Writing Leftovers

Usually when I’m revising, there’s a stage at which I realize I have to cut some stuff, either because it’s kind of tangential to the focus of a paper or because the draft has gotten too long. The writing I have to cut might be just a sentence or a paragraph or two; occasionally it’s multiple pages of text. It can be painful to just delete writing that I spent hours working on, that I think explores some good ideas, or that I just really like how I said it. So about halfway through my Master’s program, I quit deleting stuff I liked from my drafts. Instead, I save it for later.

I am not sure exactly how I arrived at the “freezer” metaphor. Maybe it was because I had recently been reading Plato’s Gorgias, in which Socrates compares rhetoric to “cookery,” and maybe it’s because as a grad student who liked to cook, I always ended up with a lot of leftovers. In any case, I created a folder named “FREEZER” on my cloud drive. It’s got a bunch of files with leftover writing that I’ve cut from various projects over the years. I try to label the files well enough to remember more or less what’s inside them, but some are labeled better than others.

Partial screenshot of a file folder labeled "FREEZER"
in all caps, with several MS Word files inside

My "leftover writing freezer" comes in handy in two situations: first, if I am searching for a new project to get started, I can look through the freezer for inspiration. For example, two of the files in the screenshot above have text I cut from other work because it needed to be its own project; I just haven't had the chance to get back to them yet. Second, sometimes when I am working on a project, I realize I’ve already written something related. I open up my “freezer,” pull out some of the contents, warm them up through revision, and use them. Having "leftover writing" can help me avoid writer's block. 

On the other hand, some of the stuff in my “freezer” is probably too old and stale to be usable anymore. Every once in a while, I open up that folder, check the contents, and decide whether or not to throw anything out. Since file space is cheap these days, I rarely throw stuff out, but when I do it’s because I no longer feel bad about tossing it. Putting bits of my writing in the freezer instead of deleting them is an easy way to make my writing and revision process more effective and less painful.

I Have Many Boxes. SO. MANY. BOXES

No, the title of this post is not a clever metaphor:



Why do I have so many boxes, you may ask? I'll tell you.

In ordinary years, my parents and my four brothers with their wives and kids all gather at my house for holidays and family get-togethers because it's bigger than my parents' tiny one-bathroom house. I moved into my house a few weeks before Thanksgiving in 2016 (my first year as a full-time professor¹). Since I had been living as a student for the preceding decade, I had hardly any furniture, but I did have a lot of books. After I finished unpacking my stuff, I was too tired to want to break down all those cardboard boxes and find a big recycling dumpster to put them in.

Then it hit me: I have four brothers and a bunch of nieces and nephews. I decided to keep the boxes in my big empty² family room in the basement and let my nieflings play with them.

When my extended family is not sleeping in the big empty room in the basement, we use boxes to build forts, and we have Nerf wars. After that first Thanksgiving, my nieflings emphatically forbade me from ever getting rid of my pile of boxes or ever putting any furniture³ in that room. Of course, some boxes are inevitably destroyed by the ravages of our Nerf wars, but the supply gets replenished because online shopping is a thing.

Anyway. There was a pandemic. My family hasn't been able to gather for more than a year now, so we haven't had any Nerf wars. Plus I've been shopping online more than in physical stores for the past twelve months, because pandemic.

And that is why I have a ridiculous amount of cardboard boxes in my basement.

I'm really looking forward to getting vaccinated so I can get together with my family again. I'm sure there will be Nerf wars.

on Wise Judgment and Civic Virtue

One of the many problems that our political polarization has created is that folks are increasingly likely to forget that it is possible for people and systems to do things that are bad without being motivated by malice, hatred, greed, or corruption. Those motives do lead people and systems to do bad things, of course, but so do other things, like inexperience, ignorance, having a different perspective (this isn't the same as being ignorant), not having enough information or resources to do things better, having conflicting needs and values, habit, accident, and others. 

