So what is it that you do?

August has gotten off to a rather lazy beginning. After finishing a monster 10,000 word essay for my supervisor, I felt the need to go into a bit of a hibernation mode. My days have been filled with CrossFit, YouTube videos, Netflix, and World of Warcraft. It has been a very necessary break and I must admit that I am loathed to start up work again. Thankfully, I’m slightly ahead of where I need to be in my PhD and so I have a bit of wiggle room.

It hasn’t all been hedonism and weightlifting though. I’ve been working on some extracurricular projects over the summer which have taken on a new prominence as my own project waits patiently for me to get back to it. I have agreed to be an SSCC representative at the department. SSCC stands for Student Staff Consultation Committee. Some of you may remember I took on this role while I was at Durham as well, though it’s a very different thing at this university. It seems that while there is the liaising with staff representatives which was the core of what I did last year, reps here are more about providing help and support to PhDs which includes social activities, welfare and the like. I haven’t officially begun my tenure as a rep but I’ve already been in contact with my colleagues and we’ve discussed some potential routes we may explore. To be honest, there is some irony is my taking this position on. I’ve been struggling with feelings of isolation, imposter syndrome, and depression and anxiety. In speaking with other PhDs not just at this university but at others as well, it seems that isolation and imposter syndrome are extremely common. I’m hoping as a rep to prioritise mental well-being this year not just for my sake, but for all of our students.

While some ideas for social gatherings and perhaps periodic yoga and mindfulness seminars are bouncing around my brain, I’ve also been stuck in with work on a Black History Month community project. This is probably the one project that I feel most excited about and really touches on the work I hope to do in the future. Teens from around Leicester are going to be coming to the university in October (that’s when the UK celebrates Black History Month) where they will have the opportunity to interact with some collections and where we will be discussing race issues. I’m really hoping it’s a day that will inspire the students to make some changes in their lives and communities. It’s such an exciting and complex project to be working on but it’s one that is so important to me.

Finally, I’m getting some practical exhibition experience as well working on the display of a commissioned art piece at the university library. The display will also include a digital exhibition of some of the library’s archival collection, specifically the Joe Orton Collection. While rather ironically, I find my interest in museum work moving away from exhibitions and more into community engagement and education (yes, I know I railed against returning to an education career last year), I am glad to finally be getting some hands-on exhibition experience.

Back in the Saddle Again

I really must apologise for abandoning this blog the way I have. It has been three and a half months since I returned from my research trip in the US and I've not been able to get back to blogging regularly for a number of reasons.

I pretty much hit the ground running when I got back to Leicester after a month going through the southern US and spending time at home. My trip was absolutely brilliant. I got to see so many incredible sites, went to the American Alliance of Museums Conference in Atlanta, and also got to spend some much needed time at home with friends and family. While I did keep up with my personal travel journal, there is just too much to put down here. I would love to write a proper post about it though I don't want to promise anything. What I will say is that I never expected to enjoy the American south as much as I did. I absolutely loved Atlanta and Memphis. I managed to go to both city's botanical gardens and made sure I visited the National Center for Civil and Human Rights and the National Civil Rights Museum. The latter is on the site of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s assassination. I even stopped off in Montgomery to visit the Rosa Parks Museum. From there I flew to DC, one of my absolute favourite cities in the world. I had a lovely few days there visiting the Holocaust Memorial Museum, the parks, monuments, and the National Mall. I lovingly referred to my trip as my Super Duper American Research Tour 2015 Extravaganzapolooza and I think it definitely lived up to the hype. I got a lot of good ideas from visiting social justice museums and nothing can ever beat meeting and talking to new people. Despite some of the rough patches I've hit in the past few months (I'll get to that in a minute), looking back on that month really makes me smile and wish I could do it all over again.

When I returned to the UK I immediately took on a number of projects. I was feeling rejuvenated and refreshed from my trip. Travel always does that for me and indeed, I'm at my happiest when I'm travelling. Unfortunately I took on too much. I agreed to do some transcribing work and while the fee was brilliant and I was in desperate need of some cash, the job took up every spare moment of my time. I also had to dive right into my next major paper for my PhD which took two months and ended up weighing in at a monstrous 10,000 words. As if those weren't enough I decided to help out on an exhibition project for the library which ended up being a bit more than I thought and I was already working on another project in the department and oh, yeah, there was Research Week in the middle of June. You sort of see how things just got piled up on top of me. 

Probably the worst bit of it all was that I was ill for most of June and some of July. About two weeks after I got back I was slammed by a peculiar exhaustion. When I say slammed, I mean slammed. One minute I was fine, the next I could barely make the walk home and was worried I'd have to have a nap on a bench somewhere. A few blood tests and plenty of doctor's appointments later, it turns out it may have been the result of low iron. I've since started taking a multivitamin with extra iron and I've changed my diet to include iron-rich foods. It seems to be helping. I'm still feeling a bit tired overall, but now I can actually get some things done before I need to crawl into bed at the end of the day. 

So the good news is that I'm feeling better, my paper went over exceptionally well with my supervisor, and now I'm a bit ahead of where I need to be. I do wish I could give you a better recap of the past four months. I'm hoping that with this post, I'll be able to get back into the swing of blogging again. I do miss it immensely. I think one thing I need to get over is that Leicester and my experiences here are very different and perhaps not as blog-able as the experiences I had in Durham. Maybe some of the novelty of living in a new country has worn off, definitely a PhD is an altogether different beast, and sadly, I've just not got the time or money to try out a lot of new experiences here. With that being said, I do hope you'll try to stick with me and my erratic updates and I'll do my best to dig up some interesting, funny, and engaging stories over the next couple weeks.