

...but it's the Penn State graduations that are giving me intense, conflicting feelings.

This is the time and year that my cohort begins en masse to graduate with their PhDs.

I'm very happy for them and extremely proud of what they've accomplished. It's a big deal. They've done groundbreaking research that matters and have done it brilliantly, with excellence. They're the smartest, most resilient folks I know, and I miss them--they solved some intractable problems with patience and intelligence. Some of them have even been recognized by their government and by ChE's American Institute.

It's incredibly painful too though, because I also entered the program at the same time they did, with PhD aspirations. I earned my M.S. after three years and left almost two years ago. I left because I wasn't sure how much longer I'd be able to take the anger, coupled with verbal and emotional abuse, from my advisor. I was worried that it would affect who I was as a person and that was non-negotiable for me.

I'm not walking across a stage this month and no one will call me Dr. I won't lead a fancy pharmaceutical lab or drive a fancy car.

But I also don't wake  up with an immediate, deep sense of paralyzing dread every morning. I don't have to face the sneer of a supervisor who with every glance, breath and word tells you that you're scum and get different treatment. I don't have an eye tick from the stress of facing another human being.

Most days I'm very content to be doing what I'm doing--I love it in fact! It's the infrequent reminders that bring pain.

Naming the specific opportunities and good, good things in my life helps. I just re-read the documentation I made of my former supervisor's behavior for the first time in over a year--it was surprisingly helpful to remember the former days of insanity that I dealt with. I don't feel like a failure after reading it.

The beauty of the consolation prize M.S. that I earned (most days that's how it seems to me), is that I can teach college, and maybe even lead independent, novel research with undergraduate students in a new direction--one without the former baggage of a past research life. I can teach science to high school students and walk alongside others, talking about the things that matter. Even if a person decided that I wasn't worth their time, I learned the art of research and studied ChE with some of the best in my field--that can't be taken away.

Mine is not a prestigious life. But it's mine to give, and I'd rather give it to people who are deserving.

Life and stats

The postdoc I taught with told me once that statistics let us tell people how much we're lying...and that they can be used to lie about how much we're lying.

His statement might be ± anecdotal, but I think it holds.

So, here's to lives dictated by P.

the remainder of November's winter

I found this tidbit on a scrap of paper today, while unpacking and exterminating the contents of another box.  It's a little alliterative reminder of yesteryear's winter, during the throes of a fresh new April:

Slowly, snow's soft caress hides hills, tips trees, blankets buildings...
I wake to a washed world, and cannot contain myself.
--
SEP 11-27-12

Discovering the dead

Written 6/27/13:
Today my friend tells me a detail about her job that mine will never measure up to, no matter how many papers I publish or mechanisms I discover. She's working on a dig at ----, in southwest ----, for the summer. Her degree is in history, and she studies ancient texts and peoples for her PhD thesis. We've talked together about ancient basalt grinding stones she's studied and how information like that can tell you about the people and ways trade routes take, based on basalt availability in the region (check out this unrelated but cool dig blog that I found). It's pretty fascinating what historians and archeologists are able to infer from the limited data they can collect--where artifacts lie after centuries or millennia in repose.

She told me earlier this week that the area they were working in was home to some tough customers.

In response to her assertion I ask if they've found human remains or bones with knives stuck in the ribs before, or other such dastardly discoveries. She responds that their neighborhood could have made a good
Law and Order episode. I like it, but don't know if NBC would go for something like that.

A day after she mentions this, she drops a knowledge bomb on me: there is a skeleton. It's out of the ground after all the proper procedures. But not only that...he was buried beneath a floor and may have been bound, with hands between his knees or feet! They of course can't tell if he was a victim or criminal, but...um, that beats the pants off any job I've ever heard of. Finding an ancient skeleton is just part of the job for people like her. Not a bad day job, time spent scrutinizing ancient texts notwithstanding.

[Some details edited/removed out of respect for the site and dig ethos--3/3/15]

What was my experience in graduate school?

Negativity says:
    getting used to being dressed down verbally, and letting hostility and spite roll off of me
    at 8:30am every Monday morning...

    being wrong all the time...

    having my idea rejected, then proposed to me later when it turned out to be better...

    having my confidence completely destroyed...

Neutrality says:
    being exposed to my flaws and weaknesses (but not being allowed to ever forget
    them. ever.)...

    developing maturity despite everything...

Positivity says:
    befriending beautiful, complicated and confusing people...

    exposure to cultures outside my ken...

    developing skills and expertise while learning about our world...

    extending human knowledge...

    the opportunity to advance my career and open doors...

    actually getting better at being an investigator...

I'd probably do it again.  I like who I am.

Bri

There are many words that I can use to describe a relationship I've had for over 80% of my life. The picture above does a very good job though, without uttering a syllable.