Of the non-nefarious reasons why people and systems can do bad things listed above, we rightly view ignorance, inexperience, and habit negatively--not necessarily as vices, but certainly deficiencies. We recognize that ignorance, inexperience, and bad habits can and should be corrected, especially when they're leading us to do bad things or preventing us from doing good things. But others, like having a different perspective or having conflicting needs and values, aren't necessarily negative and can't entirely be corrected. However, they're also not intractable. We can acknowledge, address, and work with, through, and around them. 

When someone or some system does something we believe to be bad, we have several judgment options: 

1. We can decide that the person or system did the bad thing because they are bad

2. if we think very highly of and/or identify ourselves with the person or system that did something bad, we can decide that the thing they did can't really have been bad because those who did it are Good, and Good people/systems don't do bad things (after all, we are good, so we'd never belong to, identify with, or admire someone or something bad, would we?)

3. We can decide that they did the bad thing because they are foolish (and if they seem to resist learning better, we might fall back on option 1 or consider option 5 or 6)

4. We can recognize that mistakes happen, and doing a bad thing by mistake doesn't make someone bad. However, it's hard to sustain this position if they keep on doing the same bad thing again and again

5. We can consider whether they're doing the bad thing because they have a different perspective, limited resources to do things better, and/or conflicting needs/values.

6. We can consider whether we're the one who is ignorant or mistaken: maybe we're wrong about the thing they did being bad; maybe it's value-neutral or perhaps even good

Of the judgment options above, #1 and #2 generally go together and represent an absolutist, black-and-white worldview where only bad people and systems do things that are bad. While it's true that sometimes people and systems that do bad things are themselves bad, it's not true that good people never do bad things. And I believe that most people and systems aren't bad--or at least not entirely or irredeemably bad. Nor are any of us entirely good, though I believe most do try to be. 

Furthermore, adopting judgment options 1 and 2 leaves us absolutely no room--and indeed no need--for civic engagement or government of any kind. Good people do things that are good and always will. Bad people are bad and always will be. The only thing good people can do about it is to get rid of all the bad people (and getting rid of people proves that those gotten-rid-of people are bad, because otherwise good people would not have got rid of them). And indeed, we find many people these days making just these sorts of claims and inferences.

If option 3 is our default judgment, we're likely to be very arrogant and uncharitable (and, in my experience, those who default to option 3 are often just a hair's breadth away from falling back on options 1 and 2). People and systems often do suffer from ignorance and inexperience. Us and ours included. Judgment option 3 is always a real possibility, but it shouldn't be our default; it's too limited.

Likewise, judgment option 4--that they did the bad thing because they were mistaken--is always a real possibility. But if we're too quick to jump to that conclusion, and especially if we're not sufficiently aware of our own propensity for being mistaken, then we're basically back to option 3 and all its problems.

The civic virtue of options 4-6 (5 and 6 especially) is that they make space for respect, trust, change, and improvement. Careful consideration will generally reveal these judgments to be the most likely of all to be true, as well. 

Whenever we find ourselves judging something to be bad (or good, for that matter), it's worthwhile to reflect on how we've evaluated the motives behind it. Even if the thing really is bad, the motives may not be (and often aren't), and that matters. It affects how we address both the consequences of the bad thing and the people or systems responsible. Even if we correctly judge a thing to be bad, a poor judgment about the motives that led to it will prevent us from most appropriately addressing its consequences and preventing its reoccurrence.

We can also benefit from considering how others (I'm thinking especially of media pundits and politicians here) characterize the motives of their allies and opponents when they talk about the things they do. If someone is trying to persuade you that their opposition did (or will do) a bad thing because they are bad, or that the thing they themselves or their allies did (or will do) can't be bad because they are good, then you can recognize that they're operating within an absolutist judgment framework, which is fatal to civic virtue.

Setting In for Social Distancing

It seems that social distancing will be our reality for the next 6-18 months, depending on a bunch of variables, a few of which we have some influence over, and some of which are just unknown because researchers have had so little time so far to study this virus. Anyway, you can look up the details if you want; this post is about how I'm making plans to settle in for a while.

