Today has been less than productive. Okay, it’s been almost entirely unproductive. I think I’ve refreshed every single website and blog I frequent at least 50 times today, which is only about ten fewer than the number of times I’ve hit “Send/Receive” on my email. And while I would ordinarily beat myself up for my inability to focus on my writing (can’t pass up an opportunity to self-flagellate!), this time I’m not at all certain I’m entirely to blame.
When’s the last time you wrote an abstract? Seriously. Abstracts suck. It’s just not natural to distill 35 pages down to one 50-word paragraph. Not only have I been reduced to, gasp, fumbling through a thesaurus for the right word, but I’ve also been writing in a voice that sounds to me like it comes from one of those academics who introduces himself/herself as “Dr.” when you first meet. Think Eddie Murphy in Beverly Hills Cop—“Not gonna fall for the banana in the tailpipe”—and you’re there. Yuck.
As I made my 700th trip to the kitchen to see if something other than lemon lime Canada Dry and carrots had materialized in my fridge, I had a pretty horrifying thought about abstracts and my inability to produce one. It began with a question:
Why is this so freaking hard? Why can’t I just crank these little paragraphs out like so many spoken explanations of my work? What is my basic problem?!!!?!!
Continued with a defensive response:
You know, I’ve never really learned how to write an abstract. It’s not as if I’ve had much guidance or practice…
And culminated in this solution:
Maybe I'll force my first-year writers to create abstracts or précis of all of the readings we’ll do for class this fall. So they don't suffer like I have today.
You know those parents who, being unable to accomplish something in their own youth, project onto their children their desires? Little Susie may not want to be a cheerleader, but dammit, she’ll jump around whether she likes it or not. And Tom, well, he better set his origami to the side because he has to play tennis or else. Yeah, those parents. Uh huh. Yeah. How creepy is that? Discipline and punish.
(This post burned approximately 15 minutes. I’m that much closer to hanging it up and giving myself over to a run/walk and the Pixies…)
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3 comments:
Well the only solution I have to offer you is to start using a "reader" like Google reader so that you're NOT refreshing every website or blog you read, hoping that there's a new post. It will tell you when they've updated it...sorry if I'm telling you something you already know. Truth be told, I *just* started using Google reader after 3 years of this exact same time waster of refreshing a bazillion times. And you know what? I'm more productive and it's as exciting as that time when we all started getting email in the mid-90's!
As for the abstract? Sheeeee-it...
Ha! I didn't know (big surprise there) but am glad to. Not that it will help much--yesterday was an exercise in avoidance, you know? I was doing everything (well, almost, I didn't pick up any knitting) to put off the hard work of writing. Thanks, though, for the tip.
p.s. shoot me an email about blog rolls, though. i still want to link your page...which looks awesome, btw.
HA! Found you! Only to discover you're channeling me. I'm convinced that writing assignments are designed to wring every drop of enjoyment from our ambitious sponge-heads. And then if we can survive the process and still manage a desire to write, well then, permission granted.
Sorry about lack of binary activity. Compy's down (yes, again) and I don't get much access to the web.
Get yr distracted azz back to work. Hey! You!
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