What it's like to Write a Dissertation

(A repost mired in optimism but apropos of nothing.)

In "On Sad and Joyful Passions of Academia," Anthony Paul Smith writes:

I get that people are unhappy with their advisors, with the lack of support from the university, and from the seeming glacial pace of publishing ... But the complaints, especially from those fully funded at institutions I would imagine are very exciting, foster a different sad passion within me.  They even foster a kind of resentment that they have been given this opportunity while I have to scratch out a future ... yet they seem to enjoy nothing about academic work.

The best way to talk about academic work is baseball.  This goes without saying. 

I played third base and shortstop.  I played them well.  I had sure hands and quick feet.  When the ball screamed off the bat, there was no time to think.  There was only time to react. 

Move the quick feet.  Catch with sure hands.  Throw the ball. 

In between pitches, I would look to the man to my left to make sure we knew our assignments.  Then the ball would leave the pitcher's hand.  Then the batter would swing. 

Move the quick feet.  Catch with sure hands.  Throw the ball.

In the infield I felt like part of a team.  I could look to my left and catch the second baseman's eye.  I could look across the diamond and catch the first baseman's eye.  I was a player among players.  We all knew how to react and how to react together. 

Then one year my coach wanted me to play center field.  Being a team player, I consented.  I'd shagged flies during practice, and was better than most at going back on a ball.  So why not?

I left the dugout and jogged past my teammates.  Then I kept jogging until my teammates looked like toy soldiers.

I stood there.  I was still playing baseball.  Only alone.  Three hundred and ninety feet from home plate.  Two hundred feet from anybody else. 

Short screaming or semaphore, I couldn't catch anyone's attention.  I was alone. 

See home plate in the shot above?  No?  Click on the picture to enlarge it.  See it now?  Focus your attention on the tiny white dot near dead center.  There's another to its right.  Either will work. Zoom in on them.  Those tiny dots are twice the size of a man's head. 

Now imagine something an eighth that size come shooting from the crowd. 

You track the ball.  You run intuitive quadratic models.  You run where you think it will land.  You compensate for drag.  The wind blows it to the left. 

You run intuitive quadratic models.  You compensate for drag. 

Or the right. 

You run intuitive quadratic models.  You compensate for drag.

Or further behind you. 

You run intuitive quadratic models.  You compensate for drag.

You adjust course.  You adjust speed.  All the while you track the ball.  All the while you calculate.  The ball hangs in the air for seconds.  You spend every last one of them calculating. 

This is not about reaction. 

This is not about moving the quick feet.  This is not about catching with sure hands.  This is different.

And you are alone.

And everyone is watching you. 

All eyes follow your eyes following the ball.  You feel them.  The weight of them.  They're relying on you to know how wide and fast to stride.  They trust the calculations you've made.  They trust in the ones you will.  Sometimes that trust is well-placed. 

Sometimes not.

Writing a dissertation is like playing center field: 

Your eyes light on something small launched at an incredible distance.  Time slows.  You calculate where it will land.  You compensate for drag.  You track it as it flies.  While sprinting.  You adjust your course. 

You are alone.  Everyone is watching you.

Fear overtakes you.  You will lose the ball in the lights.  You will lose the ball in the high glare of a slate sky.  You will trip.  You will stumble.  You will fail.

You compose yourself.  While tracking.  While sprinting.  Your chest hurts.  Your legs ache.  Then:

The satisfying recoil. 

You close your glove around the ball.  You gather your wits.  You throw the ball back to the infield. 

Writing a dissertation is like playing center field with one difference:

No satisfying recoil. 

The fear is there.  As are the calculations.  And the gasping.  And the aching.   Sometimes you exhilarate in your own breathless grace. Certainly.  And sometimes you admire the ball descending its clean arc.  Of course.  But:

There is no satisfying recoil.  There is no salutary smack of ball on leather.  Not yet. 

You are the outfielder problem (Chapman, 1968; Dienes & McLeod, 1993; McBeath, 1990; McLeod & Dienes, 1993, 1996; Montagne, Laurent, & Durey, 1998; Oudejans, Michaels, Bakker, & Davids, 1999; Todd, 1981). 

You await your solution.  But:

You're still playing baseball.  You're still having fun.  But:

You are unsolved and you are surly. 

I know I am.

BONUS (5 POINTS): How do Scott's career anxieties manifest in dream?

(A repost mired in optimism but apropos of nothing.)