I posted on Facebook last week about the need to set a personal schedule and create boundaries both in time and space. I'll reiterate those here, with additions and revisions. I also highly recommend my brother's post about dealing with social isolation.

Create a schedule that works for you and stick to it as much as possible.

Some of us have been required or strongly encouraged to stick to regular business hours so that we can coordinate our work with coworkers. Others will have the ability (or the necessity) to adjust their working hours to accommodate the fact that they are now de facto homeschooling teachers and caregivers, or for other personal reasons. Regardless of how much flexibility is available to you, I recommend the following: 

1. Get up and go to bed at the same time every day. 

In Doctrine and Covenants section 88, the Lord counsels his servants regarding their preparations to build a temple for the first time since the Restoration and to establish what was known as "the school of the prophets." In verse 124, we read:

Cease to be idle; cease to be unclean; cease to find fault one with another; cease to sleep longer than is needful; retire to thy bed early, that ye may not be weary; arise early, that your bodies and your minds may be invigorated. (emphasis added)

Due to the protestant work ethic that was imported into Mormon culture from its earliest days, this verse has often been interpreted to mean something along the lines of "faithful members should be asleep by 10 PM and awake by 6 AM, if not earlier." But I want to suggest a somewhat different interpretation, especially given the evidence that different people do in fact have different circadian rhythms, and that some people's work schedules simply don't permit such a rigid reading. What I want to suggest, then, is that while the underlying principle expressed in verse 124 is true for all people, "early" is subjective. And I think it has to do with what I like to call "the Hour of Dumb."

The Hour of Dumb
The Hour of Dumb varies somewhat from one person to another, but all of us have one. If you think you don't, it's probably because you're in the habit of staying up way past your Hour of Dumb and you're in denial.

The Hour of Dumb arrives when you have pushed past your body's normal feeling of nighttime sleepiness and achieved a sort of second wind that you mistake for actual alertness.

In fact, at this point, your brain function is pretty much that of a drunk person. You cease to have the good sense to go to bed, or if you do start getting ready for bed, you find it difficult to remember or perform your normal bedtime routine: e.g. you forget to take your nighttime medicine, or to floss, or something like that. Even more likely than failing to properly navigate your bedtime routine, you'll just decide to postpone going to bed even further for no particular reason. If you are past the Hour of Dumb, you will likely find yourself watching a whole series of inane YouTube videos and reading the comments, or worse: responding to YouTube comments. If you are trying to overcome a bad habit, the Hour of Dumb is the time you're most likely to cave in and repeat the bad habit.

So I interpret "retire to thy bed early" to mean "go to bed before your Hour of Dumb."

Now, if you're going to bed before your Hour of Dumb, it is equally important not to sleep in longer than you need to. I don't have a catchy name for that point in the morning when you've indulged in one too many hits of the snooze button, but most of us are probably familiar with that groggy feeling we get on weekends when we try to "catch up" on the week's lost sleep by sleeping in until 10 AM (or whenever it is for you). Plus, getting up at the same time every day as much as possible will help you avoid staying awake past your Hour of Dumb.

2. Establish regular working hours and maintain those boundaries carefully

Maintaining regular working hours benefits you, your coworkers and students (if applicable), and anyone you live with (including pets). Especially in a time of so much uncertainty, routine helps manage stress and sustain realistic expectations.

I realize that my rules for boundaries won't work for everyone in every situation, so feel free to adapt them, but stick to the underlying principle: you need work-life boundaries even more now than you did when you weren't working from home.

