Recent Accomplishments

In the whirlwind of the past month or so, I accomplished two very different things of which I am rather proud. The contrast between the two also provides a lovely cross-section of my life at the moment, and both are things I wanted to share here anyway, so here they are.

***

First, the final publication version of an article I co-wrote with my research partna', Teresa, became available on the publisher's website. The article was accepted for publication back in February, to be included in that next issue (which was available in pre-pub form in March). It is our first peer-reviewed journal article about our Facebook research, called "Information literacy on Facebook: an analysis." That link will take you to the article information and full abstract at the publisher's website, all of which is freely accessible to any web visitor. If you're interested in the "stuff" we're working on with Facebook (or, if the question crossed your mind: What serious relationship can Facebook have with anything educational, let alone scholarly?), go take a look at the abstract to see what we're up to. And as the abstract notes, this article is part one of a two-part study, so God willing there will be another article within the next year or so that reports on our further findings. 

Also, I love talking about this stuff, so if you read the abstract (or if you're a librarian and/or professiorial-type and can get access to the full article through your library's subscription or ILL), and you want to discuss what we're doing, leave me a comment! 

I am not at liberty to post the file of the full article here--though once I figure it all out I should be able to post a pre-pub version at some point down the line--so in lieu of linking to the article itself, I have some images that sum up my excitement. Oh, did I mention this is my first real publication? As in, my name on something in print that needed to go through a rigorous vetting process before it was accepted? I joke with my friends who've known me since childhood when my one dream was to perform on stage for a living, that this is the research equivalent of seeing my name in lights...

The front page of the final pub version of
our article, complete with the publisher's
emblem in the lower left-hand corner
(I know, I'm a dork) :)
click to embiggen

Yes, that's a pic of the computer screen I took with my phone, of the first page of the article. But look! It's my work, with my name under it (and Teresa's too, of course), and our affiliations, and the publisher's emblem, all on the same page! And wait, there's more...

The bibliographic record for our article
in the online research database ProQuest
(click to embiggen)

Full record of our article in ProQuest--
we're indexed! :) click to embiggen

When you're junior faculty, working towards tenure, and a librarian to boot, which means most of your professional time is spent in databases like ProQuest, seeing your work appear in the context of one such database is pretty thrilling, to say the least.

So, yea, it's been an exciting few months for me and Teresa and our work. Up next: writing up part two of the study, to be submitted for publication as soon as we can manage it.

***

The second thing I accomplished recently, this past week in fact, was to begin to get Rosebud's room ready for her. When we moved into our home last summer, our second bedroom became de facto a storage room. When we found out Rosebud was on her way, it became clear we needed to transform the room from storage into a nursery. This involved removing things we were storing in there that didn't belong in a baby's room, and making room for the essential pieces of baby furniture we knew we'd need: crib, changing station and rocker. There was already a bookshelf as well as a full-sized bureau (matching), brought from my former apartment, which we planned to keep in there for Rosebud. And, we also put in that room a loveseat-sized foldout couch, also from my former apartment, which we use when guests visit. This couch is so heavy and difficult to move, we decided to leave it in there even after Rosebud arrives, since we don't have a separate guest room to speak of (we live in a two bedroom house). The plan is, when we have guests (including Rosebud's grandparents), they will stay in the nursery on the foldout couch, and Rosebud will sleep in our room on one of our portable type sleeping options (which we've registered for...more on this in a moment). We recognize that this will only work for the first couple of years of Rosebud's life, but we'll worry about future arrangements when the time comes (God always seems to provide solutions to problems we haven't even identified yet).

So, without further ado, and definitely still a work in progress, here is Rosebud's nursery:

Crib my mother bought for Rosebud,
rocker, and of course, laundry, including
baby clothes and bedding that were
gifted to us second-hand

The foldout loveseat (I don't like the bright red color--
it was on sale a few years ago when I acquired it, largely
due to the color I think, though thankfully it doesn't
utterly clash with the colors in Rosebud's room--
I've toned it down with a lovely rose pattern quilt)

Book shelf (holding my childhood stuffed animals :) )
which will house Rosebud's library...the diaper
changing station will go in front of that window,
which also needs an AC unit before the
heat of summer settles in

The bureau, for Rosebud's clothes and extra bedding,
and the door leading out of the room--there is also a
small closet (not visible) immediately on the right on
the way into the room, where we'll hang Rosebud's
little dresses and things (and also where bedding
for the foldout couch/bed is stored)

The room came with that lovely Victorian wallpaper, which we had every intention of keeping whether we were having a boy or a girl--it has a border of faded roses along the top (perfect for Rosebud's nursery). But clearly there are still a lot of necessities missing, including the diaper changing station I keep mentioning. Which provides a perfect segue into sharing links to Rosebud's registries--something I've been meaning to post in a public-like place for some time.