Two boys sit in kayaks under a bluebird sky in the chill August waters of Lake Huron. One is yellow, bright as a banana and similar in shape. The other is bathed in blue, green and yellow, fading twice in a continuum of color.

We constructed sails from a dutch golf set and broom with garbage bags. Matching the creativity in games imagined and played over the years is the competitiveness with which we play them. It's funny how important it becomes to win a game that was conceived of mere seconds ago, but it's been foundational to our friendship over the years. I used to get truly mad at him in middle school.

Never content to just make something, we use our new "sailboats" for sport. Paddling out past the breakers, we align our vessels for shore and pick a large rock as the finish line. The no-paddle rule is in effect as we let the wind carry us and cleverly "steer" with our paddles to arrive on shore first. We're more pushed by the waves than any effect the wind may have had, but it's a clear and definitive victory for one of us. Our sailing prowess is unmatched by the other and to the victor belong the spoils. And the next day comes with seven more invented games with seven more victors. [Note to the reader: the last two sentences are best read dripping in sarcasm.]

As we've grown older our competitive streaks have subsided...somewhat. They'll never be gone completely though, as board games continue to show. I can't stay mad long though. Since we're still friends I presume the same goes for Brü.

Every time we get back together, after being separated by hundreds of miles and hours of interstate, we can pick up right where we left off from. Just writing this makes me yearn to mosey back to Hudsonville and sit in a basement to play games with Brian, Scott and Jeff. Ah well, you can't always get what you want.

“It is one of the blessings of old friends that you can afford to be stupid with them.” ― Ralph Waldo Emerson, Emerson in His Journals

Those who ride pandas

For those who ride pandas to battle,
harness something fierce 'neath the saddle.
The black and the white,
they cause such a fright.
Because sometimes you need to kick a pack of wolves to death.

Only seeming to live on bamboo,
whose G.I. tracts are talented: poo.
They might be a blight,
people flee on sight.
Because pandas will knife you to death if you're not careful.

A general once said to his captains,
"A panda did make me these napkins."
His stitches were tight;
they came out just right.
But it turns out that now he just sells refrigerators.

But this poem doesn't make any sense,
pandas aren't even very intense.
Don't bring them to fight,
just buy them a kite.
But they can totally only barely throw a frisbee.

Inspiration credit to Luc LaFreniere

Set to music

0.6 Yparticles

A mole once emerged from her hole.

She rolled out to go on the dole.

Though fat as a slug, she outweighed the bug,

and never got any money from the government.

German reggae: Seeed

I've listened to a few of the songs off Seeed's most recent album, but finally came across this gem a few days ago, a full year after its release. Augenbling. The song jumped into my bones the first time I heard it and I had to immediately buy a physical copy of the music! Gotta support those that make the good stuff :)
I'll be bumping to work with Seeed for the foreseeable future.

It took but a day or so to notice that there is also an English version called "Blink blink". I was pretty impressed to hear how fluid the lyrics are in both versions. The French singer/rapper from Niger, Féfé, is featured on the English version.

Long story short: Seeed is bringing reggae/dancehall to the next level. To be fair, I don't know enough about reggae/dancehall to know what the current level is...but I'm fairly sure this is a paradigm shift.

The English version for those interested:

Sloats and Frains: Genesis

I wake up in my one room apartment with the sun drenching my face, prying my eyelids open. Yesterday was a whirlwind of miles in cars and planes, across timezones and an ocean.

My supervisor, Dr. Heckmann, came by in the evening to make sure that I had arrived and was settled. We went for a bit of a walk, and found a payphone for me to call my family and reassure myself with their voices. I went to sleep feeling more comfortable with the unknown...now that it was a little more known. And Nutella. They bought me some food for the weekend, giving me my first experience with the rich, creamy, chocolatey, smooth Haselnuss perfection that is Nutella. In fact, supper on jam and Nutella sandwiches was not uncommon...

The morning was warm, bright and sunshiny. I leave the apartment a few minutes after 9, to do some of the exploring I had been too tired for the night before. I walk along a stream, over a bridge, along a meadow bursting with yellow wildflowers and past some barns. The path goes over the road into town and is paved with cobblestones, trimmed with cement. The Selz burbles along joyfully before breaking from the path that opens into green, scrubby fields mottled with fluffy, sheepy shapes. The picturesque path will later accompany me on many a run during warm summer nights to Groß-Winternheim and back.

As I walk back into town, St. Remigius' bell tower rings loud and bold, imploring, beseeching and celebrating with parishioners arriving for Pfingsten Mass. The bright, cheery mood fills me too, as I begin to decompress from the terror of exams and the immediacy and rush of a good friend's wedding just days before. There is no rush here. We are on holiday, and I am becoming part of this quiet town, if only for the summer. I glory in my status as local-wannabe.

Song writing/recording

I've been putting together a recording for a little ditty about camping in Mackinaw during years past, that I composed during last summer and fall. I put it together on the ukulele and have the chords figured out as well as most of the lyrics. Some of them need a little polishing and fixing of course. I have the piano chords and inversions figured out and in the computer, so it's just a matter of making sure that I like the tempo, and how the chord progressions sound. I'm getting pretty excited about this "UntitledMackinac" project.

In the last couple days I've also decided to work on a little hiphop/rap project too. Last fall my friend Jenny received a ridiculous voicemail from her dad, caused by a butt dial. The text was pretty funny to read, so I want to set it to a sick (hopefully) beat that I've been working on, and record it as a short rap. I love working on both projects, and I'm ready to be underwhelmed by what I produce...but hey, I've got to start somewhere. It's just hard to find the time to work on them. School is a black hole :)

I received a Behringer UMX-610" midi controller for my birthday, which has been helping, and I've been putting the tracks together using LMMS, the Linux MultiMedia Studio. I may move to a different product in the future, but for now, I'm pretty happy with this setup.

Snark

Photo credit: Mural (Banksy); Aardvark (travelnewsnamibia); Bird on a branch (Dawn Smith); Stars (bitácora de Galileo).
In the dark park sat a lark upon the bark.

Its shadow marked stark against the luminous pockmarked bulwark.

"Hark" remarked the aardvark matriarch set to embark.

"Join me Plutarch, in my arc to the celestial monarch."

Hughes park

Arch linux

I've had to troubleshoot computer issues at work from time to time, and any time I can't handle it I call upon a linux power user who works for our IT guy. He's helped me with installs gone wrong (openSUSE) and when an update resulted in GRUB unable to find the partition table. Now I'm on a Fedora system which should be more stable and has the same libraries and available repositories that I needed. It's also the distribution that the developer of the software I use recommends (I had no experience with it though, thus openSUSE). In any case, we were talking shop about different distributions that we've used, while he was fixing my problems, and he mentioned Arch linux, which piqued my interest.

It's a simple and lightweight distribution (their words) that really teaches you how linux systems/installs work. You need to mount the drives yourself and install the base system, bootloader, users, network and anything else you may want (really useful Life Hacker guide here). One of the best things is that it updates on a rolling release model which is continually upgraded, instead of upgraded by reinstalling for every version.

The first install didn't go well, because I didn't understand exactly how the mounting and base install went. However, the second time through I managed to mount the correct partitions and write the files I needed to the spots that needed them. It was slightly trickier since I'm dual booting with Windows 7 and was installing from a USB key, but I made it work. I also had some issues getting Xorg to work (installed the wrong drivers), but the second time was the charm (Intel drivers). After that it was basically just a matter of installing some fonts and choosing LXDE as my desktop environment.

Eventually my goal is to use this box as an FTP server and be rid of the windows partition completely. I need it for MSPowerPoint in the mean time, so until I can figure out a stable way to display slides I have to keep it. I've been trying to use Wine to install MSPowerPointViewer, but haven't had much success with it yet (guide). It's still very much a work in progress and I'm planning on reformatting the linux partitions I made and trying it again from scratch to get it right the first time.

I'm also still trying to get the hang of the Arch User Repositories for installing things like Packer.

Blast from the CCM past

I stumbled upon a song by the O.C. Supertones from 1999 that I used to listen to on repeat. The song is from their album Chase the Sun.
Nothing catchier than Christian Ska...

Constantly moving...comes to a halt

My roommates and I just completed one of the last parts of our move last night: arranging the kitchen!

It brings to a near-end the saga which began roughly two weeks ago. Our lease ended on July 27 (Saturday), but the new one didn't begin until August 1 (Thursday)...leaving us with no place of our own for a few days.

My dear brother sent me the most uplifting text at the news:

Haha so you're homeless. bummer

Yes, we were homeless. But not to fear, for our new roommate was the fortuitous renter of a townhouse in the same complex we lived in and happened to have a roommate recently vacate.

• Stage 1: Move everything from our place in boxes and other such packing shenanigans, to the empty room on Thursday and Friday nights and cram as much furniture as possible into the interstices while still keeping his place livable for his remaining roommate...mostly successful.


• Stage 2: Apartment preparation and waiting period. We managed to schedule our required carpet cleaning for the morning of the last day we were on the lease, not noticing that we were required to be out and have keys turned over by 10am that day.
  
  After a last minute scramble, we got an extension from our complex until 4pm (latest possible) and had the carpet cleaned just in time. Other things cleaned at the last minute: oven (probably burned out my lungs with the lye in the cleaner and a too-hot oven), fridge, upstairs bathroom, downstairs bathroom (remembered at 3:40pm) and range. We turned in the keys at 3:59pm.
  