• Dress for work. This doesn't necessarily mean you have to wear a suit and tie at home. It might simply mean that you have a different, somewhat nicer pair of yoga pants and a cleaner, nicer shirt to wear while you're working than you do when you stop working. 
• If possible, create a dedicated work space. Maybe that just means a corner of your living room, or maybe you can convert a guest room or another space into a home office. Ideally, this will not be in your bedroom, but regardless of where it is, try to create some kind of visible divider between your work area and where you relax, unwind, and sleep.
• Establish a "preparing for work" and "ending the work-day" routine that is similar to what you had before. If you didn't have a routine before, create one. Your mind needs cues to know when it's time for work and when it's time to not work.
• TURN OFF YOUR WORK EMAIL NOTIFICATIONS. I'm absolutely serious about this one. I know some employers won't like it; some might even prohibit it, and sometimes it's a necessary evil. But it's even more important now that you not allow work to invade non-work time. If at all possible, turn off those notifications. Use your phone or computer's calendar app to create a reminder to check your email once or twice a day on workdays. Unless your job actually, officially requires you to be available after working hours, do not check or respond to work email outside of your established working hours. 
• You will most likely have to go into your mobile device's system settings to turn off each app's permission to send you notifications. If you don't know how, you can google it.
• Turn off your social media notifications. While you're at it, it's just as important to prevent your non-work activities from invading your work hours. It's OK to choose to open your Facebook or Twitter app during your breaks (but set a timer); the notifications will all be there waiting for you at a time of your own choosing! But it will be even harder for you to resist checking those notifications when you're working at home than it was before (and be honest, it was already nearly impossible).
• You will most likely have to go into your mobile device's system settings to turn off each app's permission to send you notifications. If you don't know how, you can google it.
• In as many other ways as possible, create and stick to a work routine.

3. Establish a self-care routine and stick to it

This includes things like getting regular exercise and nutritious meals, but you might also consider replacing time you might have spent going out to socialize with other things you enjoy. For example, you might:

• Set aside daily reading time, either to make a dent in that massive pile of books that's been accumulating next to your night-stand, or to spend quality time with your kids. But don't spend too much of your free time reading; be sure to include a variety of other self-care activities as well.
• Learn (or continue practicing) a musical instrument. I've ordered myself a ukulele, because I've been told they're relatively easy to pick up the basics and the instruments themselves are pretty inexpensive.
• Learn (or continue practicing) how to draw, paint, whittle, etc. Basically, indulge in a little artistic creativity! Even better if you include your family. There are all sorts of tutorials available for free online.
• Start a garden. Not only will a garden reduce your need to go to the grocery store if the need to practice "social distancing" continues well into the summer, but working with soil and plants is good for your mental health! You don't even have to have a yard; you can set up an herb garden in a window sill--with or without a fancy hydroponic thingy.
• Spend time outside, but maintain appropriate distance from non-household members. If you've got a porch and the weather permits, pull a chair outside, enjoy some fresh air, wave to your neighbors, and maybe even enjoy some music together. I was saving up to buy a porch glider, but now I'm retooling my budget so that I can buy it sooner--I need more usable living space since my roommate and I are going to be home pretty much all the time!
• Check in virtually (and regularly) with family and friends. Make phone calls. Send letters (don't worry; the Post Office sterilizes them). Use video chat. Practicing social distancing makes it even more important that we practice relational gathering.
• Maintain good hygiene habits. I mean in addition to properly washing your hands, keep the rest of your body and living space clean and reasonably tidy, too. Hey, I know nobody can see your hair when you're working alone in your studio apartment. Wash and style it anyway; you'll feel better.
• Maintain health habits. Keep taking your medicine on time. Set up virtual appointments with your health care providers as needed. 

If your budget permits, make your home a more enriching, enjoyable space.

In the first few weeks of the pandemic, most people focused on the core essentials: nonperishable food storage and, for some reason, toilet paper. However, experts are now saying that the need to maintain social distancing may last between 6-18 months. And the longer it lasts, the better it will be in terms of saving human lives, but that will come at an almost incomprehensible cost, both economically and personally. So since we're in it for the long haul, we need to start thinking strategically about how to manage for the coming months. We don't need to head for the hills; we need to hunker down. And that means making the places we're hunkering down in as livable as we can manage.

