quick jump back to the present

So what have I actually been doing since John left? Well, I managed to remember that I have a dissertation to research, and I've been in full work (read: panic) mode every since.

Seriously, taking that vacation won't have made much of a difference in the long run, especially since I already KNOW that I have to come back to Russia next spring. But yesterday in an archive that I haven't spent that much time in because I thought its holdings were not so rich compared to others, I read a finding aid and OH MY GOD it had all this GREAT stuff in it, huge files, some about really key aspects of the diss. This archive closes on July 25, which means I have, oh 20 working days left in it and all I could think to myself was "WHY the F**K didn't I look at this finding aid 8 months ago???????? I am an IDIOT."

I've got colleagues here who really have their shit together. They've had a plan from the beginning, they stuck to it, they are rarely suprised. This doesn't necessarily mean they work any harder than I do (and maybe I work harder because I don't have my shit together), but geez! why didn't I look at that finding aid before. Its just a matter of shifting research priorities, no doubt for the best, but I'm kicking myself.

Its like dominoes. The files I looked at in October, say, put ideas in my head and so I followed those for awhile, and then I got another idea, and pursued that. What I'm reading at any given moment heavily influenes what I'm thinking about and what avenues I pursue in other archives. This sometimes leads to dead ends, or perhaps me beating the proverbial dead horse, when I should be moving on to something else. There are aspects of my research that are no doubt way more thorough than they need to be for the diss., but I worry about not reading a file for fear I might miss something, I don't know what, but something....my Ur document that breaks it all wide open for me.

I know, I'm sick. And I won't even tell you about my friend's equating our archival research with sexual fetishes - and it made sense. We're a strange breed.