  Anything we get back on our deposit will be icing on the cake at this point, since we took the lease over after a few years of damage from the previous tenants (fridge was oil-orange, cabinet doors perpetually greasy etc.) and they left us the deposit money.


• Stage 3: The second move began on August 1, after work. We rented a truck for a few hours, which I had overly much fun driving. It took us just two trips:
  1. large furniture
  2. boxes, boxes, boxes
  with some great help from our new roommate's former roommate.
  
  The lion's share of the move was over at this point, with all of our stuff in the new location (sans a few boxes).

Since then it's been the slow process of clearing floors and re-arranging. My own room was mostly done last Saturday (day following the mass move), and Nate and I had a good start on the kitchen as well.

This brings us to last night (Wednesday, 6 days post move) with the last phase of cabinet filling and utensil placing, mentioned at the start of the post...I'm just so glad it's over and that I can rest when I get home.

Lewis speaks

Its strange to have read a great deal about someone and never heard them speak. Not so strange that it's uncommon, but strange for a figure such as C.S. Lewis. Lewis was a prolific Christian writer and apologist who passed away in 1963. His writing is known by many, but his voice by relatively few.

I found a treasure trove of Lewis audio online though from the Gospel Coalition. If you enjoy his writing and want to hear the apostle to skeptics for yourself I would recommend checking it out.

His accent sounds exactly like what I think of as the prototypical British man in the 1950s. He could just as well be narrating a video clip about some scientific phenomenon or study. I like it.

Goodbye again Grandma Split

I said goodbye to my Grandma Split again this weekend. Home for a wedding, I stopped by her room with my mum and sister, to visit her and Grandpa, who hadn't left her side in days. We talked with Grandpa for an hour or so, and I held her hand and stroked it while listening to her labored breathing. She never opened her eyes, and to be honest I was kind of glad, because the lifeless stare would have been through her eyes, but it wasn't her anymore. I told her I loved her, and that I was back from Pennsylvania to visit her. They said she could hear us, so we talked to her, and with Grandpa too.

Alzheimers had already robbed Grandma of her mind years ago and it had now come back to take her life. It still hasn't quite hit me that she's passed and gone now, but when it does I'll grieve again. I'll grieve for the finality and to know that all of which was her is gone, save what lingers in our memories and the pictures that captured her in time.

I can remember Sunday dinner at their home with the pot roasts, potatoes and gravy, beans and corn with pepper sprinkled over them. I can remember going to her house while mum worked and coloring with her, playing in the den with the shag carpet under her watchful eye while she sometimes played the piano. I remember the camping and the crocheting and the puzzles, crossword and 1000 piece alike. I remember impossibly good baked beans at picnics. I'm thankful for all that I can remember, and I remember grieving with her when memory became hard.

Hers was the story of a dutch girl from Iowa who moved with her family to Grand Rapids and went to Grand Rapids Christian HS when it was the only 'Christian High' in the area and so deserved the moniker. A beautiful young Maliepaard bride, she married my dashing Grandpa and started a family, raising four children and knowing the heartbreak of losing another. Not an extraordinary story, but a true story and a good story. Her story is of faithfulness, faith and family that she carried on her back in an unassuming manner. Her story is echoed and carried on in the hearts of all the honeybunches that she had and held and loved, and who loved her back, and in Grandpa's heart for over 60 years.

Grandma won't get posthumous awards or prizes (as far as I know). Her quiet story is one of many like it but that doesn't make it any less unique or powerful.

Her confusion is gone now. Grandma's not concerned about when she'll go home, or about where home is any more. She is home now. Her mind is at rest with the knowledge of her Savior and she's in his presence. Her mind isn't worn and torn anymore--it's been fixed and renewed.

We love you Grandma and we miss you. We're glad you have your mind back and that it's better than it ever was. We love you bunches and we remember you as the vibrant, creative woman of God you were always meant to be.


I was able to get the audio of her funeral service in which I read this. It was beautiful and it's still a little hard for me to listen to, but it means a lot, so I think it's worth sharing. My cousin plays the piano starting at 22:20. I try my best to read this post at 24:55 and my brother and sister play piano and viola at 28:25.

The north lawn was a letdown

I saw the President's house on Saturday for the first time in person. I was not impressed.

This is roughly what I saw (mouse-over for expectation):


I guess the north lawn is fine, but I was expecting the south lawn, and not to see a street sweeper on the driveway...It all seemed very pedestrian and not suited for a person of the presidential station. Ah well, all things considered, we put the Executive and family up pretty well.

I learned earlier today that the official residence of the South Korean head of state is called the Blue House (Cheongwadae is literally: pavilion of blue tiles). Pretty cool I guess. The grounds are hella tight (below):