I certainly do recommend investing in good quality emergency food storage, including having a 72-hour kit as general good preparedness practices. However, the reality of our current situation is that we are less likely to have to grab a bag and leave our homes or to experience food (or TP) shortages than we are to drive ourselves stir-crazy following CDC guidelines to stay home and practice social distancing. So my advice is that when you're thinking about stocking up on emergency supplies, once you have food and shelter sorted out (which I hope everyone reading this already does), you will want to expand your thinking to include other kinds of emergency supplies.

I already mentioned and linked above to some things you might consider obtaining, but here's a quick list of the kinds of things I've already gotten or will get to help keep my spirits up and make living nearly 24/7 at home for at least the next several months more bearable: 

• LEGO. It's a fun, creative, and infinitely variable hobby. I find it highly relaxing and mentally stimulating.
• Arts and crafting supplies.
• A ukulele and set of materials for absolute beginners.
• Treats. Chocolate, cookies, brownie mixes, stuff like that. 
• A good webcam.
• A better keyboard.
• A floor mat for my home office chair.
• Speaking of home office chairs, I already have a really nice one because fibromyalgia and dissertation, but if you have a cheap one and you just moved your desk job home, consider these (fairly expensive but worth it): 
• The Aeron (which is what I have at home and used for writing most of my dissertation) 
• The All33 Backstrong (which is what I bought myself for my campus office and I LOVE it)
• A porch glider. I like the ones at Polywood because they look good, are high quality, and are made from recycled milk bottles!
• An indoor slackline. I have had one of these for a few years now, and it's great! Ilove slacklining, and it's not too difficult to pick up, but you might want some other kind of indoor exercise equipment. Just make sure it facilitates an activity you really enjoy, or it will end up just an expensive dust collector, and you really want to avoid clutter in your living space right now!
• A Backmate self-massager that sets up in any door frame. I was a Kickstarter backer for this product, and I like it a little more than I expected to. It's not as good as a real massage, but it's great for in-between times when you can' get a real massage.
• Comfy indoor footwear. I like going barefoot, but it can get hard on my feet. At the same time, I definitely don't want to wear my "outdoor" shoes inside right now. 
• Comfier bras--or rather, not exactly bras. Nuudis provide some support and not much coverage, but are much more comfortable than traditional bras.
• Books. I didn't need to buy more of these, but I did it anyway.
• Chicks! As in baby chickens. They are adorable, and when they reach adulthood they will produce the most delicious eggs, which helps my household be a little more sustainable.
• Seriously, look how cute they are: 

Your list will probably look different than mine does--it might be completely different depending on what your own and your family's needs are. 

What are your strategies for settling in for the "Coronapocalypse"? 

Securing the Blessings of Liberty

It customary on Independence Day to honor the service and sacrifice of our military veterans, who, we are solemnly reminded, have "secured the blessings of liberty" for the rest of us and our posterity since the first continental army. While it is true that members of our military have historically paid the highest price in the cause of liberty, it would be unjust and untrue to give them all the credit--or all the responsibility. 

After all, threats to our liberty do not only (perhaps not even primarily) come from external forces. So on this Independence Day, I want to suggest that, in addition to honoring our veterans' many sacrifices to make and keep our nation free, we also remember the service and very real sacrifices of many others who also dedicate their lives to securing for all of us the blessings of liberty, including:

• Civil Rights leaders who have fought and sometimes died to ensure that women and people of color could enjoy the blessings of full citizenship, and who still fight and sometimes risk their lives to secure the blessings of liberty to Americans who remain to any degree unjustly disenfranchised
• First responders who put their lives on the line to keep us safe enough to enjoy our liberty
• Overworked lower court judges and public defenders who work thanklessly day in and day out to try to keep our justice system functioning, and those who attend seriously to their duties as jurors
• Civil servants--including politicians (not all, but many), regulators, etc., all the way down to the lowly poll workers on voting days making sure that we can participate in the democratic process--who dedicate their time and talents to promoting the common welfare rather than simply their own selfish interests
• Teachers of history, philosophy, ethics, civics, the arts, and sciences who remind us what liberty has meant and can mean, and what it has and may cost us to get, keep, and extend
• Those who stand up to government authority and say "no" when the government is in the wrong, even when they are in the minority
• Those who stand up FOR government authority against the mob when the government is in the right
• Countless and nameless women, LGBTQIA people, and people of color who for most of our country's history were effectively or explicitly denied opportunities to serve in the military, in office, as civil servants, or in most professions; and who yet retained faith, though long deferred, in the promise of liberty and served however they could within the limited spheres they were allowed. 

Though we rightly honor members of our armed services, we must not forget that not all patriots wear a uniform. Even George Washington, perhaps our nation's greatest military hero, understood that slavish veneration of a nation's military would ultimately doom it. Those who serve honorably in the military deserve our care and respect, but they are the arms, not the heart and soul of a free nation. Though most of us will never serve in the armed forces, all of us have a right and a duty to "secure the blessings of liberty" to ourselves and our posterity.

Jesus Is Not Your Political Property

Neither the Republican nor the Democratic party can lay a greater claim to "Christian values," because Jesus Christ didn't come to Earth to establish a political kingdom[1], and he expressly called his disciples to reject political and other worldly divisions. We are to be one in Christ, not one in any man-made political ideology.

Both the Republican and the Democratic parties in the United States are strongly influenced by Christian ideologies because Christianity has historically been and remains a majority religion in the United States. Furthermore, many members of both parties are Christians, not merely in name but in practice.

The reason that Republican Christians and Democratic Christians disagree about which party is more compatible with Christian discipleship is because Christianity has a complicated, millennias-old history of interpreting its own doctrines and sacred texts. Neither party is the party of Jesus.

This does not mean that Christians should be apolitical. Although we are called to be not of the world, we are also called to live in the world and to be a force for moral good in our communities by word and by example. But it does mean that we must avoid taking our Lord's name in vain by claiming (or even allowing ourselves to privately believe) that Jesus is "on our side" or "against the other side" politically. We are called to be on His side, and not the other way around.

Image: "Black Marble: Americas." NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. Flickr. CC BY 2.0.

[1] We understand that following His second coming, Jesus will establish a kingdom on Earth which will be both spiritual and political, but it's not that time yet, and it would be the height of arrogance to assume we know what that kingdom will look like or how its government will function. Our sacred texts give us only a few clues, and those clues don't look much like any human government that we have any record of.

A Love Letter to My Female Friends

When I was a very little girl, I reveled in pink everything, and in frilly dresses. By the time I reached adolescence, I disdained "girly" things and performative femininity because they felt too constricted.

During and after puberty, I struggled to love my increasingly feminine body. I liked myself, but the messages I heard from my local and national culture about female bodies and female minds left me feeling very ambivalent. I felt like I needed to prove that I wasn't one of those women (no woman is, really; but I didn't know that then). In many ways that attitude endured into adulthood.

But then something happened. I met a series of amazing women, some of whom revel in performative femininity, and others who don't. And I discovered feminism. Not the caricature of feminism that I was told about in disapproving tones as a child and young woman, but actual feminism, which is far more complex and inclusive than I had imagined.

I got plugged into more than one network of women who taught me by word and example that womanhood and femininity don't have to be constricting. Rather, womanhood and even performative femininity can be powerful and celebratory. They taught me to interrogate and resist those cultural messages that told me there was something (oh so many somethings) wrong with my femaleness. These women continually love and support and challenge me. They help me grow.

My life has followed a course I never could have expected and did not plan. I cannot imagine how I could have navigated that course and remained spiritually whole without my beloved women friends. I need them like I need oxygen and like I need chocolate.

(I love my guy friends too, and the amazing men in my family who love and support and challenge me. But they are more like icing on the cake! They are a wonderful bonus.)

As Leslie Knope says: