Stormy Seas of 2020

Troubling Times in the New Year

For those who have talked to me this semester, you are probably well aware that I have been STRESSED.  Primarily, it has been centered around academics, as I needed to finish my Master's thesis.  However, a number of factors led to a perfect storm of troubles making the Spring of 2020 the toughest semester of my academic career.  Let's start at the beginning...

January

Having moved in at the end of the previous semester, I find myself in my new office in the new department on the first day of the semester.  I encounter my advisor, we catch up from the holiday break, and welcome each other back.  As he leaves, he asks me if I have all my classes and TA work all set.  I am confused, I had not received a TA assignment and assumed that I must be a Research Assistant instead.  My advisor tells me "No, you're supposed to be a TA."  SO after scrambling around for the first week of school, worried whether I would be getting paid, my advisor asked around the faculty and found me a class to teach.  It was an online, introductory level class which I describe as "the most Diet LaCroix" science class I've ever seen.  I was not excited.  I prefer actual communication where I can share my interest in the geosciences with (usually non-STEM) students, rather than being a grader/"tech support."  I'm thankful that I was able to work and be paid, but it was not ideal.

In the second week of the semester, I received the news tat my grandmother had passed away one week after her 100th birthday.  The beginning of the semester involved drive to south Florida,  attend the service, and drive back up to Tallahassee over the course of a weekend.

On top of this, one of the professors with whom I work closely was scheduled for some surgery.  Over the course of a month, there was delay after delay and a number of complications.  A lot of things were uncertain and his absence definitely felt within my colleagues.  As he helped with many of the mechanics of my research, it was definitely stressful not being able to consult him in my work.

Also academically, I entered a competition for Master's students to present their research to a general audience in 4 minutes.  The preliminary round was just in front of a few judges and was surprisingly stressful.

Finally, I finished my PhD application to FSU (while still not being completely sold to continue my education), was accepted, and I would have to make a decision soon.  I had applied to around 20+ jobs already and had a lead on an interesting job that would help me grow my skills in the practice of geology. Knowing that this decision may impact the direction of my life, this kept me up a couple of nights.

February

Well it turns out, I passed the preliminary Master's in 4 round and was moving on to the final round at the end of the month, and my one-track mind made it difficult to focus on anything else.  Mind you,, I still needed to be doing my normal thesis research/writing which was definitely being put on the back-burner.  Ultimately, the event occurred at the end of the month.  I did not win anything, but I was glad that I got the opportunity to practice communicating my scientific concepts to the public.

Ultimately, I ended up making the choice of doing a PhD and worked out a potential project to start in the fall.  While this was a weight off my chest, this was once again something to distract from writing my thesis.  The prospect of doing something New and Exciting won significantly more headspace than something Old and Frustrating.

At this point, my professor's health had gotten worse and had been hospitalized for what was looking to be a long haul.  A couple of folks in my research group decided to visit him in the hospital.  While it was nice to see him and talk to him, it was pretty upsetting to see someone whom I really respected and appreciated in such a bad shape.  However, it was really nice to see him light up a little when he heard I was continuing on with a PhD.

March

The pandemic was starting to become real.  It was starting to spread and grip the fascination of the country.  While this was again another distraction from writing my thesis (aka the one thing I needed to finish to graduate) as I became a little obsessive at looking at the data, the pandemic started raising some questions.  Were we in danger?  Would school continue? Would I be able to defend my thesis in person? Would I be able to defend at all?  Lots of change was happening.

Research wise, I was running experiments pretty much everyday.  Every time I finished a set, I would either look through the data or show it to my advisor, only to see that it was inaccurate, not "good enough," or just done improperly.  When I say that there was a month of failures, I don't mean that a few things went wrong in testing.  I mean that working every day, about 90% of what I did was unusable.  Parts weren't working correctly, the code was wrong, the data processing was wrong, etc etc etc, for a month.  Mind you, my defense was at the beginning of April and I needed to write something presentable.

At this time, we had to limit the scope of my project to something I wasn't very proud of, but still not something that I had enough data to defend.  Also due to a communication error involved with removing my sick professor from my committee, I needed to do a bit of paperwork quickly.  I began to feel something that I hadn't felt before: despair.  I don't mean an uncertainty or a worry, but a true deep despair felt in my core.  Everything seemed to be falling apart in front of me, a pandemic was rearing its fangs, in-person classes were canceled, restrictions to University buildings were starting to take effect, travel was limited, I would have to do an online Thesis defense, I barely had enough data for a first draft of my thesis, and I was starting to think I wouldn't be able to graduate in the Spring.  If this occurred, I would have to defend in the Summer, pay a bit more money, and potentially prohibit me from taking a summer internship I was looking forward to.  Things were not looking great.

April

I was able to scrap together a first draft, get feedback, do heavy edits and additions, and get in some field work within the first week of April.  By the time I got to April 8th, I defended my thesis without a problem, made some minor edits and turned it in.  While I work well under stress, this process was extremely taxing, frustrating, and difficult.  As of writing this post, I have had to edit the formatting twice and am awaiting a decision, as this is the last major hurdle that I can trip over and not graduate.  

Last week, my professor unfortunately passed away.  While this extremely saddening, I am glad he is no longer in pain, though I am still feeling those regrets of not "doing more" with him before this year.  Truly, I am also saddened by the great loss of knowledge that left with him as he is one of the most knowledgeable people I've met.

As for the pandemic, we're still in the thick of it with a lot uncertainty going forward.  I don't know how my internship will play out.  I don't know how the state of the country will play out.  I don't know how the Fall semester will play out.  These are troubling times that we're in but we can do nothing but continue sailing through the storm and hope for reprieve to come as quickly as possible.