In "On Sad and Joyful Passions of Academia," Anthony Paul Smith writes:

I get that people are unhappy with their advisors, with the lack of support from the university, and from the seeming glacial pace of publishing ... But the complaints, especially from those fully funded at institutions I would imagine are very exciting, foster a different sad passion within me.  They even foster a kind of resentment that they have been given this opportunity while I have to scratch out a future ... yet they seem to enjoy nothing about academic work.

The best way to talk about academic work is baseball.  This goes without saying. 

I played third base and shortstop.  I played them well.  I had sure hands and quick feet.  When the ball screamed off the bat, there was no time to think.  There was only time to react. 

Move the quick feet.  Catch with sure hands.  Throw the ball. 

In between pitches, I would look to the man to my left to make sure we knew our assignments.  Then the ball would leave the pitcher's hand.  Then the batter would swing. 

Move the quick feet.  Catch with sure hands.  Throw the ball.

In the infield I felt like part of a team.  I could look to my left and catch the second baseman's eye.  I could look across the diamond and catch the first baseman's eye.  I was a player among players.  We all knew how to react and how to react together. 

Then one year my coach wanted me to play center field.  Being a team player, I consented.  I'd shagged flies during practice, and was better than most at going back on a ball.  So why not?

I left the dugout and jogged past my teammates.  Then I kept jogging until my teammates looked like toy soldiers.

I stood there.  I was still playing baseball.  Only alone.  Three hundred and ninety feet from home plate.  Two hundred feet from anybody else. 

Short screaming or semaphore, I couldn't catch anyone's attention.  I was alone. 

See home plate in the shot above?  No?  Click on the picture to enlarge it.  See it now?  Focus your attention on the tiny white dot near dead center.  There's another to its right.  Either will work. Zoom in on them.  Those tiny dots are twice the size of a man's head. 

Now imagine something an eighth that size come shooting from the crowd. 

You track the ball.  You run intuitive quadratic models.  You run where you think it will land.  You compensate for drag.  The wind blows it to the left. 

You run intuitive quadratic models.  You compensate for drag. 

Or the right. 

You run intuitive quadratic models.  You compensate for drag.

Or further behind you. 

You run intuitive quadratic models.  You compensate for drag.

You adjust course.  You adjust speed.  All the while you track the ball.  All the while you calculate.  The ball hangs in the air for seconds.  You spend every last one of them calculating. 

This is not about reaction. 

This is not about moving the quick feet.  This is not about catching with sure hands.  This is different.

And you are alone.

And everyone is watching you. 

All eyes follow your eyes following the ball.  You feel them.  The weight of them.  They're relying on you to know how wide and fast to stride.  They trust the calculations you've made.  They trust in the ones you will.  Sometimes that trust is well-placed. 

Sometimes not.

Writing a dissertation is like playing center field: 

Your eyes light on something small launched at an incredible distance.  Time slows.  You calculate where it will land.  You compensate for drag.  You track it as it flies.  While sprinting.  You adjust your course. 

You are alone.  Everyone is watching you.

Fear overtakes you.  You will lose the ball in the lights.  You will lose the ball in the high glare of a slate sky.  You will trip.  You will stumble.  You will fail.

You compose yourself.  While tracking.  While sprinting.  Your chest hurts.  Your legs ache.  Then:

The satisfying recoil. 

You close your glove around the ball.  You gather your wits.  You throw the ball back to the infield. 

Writing a dissertation is like playing center field with one difference:

No satisfying recoil. 

The fear is there.  As are the calculations.  And the gasping.  And the aching.   Sometimes you exhilarate in your own breathless grace. Certainly.  And sometimes you admire the ball descending its clean arc.  Of course.  But:

There is no satisfying recoil.  There is no salutary smack of ball on leather.  Not yet. 

You are the outfielder problem (Chapman, 1968; Dienes & McLeod, 1993; McBeath, 1990; McLeod & Dienes, 1993, 1996; Montagne, Laurent, & Durey, 1998; Oudejans, Michaels, Bakker, & Davids, 1999; Todd, 1981). 

You await your solution.  But:

You're still playing baseball.  You're still having fun.  But:

You are unsolved and you are surly. 

I know I am.

BONUS (5 POINTS): How do Scott's career anxieties manifest in dream?

Comments

[Tim Lacy]

Your diss.-writing analogy dream is fine and everything, but you inserted a picture of Hunter Pence(?) rather than Carlos Beltran? What kind of SEK-Mets-fan dream post is this? - TL

[Karl Steel]

typically great post, Scott, but I wonder if this works in the blog era: when I was doing the diss., I put great gobs of it on the blog, and you've done similar things here over the years. Surely our loneliness is less than that of non-blogging dissertators.