Author Archives: Christene

Wordless Wednesday

My brain was so done this week… I was lesson planning and kept staring at the same page for almost thirty minutes…
Completely unrelated to the above, this weekend I got this for my dresser… it holds my necklaces so they don’t have to be sprawled out everywhere… I have been wanting one of these for years!
My old coworker, Marian, came by my office on a surprise visit last night, with many butterfly gifts and books for me and an invitation to a wonderful dinner at the French Connection… Here are tiny Duck shaped chocolates and (not in the picture) Butterfly Kiss pinot grigio, eclipse dark chocolate bars, and kitty stationary… (oh my!)
A coffee cup sleeve she saved for me so I can pin up above my desk for artistic purposes…
A hand decorated match book with tiny butterfly aphorisms inside…
And feminist literature in German and French…
Thank you Marian!!!

I should have posted these last week… would have made more sense, but on Halloween they made spooky spider cookies at day care…

Arick and I took them Trick or Treating that night… Fairy Kitty Princess…
And a Duck…
On Sunday I took them with my mom to Griffith Park…. They rode the ponies….
Then we all went on the train… My mom and Ally rode in the front as we crossed the miniature Golden Gate Bridge…
Past the replicas of a gold mining town….
Ducky and I sat right behind…

Clarissa and Caleb

I had this crazy idea last night.

In light of my GRE scores I have been compulsively rewriting every other part of my application, however, last night I had done it so many times my brain just decided it wanted to stop.

I was proofreading/rewriting my statement of purpose for the umpteenth time and in the middle of everything I started thinking about Clarissa. Yes, *that* Clarissa.

It went something like this:

blah blah blah Chaucer… blah… medieval studies… blah… manuscripts… hrm.. Clarissa and Caleb?

No, I did not include the latter in my statement. I am not presenting a stream of conscience piece. Unlike everything else in my life that pretty much emulates my blog posts, this is not one such thing. I am actually trying to impress people with this thing.

Since this was a totally random thought, I have not researched it, and have no academic proof that I am onto anything, or that I am on to anything new. I might be right, and fifty other people may have already written about this.

However, this is not pressing, so it will go into my “should I have some time” pile to be looked into at a later date.

In the meantime, here is the most basic outline for my connection:

Clarissa and Caleb Williams appear to have a similar compulsion to remain true to themselves at their own detriment. She harbors an unfaltering conviction to preserve her chastity and virtue while his actions are dictated by what he believes to be his moral compass. Even once they are respectively compromised, and abandoning their their quests would be in their best interests, they set out to vindicate their names while continuously getting trapped by their oppressors. He is returned to jail as many times as she is returned to the brothel – against their will, but significantly through their own doing.

As the “theater of [their] calamity” unfolds, each fixate on the dominant figure in their lives, pursuing him out of stubborn, and for lack of a better term, stupid curiosity, unable to leave well enough alone when told to do so. Each begets an unfavorable end (with Caleb it depends on which ending you use).

As I write this I realize this very pattern could also be applied to Howard Roark with slight variations (and probably many other characters along the way). But something specifically about Clarissa and Caleb elicits a connection to be made. I like to think of Clarissa as the female version of Caleb, and in a sense she is, except Clarissa was written some fifty years before Caleb, so if anything, the relationship between them is inverted.

Yet unlike Roark, or other characters who share the same plot and fate, these two were written under similar conditions, sharing the sentiments and conventions of their time.

And having absolutely nothing to base this on except that in an almost delirious state of exhaustion I had a hunch, I shall put this aside and not mention it again until I have something better to go on.

GRE Scores

When I took my GRE general test I blogged about it immediately that night. I was excited, and I had done well, and even if I hadn’t gotten back my essay results my multiple choice was better than I could have expected. Then my essay scores came weeks later. I was in the 99th percentile on everything.

When I took my GRE subject test I never blogged about it. I had nothing to blog about. I took the test, and nothing was given back. I had to wait. I knew I did well, but what was I going to say? I took the test. Did well. That is more of a twitter update than a blog post. But how well? And more importantly, how did I rank against everyone else?

I got my results back about a week ago. I didn’t blog about it. According to everyone I did exceptionally well. All I felt was disappointment. My friend had been asking me about my scores for weeks, and I kept replying that she will be the first to hear once I knew anything. As I messaged her at 3:30 in the morning after opening my email and finding my scores, I sent her one line. “710. 95th.” She knew what it was, so no explanation was needed.

Several hours later (when normal people wake up), she sent back congratulatory messages peppered with exclamation points.

Yes, I know it is a good score. In fact, considering how I felt the day of the test, this too was a better score than I had expected. But not as good as I had hoped. I had studied so hard, read dozens of books in less than two months, looked up even more summaries and outlines of everything I didn’t quite remember. I even watched movies. I gave it everything I had. 95th percentile is apparently all I had.

Instead of feeling proud joy, I felt like crying.

When I took the exam a lot was going on in my life. Perhaps more than I could feasibly handle, but to use that as an excuse is just a cop out. I screwed it up. I had one chance, and I didn’t do what I was supposed to. But I don’t know what that is. I don’t know what else I could have done except click some magical pause button on everything else and focus solely on the exam. Or maybe I am just dumb. This too is a possibility.

At least I have my GPA to fall back on, which, despite being good, is also not perfect. At two points during my MA I got a B+ and an A-. The B+ I will accept. We had a difference of opinion, and that is what I get. The A- makes me bitter.

In case you are wondering, I am terrible at formatting lists, including lists of works I have consulted, used, read, or otherwise thought about. And when taking a course entirely dedicated to making such lists, well, the A- is practically a miracle. I acknowledge my poor list making abilities. And others will be quick to point it out. Read anything I have written academically, flip to the back to the bibliography and the proof is right there. I can’t make lists.

It is not really the A- I am bitter about, but rather the entire student aspect of academia. I know several people with a 4.0, and I try not to think about it because it makes me angry. They don’t do hardly any reading, write their papers the night before, do minimal research, turn it in full of typos, but manage to get A’s. They reiterate the same topics/points that have been written for decades, because you can’t go wrong with something that has already been proven and accepted, and that is completely acceptable. Yeah, that irks me.

I can’t make lists, and I can’t write papers that are nothing more than glorified book reports. And when I write something so outlandish it could never be proven, along with my bad grade I would like an explanation of where I went wrong.

Speaking of which, I would like to know what questions I got wrong on the day of the exam. It would be easy to say it was all the ones in the topics I am unfamiliar with, but no. I panicked and I am sure I missed several that I probably should have known, may have at one point known, but didn’t know when I needed to.

There were two long passages, six questions a piece, and I left all of it blank. I didn’t recognize the passages, had no idea who wrote them, and couldn’t tell you a thing about either. I looked them up later and they were by Richard Wright and James Baldwin.

There was another long passage, five questions, and I also left it blank. I didn’t have to look it up. As I was driving home I realized I was reading Percy Shelley. This is what I mean when I say I should have known, did know, but not at the right moment.

Those are all the ones I left blank, but I am sure I got random ones wrong along the way to justify my above average, but not quite wonderful score.

I really hope UCLA likes above average, but not quite great, because that seems to be all I have for them.