By the grace of God, my husband and I are blessed with many people who love us dearly, and by extension, already love Rosebud beyond imagining. Various communities in our life are throwing us baby showers for Rosebud--for which we are incredibly grateful, since I'm not sure we'd be able to afford otherwise all the one-time, up front costs of setting up house for baby. I created a Pinterest account with the purpose of using it to make sense of Rosebud's registry items, and it has served well in that regard. She is registered at Babies R Us and on Amazon.com for baby things, and then she also has a books and media wishlist on Amazon (since many of the people who love Rosebud are of the bookish sort, so their gift-giving inclination may lean in that direction--this way we are less likely to receive titles we already own, since I have a pretty formidable children's book collection already, being a children's story geek myself).

In a sense, I'm sharing these more so the mommies out there can see how we plan to "fill in the blanks" in the above photos of Rosebud's nursery, plus items for other parts of the house, for both functionality and beautifying the space. I'm always interested in what mothers more experienced than I have to say about products we're looking to get (although I did pretty extensive customer review research on the essentials before adding them to the registry). So, here are the links:

Rosebud's Registry at Babies R Us [Edit: Bah, turns out there is no such thing as a direct link to a Babies R Us registry; this link will take you to the registry search screen. Just search for our last name and you should be able to find us.]
Rosebud's Registry on Amazon.com
Rosebud's Books & Media Library Wishlist on Amazon.com
My Pinterest boards (where you can see how the products come together visually based on where they'll go in the house)

Needless to say, I'm getting very excited at the prospect of meeting our dear little girl. Less than two months to go!

***

So, two very different accomplishments from the past few months, but there you have it. Sums me up pretty well right now. 

Leavetakings

Today is the Apodosis, or Leavetaking of Pascha, the Feast of Feasts. It is also two days after another leavetaking in my life: The End Of The Semester I wrote longingly of three weeks ago while still in the midst of the Paschal feast. It's interesting that, the first leavetaking is one I am sad to see arrive, while the second is one I am thrilled is finally here. Such is life I guess--to everything its season.

And speaking of seasons, during the past three weeks I also transitioned into my third trimester. Fascinatingly, everything about my pregnancy thus far has been "textbook" in that my experience seems to be matching the "average" experience generally described in pregnancy books. Overall, this makes me incredibly grateful, since it means my baby is healthy and developing exactly as she should be, and it also means the oddball things I am going through are perfectly normal and to be expected. Thank God for both those things. What this also means, though, is that my third trimester is hitting me hard--way harder than I expected, no matter what the pregnancy books say. I offer as evidence the following story, which will also make it clear why posting to my blog these past few weeks was next to impossible...

***

At the beginning of the Spring semester (which just ended) I received the syllabus for my Old Testament Exegesis course. In it, I learned what our final term paper assignment would be. I could tell immediately that it would be intense, but I also saw our professor had great foresight and built into the semester check-in points regarding the paper, so there was no way we could reach the last two weeks of the course without having done some substantial work on the paper already. My experience with this paper was a roller-coaster, to put it mildly: I went from being pumped about the initial research I was able to get done on it, to mid-semester having a bit of a meltdown (at home, in the supportive presence of my loving husband) about feeling totally lost regarding what we were being asked to do for it. The meltdown had both physical and mental repercussions (which I soon recovered from), resulting in my actually skipping a class meeting for the sake of recovering. To be honest, it largely came down to putting way too much pressure on myself--something I tend to do anyway, but doing so while in the hormonal throes of pregnancy = a recipe for disaster. I resolved to make an appointment to meet with my professor in order to discuss the paper, and basically tell him I needed help and direction because I felt utterly lost. (Ah, humility, glad to see you again.)

That meeting, which occurred at the very end of April, went quite well. My professor helped clarify aspects of my topic that were throwing me for a loop (and thus making me feel like an idiot), and ultimately told me he wasn't worried about where I was with the paper, that I had things more under control than I thought. So, that was very encouraging, and it left me with almost three weeks to write the paper in time for its May 18th deadline. So, one week went by...and I had library-related projects that needed my attention that week. Another week went by...and our final exam was coming up and I needed to spend the bulk of my time studying for it. And suddenly it was the third week, and I had a handful of days to actually write the paper.

Now, under different circumstances than those I found myself in, I can take a set of 3-5 days and knock out a 12-page paper (double spaced), assuming I have done some research/prep work on the paper already (which I had). But remember how I noted that over the past three weeks I also transitioned into my third trimester? Here are some things this has meant for me:

• muscles I didn't know I had are aching
• I have to do everything--everything--slower than usual, from standing up to opening the door to getting settled prior to commencing a new task like, say, writing a paper
• my balance is off, since I am carrying around more weight than this body ever has in its 28 years on this earth
• sleeping at night is getting harder--for instance, I have to go to the bathroom several times each night, so I don't get a truly full night's sleep anymore
• my hands and feet fall asleep fairly regularly, but especially when I've been sitting for long periods of time--oh, like, for example, while trying to write a paper
• by midday I have heartburn that sticks around until the end of the day unless I take something for it (which I do--thank you Zantac)
• the baby is kicking up a storm, which is both awesome but also a bit hard on the muscles and organs around her, especially when trying to concentrate on something other than my body--like, say, writing a paper (observing a theme here?)

Now, it's worth noting again that, thankfully, I and the baby are both healthy. So the above experiences, while challenging for a first-time pregnant mother who is used to moving through life at a pretty fast pace, are thankfully not at the level of indicating anything being seriously wrong. They are just par for the course...and though I read about most of these prior to reaching my third trimester, I was naive enough to think maybe I'd be able to duck and dodge a few of them. Ha, yea right. 

But what it does mean is, there was no way I was going to finish that paper in the 3-5 days I allotted for it. Talk about a hard pill to swallow for an over-achiever like yours truly. So my mental process last week, when those 3-5 days occurred, went something like this:

"Ok, right now I'm going to tightly outline and then write the first section of the paper using all these great sources I've collected." 

---after getting all my sources arrayed around me, and the document up on the screen in front of me--- 

"Man, I'm tired. Ok, now it's time to really begin what I said I was gonna do. Let's do this." 

---after having accomplished a bit of good work, but nowhere near even half done with the first section of the paper--- 

"Oh my goodness I can't feel my feet."

---freaking out for a moment, then standing and walking around to get the feeling back, only to realize I'm either hungry or need to use the bathroom or both, so I go and do those...20 minutes go by before I return to the computer---

"Ok, let's pick up where I left off..."

---by now I'm utterly exhausted but determined to try, only then the baby starts to kick---

"Babygirl I love you dearly and I've been waiting for you to kick like this for months, but please, can you be calm for just a little while so I can get some work done???"

---she cheerefully ignores my request---

"Sigh. I am horrible at life." [NOTE: this is where the mental process becomes irrational and clearly influenced by my hormones.]

---I proceed to stare into space, on the verge of tears because I feel like half the scholar I used to be---

By this time, it's pointless trying to get any more work done on the paper, and usually it required that my husband come get me out of my funk by assuring me this irrational conclusion I had arrived at was a lie. I'd then proceed to put all my books away and move on to something that made me feel less useless. The process then turned into a sad, hard-to-break cycle when, after rest and rejuvenation, I decided to try to get more work done on the paper, set yet another impossible-to-meet goal (because I'm stubborn and hard-headed), and commenced with the above process yet again...

Needless to say, I did not meet the May 18th deadline, but luckily my professor was very understanding and gave me until as close to the grade submission deadline as possible to get it to him. That gave me the equivalent of three more days (i.e., this past weekend). Well, I am happy to report that, at 12:30 pm on Monday, I was able to give him something he could grade in time to post my grade to the registrar's grading system. 

Thus was the Leavetaking of my Spring semester. And thank God for it.

*** 

At one point (well, on May 13th) amid all of this hubbub, though, I celebrated my first Mother's Day as a mother. (N.B. Anyone who reads the above and somehow can't see that carrying my little one around right now, while keeping myself healthy and sane for her sake, is a good example of what it means to be a mother, is out of touch with reality...). And since I like to include at least one picture with each of my posts, here's a shot of me that Paul took on Mother's Day, which was the day before my third trimester began.

The third trimester (or thereabouts) doesn't look quite as hard from this angle, does it? 

First Mother's Day, 29 Weeks
Me and my babygirl :)
(who, by the way, I love more dearly than
any paper or class or grade)

A Paschal Picture Post

Way too much has been going on with me lately. I haven't been able to keep up, let alone reflect on it. I've had a few moments over the past few weeks where I needed to take a step back from my figurative "plate" (which is overfull at the moment), so as to avoid burnout. I'm at that point in the academic year where I'm aiming longingly and determinedly toward The End Of The Semester. (3 weeks...just 3 more weeks...)

So, in lieu of a detailed post about the content of my work and/or home life, I am going to share pictures and a video (!!!--big deal for me, that.) which document this Paschal season for me. I posted last on Great and Holy Friday, with pictures of our just-then-blooming tulips. The next day, which was Holy Saturday, our tulips finally opened up! Well, a few of them anyway...

Ready to greet Christ's Resurrection...

Opening up toward the sun.

That same morning, I sang at Vesperal Divine Liturgy for Holy Saturday, where the plashchanitsa was still out from the night before, and remained so until that evening at Paschal Nocturnes. Parishes traditionally decorate the plashchanitsa (epitaphios in the Greek tradition, and referring to the shroud that has depicted on it an icon of Christ asleep in death) with flowers--the result is meant to bring to mind Christ laid in the tomb. Here is ours:

All Saints Orthodox Church, Olyphant, PA,
Holy Saturday 2012 --
I love how vibrant the flowers were this year :)

I also attempted to capture some audio (via video) of our church choir singing the absolutely beautiful Paschal hymns. For any readers who are unfamiliar with Orthodox Christian worship, in Orthodoxy the choir helps pray the service with the clergy (on behalf of the people), and all of the music is traditionally sung a cappella. Being an Orthodox choir singer is one of the things that is fundamental to who I am--it is that important to me--the role it plays for me is bigger than I can adequately describe, in terms of keeping my sanity in this life. 

Today, I managed to upload one of the videos (which again is really just audio, as the video's image is of our choir loft ceiling) to my YouTube account--an account which until now I only had by virtue of being a user of Google products. On the tech side of things, I feel very accomplished! This is my first video upload ever to the interwebs...long overdue, no doubt. The piece in the video is the 9th Ode of the Canon for Matins of Holy Saturday...I know, that's a mouthful! Put more simply, it's one of the brief but utterly beautiful hymns that captures the Paschal spirit so well. It is a hymn to the Mother of God, written from the perspective of her Son who is now (at this point in Holy Week) laid in the tomb. Anyway, I'll let the words speak for themselves, but here is a video containing audio of my church choir singing this piece, often referred to by its first line, "Do not lament me, O Mother" (I am singing soprano/melody in this recording...it was a small group that morning, so it may just be me on soprano, I can't quite remember now. The words of the piece are typed out in this post just below the video.):

Do not lament me, O Mother, 

seeing me in the tomb, 

thy son conceived in the womb without seed, 

for I shall arise 

and be glorified with eternal glory as God. 

I shall exalt all who magnify you in faith and in love.

So, that was Holy Saturday. Then came Pascha! Yay! I have no pictures of that celebration, but suffice it to say, it was a beautiful occasion.

Bright Week (the week immediately following Pascha) was truly bright in that the sun came out and stayed out for most of it! Which meant the entire tulip bed woke up, their little heads lifting themselves up to the sunlight (fitting, no?).

Bright Thursday: click on it to see it enlarged--it's worth it :)

And they've been open ever since, though my husband tells me their time may be coming to an end, as early spring transitions into mid/late spring in our neck of the woods (God willing this week, in terms of temps at least!). This afternoon I did get two more pretty shots of our other tulip bed--this one devoted to red lovelies, right by our flag pole. The afternoon light lit them up so beautifully today...

My husband has a good eye--these are so picturesque placed like this.
And note the other tulip bed in the background on the left--
bright happy blooms, even in the shade.

I didn't edit this photo at all. They really are this vibrant, even more so if
you click to enlarge. :)

So, even if these tulips go soon, for now they somehow help me participate more fully in the Paschal season, which lasts for 40 days after the great feast itself (which for us this year fell on April 15th). 

That's it for flower images from me, for the time being. Before I end this post, it occurred to me, as I was describing earlier how important to me church choir singing is, that today is also my 7th (liturgical) anniversary since joining the Orthodox Church. I was Chrismated into the Orthodox Church on the Feast of the Holy Myrrhbearers in 2005. As I posted to Facebook today, that moment was a paradigm shift in my little corner of the universe if there ever was one. And, in the spirit of this post, here's a picture from that day 7 years ago:

Cathedral of the Holy Virgin Protection, NYC
(my first parish home)
Feast of the Holy Myrrhbearers 2005

Now I need to go and get mentally ready to face the week. (3 more weeks...just 3 more weeks...)

But, as it's still Pascha (yay for feasts that last 40 days!), and I need to remember this as I face the stress of another over-crammed week (Aside: I will likely reread this post throughout the week as a reminder of beautiful, green, vibrant, melodic, uplifting things.), the only appropriate way to end this post is to say, again:

Christ is Risen!!!

Tulips for Pascha

This week is Holy Week in the Orthodox Church, which makes today Holy Friday. I only worked two days this week (Tuesday and Wednesday), but they were doozies. My "To Do" list did not shrink but grew during those two days...

But then it was Wednesday night, and Thursday would be my first day this week of getting to attend the church services leading up to Pascha (aka Easter), and I decided to leave (almost)* all of my work...at work. Two days later, on Holy Friday, I know I made the right decision.

So, rather than attempt to post about the exciting (though exhausting) things happening professionally for me, I'm posting a picture I took in honor of the feast.

My husband's tulips are blooming :)

A few weeks ago my husband had to protect these lovelies from a frost that hit us (by covering them with a sheet), and apparently he was successful as they are finally opening up. Just in time for the Feast of the Resurrection--couldn't be more perfect, and with the promise of warmer temperatures later this weekend, my guess is they will open up even more by Sunday.

Since I am quite sure I won't manage to post again until at least sometime next week, I'll go ahead and anticipate this Sunday now by saying:

Christ is Risen!!! 

A blessed Pascha to those who celebrate this week!!!

***

*The only work I brought home is some research-reading I need to digest for my Old Testament class, in order to write a 1.5 page summary of what I plan to include in my final paper for the course. So far, though, I haven't been able to bring myself to pull the reading out and do anything with it. Other things seem more important right now (like two theology-filled church services per day). Perhaps later this weekend....

Cosmos in Chaos

...being the first installment in a series of stories about the stars and me, which I first introduced several weeks ago.

(At the moment there's a lot percolating in my mind about information literacy, in response to a handful of things I've read/encountered recently, but it needs to marinate a bit longer before I'm ready to post on it. So for now, travel with me back to my star-filled childhood...)

***

In elementary school, my favorite time of year was when the Star Lab visited my school. This was a giant tent-like contraption, held aloft by a powerful fan which blew chilly air into its interior--making it feel much like the outdoors, or so I told myself. We'd crawl into this dark artificial cave, lie on our backs, and have an expert from the planetarium conduct a star show for us. We learned to identify the North Star (brightest star in the sky!), and how to find the Big and Little Dippers in relation to it. The other constellations would soon follow, and we watched as they rotated across the ceiling of the Star Lab, a (relatively) top-speed reenactment of how they move through the night sky throughout the year.

Image courtesy of Flickr user nd-nʎ via a CC license

To my young eyes, this was magic: having one picture after another appear before my eyes, as soon as each relational key was identified. These pictures revealed meaning to me: cosmos in chaos. It did my young heart good.

Perhaps as a result of the magic I encountered in the Star Lab, for my first ever science fair project I decided to create a large star chart, mapping all of the constellations in our region. For stars, I used the stickers that teachers use to award gold stars to students, and traced out the constellations as best as I could in relation to one another on a big piece of poster board. The project didn't win any prizes in the science fair, but I kept it on display in my bedroom for quite a number of years. It comforted me to look at it across my room when I'd settle into bed at night because it represented to me a map by which I could see the world around me more clearly--by it I could see meaning where otherwise there would be just darkness.

In honor of this, I also decorated my bedroom door frame with glow-in-the-dark stars: my mom preferred that I didn't stick them on the ceiling. This archway of stars crowned the entry to my childhood bedroom, and kept me company in the dark.

Image courtesy of Flickr user Coldspire via a CC license

As a child I wanted to be surrounded by the stars--to live among them if I could. These were my attempts to make that happen.