Cusp Years: From Glory to Glory

When I reflect on my adult life so far, I can identify sets of years that I call "cusp years". These are spans of one to two years in length during which my life undergoes a series of intense, formative transitions. During these cusp years, who I am as a person undergoes further definition--I wouldn't call it redefinition because it's an ongoing defining of who I am meant to be in this life. I am always becoming. We all are. But during cusp years, I find this especially true for me.

I can pinpoint two past examples of this phenomenon I want to share briefly. Note that I am not going as far back as my years as an undergraduate college student, or my years in high school, or my childhood, since these years are by definition marked by transition and transformation.

My first set of cusp years as an adult was in 2007-2008 (age 23-24). The following things occurred in this two year span: I graduated with my Master of Library and Information Science degree (late spring 2007); I made and acted upon the decision to move from my home state of New York to Pennsylvania, the state I now call home (summer 2007); I got my first apartment, in which I lived on my own for the first time, not counting dorm life in college (summer 2007); my father died (winter 2007); and, I interviewed and was hired into my first professional job as a librarian, at the University of Scranton where I still work to this day (early spring 2008).

The years of 2007-2008 were a crucible from which I emerged on the other side a more fully formed person, tried by suffering and the tumult of several formative life transitions occurring in quick succession. It is worth noting that the 9th anniversary of my father's death was last week, on December 21, and today is the anniversary of his funeral (December 27). May his memory be eternal. +

"Comforting Clay Hand-Held Cross" from Calypso Studios,
a new item I am finding particularly comforting this week;
the inscription reads "In Memory of My Father"

My second set of cusp years was in late 2010-mid 2012 (age 26-28). During this ~two year time span: I met Paul (winter 2010); became engaged to Paul (spring 2011); bought my first home, which is still my home to this day (summer 2011); planned a wedding (spring-fall 2011); got married (fall 2011); became pregnant with my daughter (fall 2011) and then gave birth to my daughter (summer 2012).

The transformations I experienced in late 2010-mid 2012 were all joyful and long desired, but my goodness, the short span in which they happened in my life made the transitions intense, much like the labor of child bearing and birthing. If only through the reorientation of my self and identity as I underwent marriage to my husband (a sacramental Mystery!), followed by the earthy reality of becoming a mother through giving birth to my daughter, I understand these cusp years in particular as when, in many ways, who I am was fully borne into this world. Identity is a complex thing, and there's no question my identity had changed, in some miraculous ways (I still marvel at the ways) by summer 2012.

October 23, 2011 ❤ Paul and I sharing a
kiss on the elevator at our wedding
reception venue as the doors close

Which brings me to now. It is winter 2016 (age 32), just a few days away from the transition into the year 2017, and I am finding myself again in the midst of a set of cusp years in my life.*

From the middle of them, it's hard to know precisely when they will have begun and ended, but here are the milestones I have or will experience, and the changes I am undergoing, even as I type this reflection:

• In January, June, July, and August 2016, I was on sabbatical from work, because I was in the middle of my first year as a tenured member of the Library faculty at the University of Scranton.
• In June 2016, I became pregnant with my second child. In October 2016 we learned our second child is a boy. 
• In fall 2016, I learned that two of my longtime colleagues in my department would be retiring, one in December 2016 and one in May 2017. As a result of these transitions, my Dean offered me a new position, as the Library's next Information Literacy Coordinator, which will be in effect as of June 1, 2017. I accepted. (!!!!!!!!!)
• As part of this new position, I will be permanently moving into a daytime working shift at my library. For context: I have been a second shift evening worker since 2008 when I first was hired at my library. To say this change in my work schedule, and quality of life, has been hoped for by me (and my husband) for a long, long time, would be an understatement. 
• God willing, I will give birth to my son sometime in March 2017, after which I will get to take a ten week maternity leave. I will return to work from this leave into my new role as Information Literacy Coordinator, and into a day shift at my library.
• I've also been approved by my Dean to work a flex schedule in January, February, and half of March (until I give birth), to help cover some staff shortages we are experiencing due to planned leaves and retirements. My working hours during these months will be 10am-6pm, except for just five Friday evening shifts remaining in February and early March: on these Fridays I will work the 2-10pm shift I have been working for the past seven years. 
• My daughter, Bookie, will start Kindergarten next September 2017. 

The above news, especially the parts about my professional life, mean that as of this writing, I am no longer a regular evening worker. It also means I am looking forward to beginning in the role at my institution that my research these past eight years has prepared me to be able to some day undertake. Oh, and I will become a mother for the second time, this time to a son. 

Given all of this, I expect to wake up on a random day in September 2017, look in the mirror, and see the next version of myself that these cusp years occurring in 2016-2017 have formed me into. 

I am so very excited to meet her, even as I know all that has happened to me so far in my life will still be an essential part of who she is, of who I am.

Cusp years are when I become even more who I am (meant to be). They are transformative, progressing the crude work of my life "from glory to glory", if I can only just breathe through them, having their defining hallmark in my experience of them be gratitude and love. 

As 2017 arrives, I am taking a deep breath, and thanking God. 

Ultrasound picture of my son!!
I need to think of a nickname for him for the blog...

Christmas Day 2016, first day of my third trimester;
picture is of me, smiling and pregnant, in my church

A screenshot of my Notes app, containing
my countdown of evening work shifts remaining...

*I can't post this without mention of the Presidential election that occurred right in the middle of the set of cusp years I presently find myself in. The morning of November 9, I posted the following to my social networks: "An honest post to start this day: I am heartbroken and scared. Lord have mercy on us." It is a surreal experience I find myself in, where the wider world context is so very...broken...and yet there is the possibility for transformation in the work and space of our individual and collective lives, as a community of human persons in this world who are in relationship with one another. My friend Kevin describes this surreality very well on his own blog, so I refer you to his reflection and the commentary it provides, about navigating and holding the tension of things simultaneously going well and, well, not (to put it mildly), as a bit of a supplement to my own.

Housekeeping

Fall semester begins Monday, so I took the transition in my daily schedule as an opportunity to revamp a few things here on the blog.

First, there are new tabs along the top of the blog. I plan to add to and clean up their content as time goes on, but for now they will do. But do check them out if the "meta" aspects of this blog interest you at all.

And, I decided to install the Disqus plugin for commenting. Old comments should still appear on old posts. I am hoping this will make new visitors to the blog feel welcome to comment and say hello. I just hope my longtime commenters also continue to experience ease of use when it comes to commenting because of (in spite of?) this new commenting plugin.

Thank you as always for reading! More from me soon once I have a few big deadlines behind me. 

The Blur x 2

One of the reasons I started a blog was due to a desire to participate. It's been hard lately, though.

I recently read a blog post by a mommy blogger that describes something she calls "The Blur":

My father describes the years when his children were young as "The Blur". So that's where I was - deep in the Blur. My father is a somewhat inconsistent source of wisdom on parenting issues, but he hit the nail squarely on the head with this one. I am on a 24 hour cycle of waking, sleeping, nursing, napping, cooking, cleaning, wiping, folding, dropping off, picking up and putting away.

She goes on to describe how this phenomenon has made her a moron (her word, not mine). I'm a mother of a one year-old (yes, she turned one last week--ahhh where did this year go??? Oh wait, THE BLUR) who also works outside the home in a job that is intellectually rigorous, to say the least. I'm not sure I'd call myself a moron in any complete sense, though I do have my braindead moments that I know are caused by a combination of sleep deprivation, stress, and a flirtatious dance with burnout. I know for a fact that most of the time we in my little family are in "survival mode", and that's okay. (Somehow, we're thriving in it? Is that a contradiction? Let's call it a paradox.) "Survival mode" can be beautiful too. But, it is blurry. And a large part of why I haven't posted in so long, but not the reason entirely...

...because you see, I am also in another blur. The Junior Faculty Blur (TM). I have no link for that one because I am coining it now as a parallel but similar experience to the Motherhood Blur described above. This one looks something like: "I am on a 24 hour cycle of waking, sleeping, planning, writing, reading, highlighting, outlining, emailing, tweeting, posting, meeting, talking, and teaching." Yep, that about describes it.

In this post from last November, there are three writing projects listed under "Future". Two of them (the book chapter and the article) are out of my hands (read: done, for the time being--hallelujah!). The third, my thesis, is underway. It all needs to be 100% done by November 1st of this year so I can apply for promotion to the rank of Associate Professor. I'd love to blog about each, and I am hoping to, eventually...but not today.

Plus, the Fall semester begins in less than a month. Plus, there's that adorable, mobile, one year-old I mentioned (and oh em gee she looks tiny in the pictures at that post from last November!).

Which is all my way of saying, my apologies, friends and readers, for my absence. I really wish I could participate more in the act of reflective living-learning-working-mothering right now. But I'm learning there is a season for everything, and right now I am in a short but intense (read: deluge) season I'm calling The Blur x 2. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, though, which means I'll get my head above water soon.

But until then, here are some pictures of my Bookie, intentionally not of her face since I have a policy (for now) on my blog where I don't share pictures of her actual face nor her first name. If my year has been blurry, I can't imagine what hers must have been like!

Finally grew interested in books!
Well, turning the pages at least...

Crawling around church on Sunday :)

Pull up on ALL the things!!!

And now, back to it. See everyone when things get a bit less blurry!

Information Constellation on Bloglovin

Follow my blog with Bloglovin.

Bloglovin was just put on my radar by my friend as a potential contender against Feedly for my RSS Reader replacement when Google Reader goes away completely on Monday. Because I view this kind of change in tech-related stuff as inevitable and in many ways out of my control, I haven't used Google Reader in months, wanting to expend my energy on getting to know what was likely to become my new system (Feedly).

Feedly beat out everyone else because I could have a high number of feeds without giving them my money, and, it has a decent mobile app. I was disappointed, however, that it didn't have a web-only interface and relied on a browser plugin to work in a normal web browser.

I generated this meme back in March.

But, I was not the only one, and lo and behold enough folks spoke up about it that Feedly made this change a week and a half ago. I was very impressed with this responsiveness, and will likely stick with Feedly for the time being as a result.

However, today I learned about Bloglovin, and while I don't see myself completely moving over my feeds from Feedly any time soon, I decided it was worth "claiming my blog" there in case any of my modest readership does decide to use that platform as a Google Reader replacement. In order to claim my blog, I needed to publish a post with a special link included: the first link at the top of this post. Hence, this post.

So, there ya have it folks. If you're on Bloglovin, do feel free to follow me there. And as I tinker around with it some more I may surprise myself and decide it meets my needs over Feedly...that will take a lot of tinkering though. (I'm relieved to at least see that Bloglovin has a mobile app, as well as a clean web-only interface, so there may still be a worthy competitor for my RSS affections yet...)

And don't worry folks, I haven't forgotten about my blog--which, by the way, has a fancy new personalized domain name (www.donnawitek.com) which shouldn't affect your subscription to the blog. I've just been buried in deadlines. Hopefully a chance to share about some of them, and other exciting things, will come sometime soon... Stay tuned! (And thanks, as always, for reading. :) )

Between Worlds

Most of the time I am sure of myself. What I mean by this is, my sense of self is something I can usually pinpoint and own, even in and amid the many varied roles I fill in my life. A glance at the "About Me" here on my blog (currently in the right sidebar) names just a few of these roles, though there are even more roles that aren't listed there: daughter, daughter-in-law, sister, aunt, godmother (this one's new this past weekend!), choir member, parishioner, and so on.

Now, generally speaking this is a sentiment any person should relate to---every person is many things to many people. But for my part, the two of my roles that I've been ruminating on lately are "academic librarian" and "mother". Or more broadly: professional and mother.

As I've written about at great length before, I am more than OK with the fact that I am both a mother and a professional who works in the workforce. I was a professional before I became a mother, but even as a committed professional I also knew that if God led my life to where becoming a mother, in the context of an Orthodox Christian marriage and family, was suddenly a possibility, I would never do anything to prevent it (or "plan" it or "wait until we're ready for kids" or any of those things). When we were dating and Paul and I discussed the possibility of marriage, I shared this with him and framed it as a bit of a deal breaker for me. Fortunately for me (because he's wonderful and even then I loved him), he was more than open to having children as God saw fit for us and not trying to control it ourselves. But part and parcel to this was the simple fact that, if it did happen right away for us, there was no question I would continue to work as I became a mother and he a father. He understood this. So we were married...and then I became pregnant, and Bookie's first due date was exactly nine months after our wedding day. Thus it was I suddenly found (and find) myself both a professional in the workforce and a mother.

So far, I feel I've walked this line pretty well. My workplace is amazingly supportive, my husband is amazingly supportive, the people in our lives are amazingly supportive of our family and all we have on our plates (my husband works too of course). To make sense of my world, I have several different communities I belong to for different parts of my life: my co-workers and professional network for work-related things, and my mommy-groups, -blogs, and -friends for mommy-related things, to name a few. And navigating between and within these communities usually feels natural, organic and right.

Often, though, as I navigate these separate though sometimes overlapping communities, I encounter information or conversations that are firmly rooted in either one or the other of these worlds. And I admit, sometimes when this happens, I am caught off guard by the jarring experience of diving into reading something I was sure I would relate to (being a card-carrying member of said group), only to realize there is something about it that, basically, doesn't apply to me, or applies to me but in a different way.

This happened yesterday when I read a very thoughtful, honest post on a blog I follow, and the rich comments thread beneath it, about finding a healthy balance between "me time" as a mother and the actual work of mothering. At first glance this sounds like something that I'd certainly relate to (and I do!). But then I realized, as I read on and especially delved into the comments, that unlike the very strong and awesome women who were commenting (mostly mamas, many of whom I know IRL, whose work as mothers I respect immensely, and whose friendships I value highly)---unlike most of them (to my knowledge), in addition to my mothering role I have a professional outlet where I can exercise the parts of myself that don't directly come into play when I am mothering Bookie.

And yet, despite this luxury (in the context of the problem being discussed), I still crave "me time" that isn't professional in its nature. God only knows how long it's been since I've grabbed one of my favorite YA novels and just read it because I want to. For instance, I'm dying to reread Ender's Game before the movie comes out later this year. It's not likely to happen, though, at least not in the way it used to before I became a mother, because of two very different but equally important responsibilities I have: 1) mothering Bookie and putting her needs before mine, and, 2) putting any additional energy I have left over, around mothering Bookie, toward the immense amounts of reading, writing and research I need to do in order to maintain and succeed in my professional life. There's no question that, after I've applied my daily quota of energy across these two responsibilities (not to mention being a loving wife to my husband! Bless his supportive and sacrificial heart...), all I want to do at that point is sleep (when the baby lets me), in order to build my energy again for the following day.

I thought about leaving some of this in a comment on that thought-provoking blog post, but somehow felt that the balancing act I'm describing here is unique to my circumstance as a working mother. So I decided to share about it here and link back to the post, rather than hijack a comments thread that feels, to me at least, firmly rooted solely in the world of motherhood. As I read the post and the comments that followed, and experienced my response to them, I was suddenly aware of myself as "between worlds".

That being said, you are not reading a post about loneliness or separateness, but one about adapting and belonging...

On the question of "me time" or the lack thereof as I experience it, i.e., as a working mom, I assure you dear readers that I am not deprived of light and beauty that is unfettered by my mothering or professional responsibilities. Instead, my solution has been to reimagine what "me time" looks like in my new life as a wife and mother, and interestingly enough it has manifested itself in my sharing my usual sources of light and beauty with the two people I love most: my husband and my daughter. So, whereas before we had Bookie I'd grab a book and spend a few hours getting lost in it, now instead I grab the same book and we read it aloud as a family. We started this with Anne of Green Gables, a book that is a balm to my tired soul. It is all the more enjoyable because I am introducing my Bookie to Miss Anne Shirley, my dear (fictional) bosom friend, which fills me with a warmth and joy that would be absent if I were to read the book solo for a few hours. This is just one example, but I've been trying to build into our days and weeks as a family opportunities to feed the parts of me that otherwise may become neglected amid the considerable responsibilities I and my husband have willingly assumed in our daughter and our work lives.

As for the out-of-sorts feeling that sometimes (not always!) comes from navigating between worlds, the best solution that has presented itself to me has been to build a third world between the two. For me this meant that, when the opportunity arose to help form a closed Facebook group for working moms which called upon my talents as a Facebook researcher to help get it off the ground, I took it. The story of how I got involved in the group is still being written, as the group is just under a week old, so I won't attempt to tell it just yet.

But I will provide the link, in case there are any other working mamas reading this who are also in need of a world between worlds: The Wonderful World of Working Moms (If so, please click and request to join!)

And the group description, so you know the culture of the world I'm linking to: "This is a support group for working moms who strive to mother their babies gently and compassionately. This includes moms who work outside the home or who work at home, but who have jobs in addition to the hard work of being a mom. Any discussion about the unique circumstances, both the struggles and the victories, surrounding being a working mom is welcome. Come join us!"

We just passed 50 members this evening, which is pretty exciting in one week. And the professor in me is cracking up at how my involvement as an admin in this group may play out in my professional life down the line: If the group really takes off, and becomes a large community of support to a considerable number of mamas, I can see myself making the case for my admin work in the group counting toward my service requirement as a member of the faculty at my institution. Traditionally "Service to the Community" means service within your local, geographic community; but we're living in a connected world where the definition of "community" is changing or at least expanding to include virtual, networked communities, like my working mamas Facebook group.

And so, I leave you with the image of me cackling to myself in my unabashed geekdom, as I relish the thought of making the case to my colleagues for my work on a Facebook group being bona fide, valid and valuable service to a very real community, when it comes time to apply for promotion later this year. Oh man that's gonna be awesome.

Writing About Writing (Updated)

Image by Meghan McDevitt-Murphy via Facebook

***

So many things I want to write about for this blog... I've been back at work since October 8th, and it's been some ride. Not bad by any means, but an adjustment. Bookie is 4 months today, and this past week she turned a corner where she went from infant-baby to infant-girl. She can see more, farther and deeper than she had been able to before. I can only assume the nonstop nursing she did a little over a week ago had something to do with it (can you say 'growth spurt'?)...must have gone straight to her brain, and her legs, her arms and her hair. Everything is bigger, including the world she sees, and it's very awesome and humbling to behold.

That being said, with all the different things I could write about right now (i.e., Bookie's baptism, pumping at work, Bookie's time at day care, my awesome workplace, bringing Bookie to class with me, the joys of babywearing--I plan to write on all of these at some point), I've decided to compile a quick post containing my research-related writing projects: past, present and future. There's so much to fit in over the next 10 months, especially since after those 10 months I hope to go up for promotion to Associate Professor. My ability to do that hinges on the following projects, and finding the time to complete them all...definitely wish I could wave a wand and have more time per day appear out of thin air at this point. Anyway, here they are, listed very briefly as I'll probably elaborate on them in later posts:

Past:

• "Information literacy on Facebook: an analysis," research article by yours truly and my research partner, Teresa Grettano, published in Vol. 40, Issue 2 (March 2012) of the peer-reviewed journal Reference Services Review. This is Part 1 of a two part study, the second part described below in the "Future" list.
• "Information Literacy Gets Social," a professional column I wrote that was accepted for publication in the PaLA Bulletin, the quarterly publication of the Pennsylvania Library Association. My understanding is that it should be in the next issue, which I believe is the Oct-Dec 2012 issue. 

Present:

• Term Paper for Dr. Will Cohen, Dept. of Theology/Religious Studies here at The University of Scranton, to fulfill the requirements of the 3.0 credit Graduate-level Reader I'm doing with him called Theology of Work, Rest and Liturgy. The paper doesn't have a title yet, since I haven't written it yet, but in it I will be looking at the parallel dichotomies of ratio-intellectus, work-rest, and time-eternity, in the works of several modern/contemporary theologians, including Josef Pieper, Fr. Alexander Schmemann, Fr. Andrew Louth, and Rebecca DeYoung. This paper, which I am aiming to be 12-15 pages long, will then be absorbed into my Masters thesis, which is described below.

Future:

• Part 2 of the study about Facebook and information literacy, described in the first bullet above. This article will report on the data Teresa and I collected during the course we co-taught in Spring 2011 called Rhetoric & Social Media. It will be submitted to Reference Services Review by the first week in February 2013, which means I'll be writing it during the month of January. Luckily the data is already collected and analyzed, so it is simply a matter of reporting in article-format on what we found. (Ahem. I write that so casually, but this is definitely easier said than done, as I learned with Part 1.)
• A book chapter essay for a book tentatively titled Academic Publication and Contingent Faculty, eds. Lynée Lewis Gaillet and Letizia Guglielmo, which has been accepted by the editors and is due in by April 1, 2013, to be 15-25 double-spaced pages. Rather than describe what I am writing for this, I'll just share the abstract of my piece, which is actually about...writing! (I swear there's always a meta element to everything I do it seems...) And which has yet to be written, since that is how academic publication sometimes works, i.e., the writing you haven't written yet is accepted for publication, which then means you have to go ahead and write it. (At first I thought this was crazy. Now I just roll with it. *shrug*) I plan to write this piece as soon as the Reference Services Review Part 2 article is off my plate, so beginning in mid-February 2013, most likely. I like that this is more of an essay as opposed to a research report, as it will flex different writing muscles than the other stuff I'm working on. Here is the abstract:

Among the wide variety of contingent faculty responsible for producing scholarship, the tenure-track faculty librarian is faced with the dual task of conducting research in order to maintain a personal scholarly agenda while also providing research support to others. This situation offers both challenges and opportunities inherent to the unique role of the faculty librarian as both researcher and instructor. The challenges most often come from lack of time and resources, and yet the opportunities offered by the collaborative nature of the the faculty librarian's work can in fact help define and advance a worthwhile and marketable (read: publishable) scholarly agenda. This essay will offer as an example one tenure-track faculty librarian's experience in developing a scholarly agenda focused on information literacy and social media in collaboration with another tenure-track faculty member in the English department at her institution. It will tell the story of how each of these faculty members learned of the other's research interests, recognized that they were were complementary, and developed a course together where these topics were explored pedagogically to create a meaningful classroom experience for students and instructors alike. Because they planned to use the classroom as their lab and the students as voluntary subjects, this research required that they navigate the IRB process. This process had its own unique challenges since the research involved students, technology and pedagogy, a combination of factors which lead to privacy concerns on the part of the IRB. How these concerns were worked through successfully such that the research could proceed will be discussed. Furthermore, the librarian in the team found that their work appealed to other academic librarians in her field since it represented a successful collaboration between a librarian and an instructor from another department: a dynamic that is highly sought after by academic librarians on other campuses. Because collaboration was both the means and the goal of this librarian's scholarship, it made for a successful research experience leading to peer-reviewed conference presentations and journal articles in both researchers' fields. Concrete advice based on these experiences for how to successfully collaborate with colleagues in order to identify and advance a worthwhile research agenda will be offered.

• Masters thesis, which will be at minimum 50-60 pages double spaced, though likely longer based on what I plan to write. Dr. Will Cohen has agreed to be my thesis advisor, which I'm really excited about since not only have I been working with him this semester on the topic I will write my thesis on, but he and his family are also fellow parishioners at my parish, All Saints Orthodox Church. I've already casually described what I plan to write on for my thesis in an email I sent to Dr. Cohen, so once again I will just copy that out here so you can see where my mind is and where it will be going once I dive into this undertaking. My thesis plan is to first create a detailed outline/proposal of what I plan to write, how I plan to write it, and what works I plan to use to do so. Once Dr. Cohen has approved it, I will then proceed with executing it. I want to have the outline/proposal done by mid-semester in Spring 2013, so, likely I will finalize this soon after the above book chapter is due in, so mid-late April 2013. Then I will be throwing myself completely into the work itself, aiming to complete it by the end of the summer, and defend it by the end of September 2013. Basically, once I get the above writing projects off my plate, all of my writing energies will be poured into my thesis until it's done, with the bulk of the writing happening next summer. So, here's what I plan to write on, as of now:

For the central work of my thesis I want to read/analyze the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom (both text and, where applicable, praxis) for the ways in which ratio-intellectus play a role in how the liturgy is experienced by those present. For now, I am using these words (ratio-intellectus) for these complementary concepts, though they align with the work-rest dichotomy as well as the time-eternity one--something I will develop in my study. I envision three main "parts" to the thesis: 1) a development of the conceptual framework of ratio-intellectus based on the work of many thinkers (I'd like to draw on the Fathers, classical philosophers of antiquity, and more modern thinkers like Pieper, Schmemann and Louth; the paper I'm writing this semester would likely be incorporated into that third sub-section of the thesis); 2) the analysis/study of the liturgy (this is my "original contribution" within the thesis, though I plan to begin this section with an introduction where I summarize the ways in which the liturgy has been examined in the past--a "lit review" of sorts on what others have done with the liturgy, in order to put my work in context); and, 3) implications for mission and living a Christian life "during the rest of the week" based on whatever I find in the previous two sections.

***

And I think that about covers it. As you can see, my writing marathon should be over by October 2013, at which point my next task will be to write the 20-page narrative for my promotion application to Associate Professor, due in around November 1, 2013. And if I can actually manage to complete everything I've just listed, I'll be in a very good place to apply for promotion.

And now that I see it all laid out, and as excited as I am about each project, I realize all the more how much I need that magic wand to make more time appear out of thin air... Here's to hoping I can pull it off!

Bookie thinks I can...

Post updated on December 7, 2012, to include the awesome ecard at the top of the post.

Going Back

Holy heck this is hard.

Today my daughter is 10 weeks old. Today is also the day I return to work after my 10-week maternity leave. My going back to work was always in the cards for us, starting from before I even met my husband. But now that I'm here--now that I've finally arrived at this moment in the timeline of my life--I'd be a bold-faced liar if I said it was easy.

Last night I reached a wall where I needed to just stop doing all of the things on my Going Back To Work To Do List, and just be with my daughter. I realized it was my last evening with her before I would be a bona fide working-outside-the-home mother. I needed that time with her, and I like to think she needed that time with me, so I gave it to us.

Snuggly Girl :)

Another thing I did last night--and I'm still doing it now in the early morning hours together--is take many, many pictures of my darling girl. My phone is my camera, and all of my photos are saved on my phone as well as automatically uploaded into the cloud (in this case via a private album on Google+, of all places, ha, but it was the most automated way to set up my photo and video back-up on my Android device). I think my reasoning for taking so many pictures and videos of her, and of us as a family (especially pictures of her with her daddy, since he will be her primary caregiver while I am at work these next months: the flexibility of his work schedule allows this, thank God), was to try to etch deeply into my memory my daughter's countenance, since I won't be seeing it in the flesh as often as I have these past months once I am back at work. It's fascinating to me that capturing her in my phone's camera viewfinder helped me do this...an indication of the central role technology is playing in my processing and memories of these early days with my little one. And most of the pictures I've taken are for me and me alone--I only share on Facebook and via email (to her grandparents and uncle) a fraction of the pictures I take of her. But these pictures and the few videos I've taken of her so far are precious to me, and even more so now that I'll be apart from her for much of the work week.

Watching Man of La Mancha with her Dad
"This is my quest, to follow that star, no matter how hopeless,
no matter how far..."

Speaking of, our plan for child care throughout the week is as follows: I work an evening shift at my library (Monday through Friday, afternoons and evenings), which means I get to be with her all morning. Paul works two mornings a week at one of his schools (the nearby Orthodox seminary), which are Monday and Friday mornings. Then he teaches two classes at the same university where I work, for an hour and fifteen minutes each afternoon, four afternoons per week (Monday through Thursday). In addition, I will be off from work every Wednesday between now and the end of the semester, which is something I was able to arrange because I saved so many of my Vacation Days in the first half of this calendar year. So what this amounts to is the need for child care other than Paul and myself for three afternoons per week--Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays--during the times I am at work and he is teaching elsewhere on campus. For these times, our daughter will be in day care--a very good day care that is very close to campus and which many of my colleagues at the university use for their children. We are very happy with where she'll be for those few hours on those few days each week. We recognize that she will interact with very good care givers, and as she gets a bit older she'll have the opportunity to be "at play" there in a way that Paul and I can't always facilitate here in our home due to the nature of our home and work lives. So overall, our situation for the rest of this semester at least is very good, all things considered, for which we are very grateful, since these early months in her life as so important to how she bonds with the two of us as her parents.

I took this one as a visual reminder of how well-loved and cared for she will be
with her daddy while I'm at work.

Interestingly, due to various circumstances outside of our control, she isn't starting at day care until next week. This means this week Paul and I will be watching her somewhat "on the job," which my incredibly supportive supervisors at work have approved. Which brings me to the positive side of this situation: I've missed my work as a librarian. I mean, I wasn't necessarily pining for it throughout my leave (I was way too distracted by the cutest baby on the block), but I am looking forward to picking up the thread on projects I am working on. And I love my co-workers dearly, and have honestly missed seeing them daily. And finally, with the Fall season upon us here in NEPA, which is my favorite time of year, I am so excited to have a reason to get dressed and leave the house every day. Boots, skirts, hats, scarves and sweaters are just so cozy and lovely. And if there is one thing NEPA can be said to excel at, it is Fall leaves--the colors are jaw-dropping for a few weeks each year, and those weeks are now upon us. Not a bad time of year to return to work if you ask me.

This morning. 

I'll end this little reflection with something I posted to Facebook last night in a status update: "For the record, I don't regret having to go back to work. But it'd be foolish to think that means I won't be sad tomorrow." This transition is a complicated one in terms of my thoughts and feelings. My roles as wife, mother and librarian are about to converge big time...and part of the purpose of this blog is to document this convergence. Thank you, dear readers, for coming along for the ride.

Many Pinpoints, One Picture

A little "meta" for your afternoon, concerning the name of this here blog (which I promised to share about at some point, and it being Spring Break here at my school, the relative quiet makes now a good time to do so)...

As I mentioned previously, I know that one of the reasons I do my job well as a librarian is because I make my work personal. I've wanted to blog about my work for some time now, but wasn't sure where or how to draw the line between that which is personal in my work, and that which is professional. The conclusion I came to is: I can't, and in fact an attempt to do so would likely be an inauthentic representation of the value I believe I bring to my library work.

As for the blog title, I was looking for just the right phrase that somehow expresses this idea that there are different moments in my life--different stories--some from my home life and some from my work life, that ultimately come together to form the whole person I am. It's that same whole person who is a librarian who brings value to her work, not just the "professional" part of her. And the image I came up with is that of a constellation of stars.

Then, being a librarian, I am in the information profession, and my library research centers around the role of information in our lives, how we interact with it, and its effects on us. Hence the word "information."

And thus, the name of this new blog.

Now, on a less meta, and even more personal note, I've always been enamoured with the stars. In fact, I have a handful of vignettes I wrote during my last stretch of blogging that I never published because other things became a priority in my life for a time. These vignettes chronicle my relationship with the stars, beginning in my childhood through who I am today. I'm going to publish them here over the next few weeks, beginning with the following teaser.

(And besides, I need an excuse to embed some gorgeous images of the night sky I have collected over the years from various corners of the interwebs, so I hope you enjoy these posts if only for the eye candy...)

***

Ever since I was a kid, I have loved the stars. This is a chronicle of our love affair.

Image courtesy of ESA, NASA and E. Olszewski (U. Arizona)

Return

How does one begin chronicling again, after so long away?

It's a question I don't have a ready answer to, but perhaps I will by the time I finish writing this.

***

So, I'm back, with firm plans to post as consistently as a very busy work and family life allow. I've been contemplating this return for quite a while, and the reason it's been tricky is because of the amount that has happened since my last substantial post from a year and almost three months ago. Furthermore, I knew I wanted to expand my scope and reader-ly audience to include other librarians doing similar daily work to mine, which meant conceiving of the blog in a new way. However, I was also determined not to leave behind certain things about my writing style from Librarian in the Kliros including the sharing of personal stories in order to better perceive cosmos in the chaos we so often find ourselves in.

And so, the result is an attempt to defy all the well-established rules of "what makes a successful blog," that is, the general encouragement to choose to focus either on personal matters (family, faith, etc.) or professional ones. I'm determined to focus on both. *shrug* It's my blog.

The more I reflected on this, the more I realized it is precisely because I make my library work personal that I feel I do a decent job at it, which in and of itself is worth blogging about. And I have so much to share about my work life, and so much to share about my home life, that I think I'm ready to dive back into regular blogging again, about both. But this is going to be both a professional space as well as a personal one. I'm considering utilizing labels to distinguish what topics posts are primarily about (I am a librarian, after all), but we'll see what shape that takes moving forward. For now though, some necessary housekeeping, mostly for the sake of my past subscribers (all 10 or so of you *waves*):

• I imported most of my posts from Librarian in the Kliros (new nickname: LitK) to this new blog. I have added the label "Librarian in the Kliros" to these in addition to the labels they had before, which may or may not stick around depending on what categories develop over time. 
• LitK will continue to exist in retirement, mostly because I didn't update my imported posts in the places where I link back to older posts of mine. For the time being, those links will take you to LitK posts, though someday I may do the maintenance required to update those links on my imported posts here.
• If you subscribed to LitK, I'd be ever so grateful if you'd update your subscription to this new blog instead. It's my new home in the blogging world, and I'd love to remain in touch with all of you. 

I'm going to reign this post in for now, even though there are so many questions I'm leaving unanswered for many of you. I suspect a few may notice my "About Me" section in the sidebar and be thinking, "Wife? Mother? She never mentioned those things in her LitK posts! What on earth?" Another question all of my potential readers but one (Hi, Teresa!) probably have is, "What's the story behind the new blog name?" I look forward to addressing these questions and more in upcoming posts. But for now, if I don't get this "I'm back" post done and published I'll never get to tell those stories.

***

And so, it looks like I now have my answer to the question I posed at the beginning. I guess that wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. It feels good to be back. 

Obligatory "I'm still here" post

Any of my humble readership who subscribe to my little blog in your RSS readers are probably thinking: "Woa, Donna's emerged from blog-slumber!"

Well, not quite.

Life has been full beyond words since my last post of November 25th. It's a kind of fullness I'm not quite ready to blog about though--or, rather, that I need to reflect about before I figure out which parts are bloggable. Just note that it is a glorious, wonderful fullness.

However, professionally I am slowly going to begin to bring together and update all of my online presences (as they say), and being a researcher of social media I know that having a slumbering blog is not a best practice--meaning, someone who comes to this blog won't have a real sense of where I am in the present in regards to the topics covered thus far on the blog.

Thus, this "I'm still here" post.

There is always a temptation to scrap the blog completely, seeing that I did not manage to keep to my plan to post regularly last Fall. I don't want to do this though.

I'm coming back. I assure you. I'm just not sure when. But it's a comfort to know this space is here, waiting for me to return as soon as I am able to post on a regular basis again.

So, for any of you subscribers/followers, I humbly ask you to remain subscribed to my little corner of the interwebs, since someday I will return to posting and I'd love you to know about it when I do.

In the meantime, I beg your prayers, and you have mine. And a blessed Pascha/Easter as this Feast of Feasts rapidly approaches!

Why a blog?

I'm a pretty avid reader of blogs (thank you, Google Reader). They include blogs written by Orthodox Christians, blogs written by librarians, blogs written by friends, blogs written by readers-writers-artists-etc., blogs written by interesting people I have encountered and wish to know more about, and the list goes on. Historically I have been a lurker on most blogs I read, although I do sometimes remove my invisibility cloak and make myself known by way of a comment here, a comment there.

Of late, though, I have felt an interesting urge to join the conversation a bit more formally. I find myself encountering things, as I work to know and be known in my daily life, that I wish to share. With whom? Well that, I suppose, is yet to be determined.

I'll be honest and say that I'm not sure what exactly is going to fill this space. But that's what's neat about a blog -- it grows and becomes whatever it turns out to be, and that's just fine as far as I'm concerned. Some themes and topics you can expect to see here, though, include things related to my faith as an Orthodox Christian (who is also a choir singer: "kliros," for those who've never encountered the word, refers to the space where the choir stands in an Orthodox Church), things related to my job as an academic librarian who's a bit of a techie and research junkie, and more.

I also really love to tell and hear (or read) stories. So, in a way, this will be a space where I can tell the stories I encounter in the things I do throughout my days. I believe work -- the work of singing in the choir at church, the work of teaching students how to find the information they need, the work of loving my neighbor -- tells a story, or can if I let it. I love the work God has given me to do, and I want to share the stories I get to be a part of as I do it.

So, welcome.