Entries Tagged 'Adult education' ↓

I have finished and handed in the final draft of my thesis on Yugoslavia in the 20th century.  This has been a huge endeavor and represents 5 years of study, research and travel.  It is done.  I felt good, at the end, in making some bold presumptions concerning the future of SE Europe, and that was it.  Now there is a space in my life…What’s next?  I still have to write some personal words about my goals for photography for the b/w darkroom course I am engaged in and finish the small portfolio I have started.  I can do the lab work next week and write the paper today.  Then I will have finished the semester, take the fall off, and cross my fingers over the spring semester in Greece.  I have begun thinking that even if I do not get in to the school, that I will go anyway for the time and visit the southern Mediterranean during the off season, finishing up my trip with the Greek convention.  In many ways I need a break from the former Yugoslavia and Greece and Turkey might be the ticket.

The date did not happen. I asked and she said ‘no’, but nicely.  The experience put me in an emotional tailspin that landed me on my pity-pot for a few hours.  I lost all gratitude for the above experiences as well as the whole of the past 7 years of sobriety.  I eventually snapped out of it and let it go.

Mom has bursitis in her hip. She also thinks she has been driving her car for the whole year-and-a-half she has been in bed, in the hospital, or whatever.  What a shocker for her.  ”Bullshit”, she said.  ”I can drive…I still have my licence.” “Sorry, but you cannot.”  I guess we should all be thankful that she can fight back, but that’s all he can do.  She cannot win.  She’ll wreck the car if she gets behind the wheel.  Time to keep an eye out.  She might try to make a break for it…

Johnnyboy

My paper on Yugoslavia is done.  I have handed in the final ‘first draft’ but there isn’t much to correct, in my opinion.  The bibliography will be adjusted and tacked on, but what should I call it the paper?

I have been doing a lot of old-time AA service these days: driving guys around to meetings and so forth.  there has been one kid that I have been driving to meetings.  He is, in my opinion, a real mess.  He is on 15 different medications for bi-polar, addiction, etc…and I am not sure if I would call him sober of not since one of them is a med that keeps the urge to use heroin at bay.  That’s chemically induced clean-time.  I’m glad he’s not my sponsee.  If he ever asked, I would have to say ‘No.’

Mom is doing well and her mood and memory seem to be leveling out in a good and happy space.

I have asked a woman from a nearby AA group out on a date…yet again.  This will be the third (?) attempt at dating and it is pretty low-key.  She lives in the Big City most of the week and I have asked her to be my date at a photography opening in early November.  Nothing serious, just the show, then maybe a quick bite and then I have to head back home on the train.  I am not even considering sex…well, I suppose I am, but that’s normal.  I am not expecting it, that’s for sure.

I have registered for the 2010 International AA Convention being held in San Antonio, Texas.  It will be a big deal, with about 80,000 people in attendance.  AA holds it every 5 years.  How fun!  I am thinking of driving the 4000+ mile round-trip journey, but that is far away from now.

Johnnyboy

As former GSR of my AA homegroup I am still on the mailing list.  This means that I have received the applications for the 2010 International Convention being held in San Antonio, Texas next July.  I am going, and have only to mail my registration and book my room.  I’ll do that today.

I brought the applications to the meeting last night and made the announcement, held up the flyers, etc…Then I saw that the registration applications went into the chairperson’s notebook, which means they will never be seen again.  This makes me sick, and opens my eyes again to the apathy that surrounds me in this program.  This group is full of people with long-term sobriety who do nothing outside of coming to one meeting a week (maybe two) and leaving it at that.  How sad.  They have lost the gift of desperation and in doing so dampen the exciting fire of sobriety that I felt when I came into the rooms, and still feel at certain meetings.  They no little or nothing of the 12 Traditions (which are not suggestions, like the Steps), and to top it off, I found out last week at a business meeting that the current treasurer (15 years sober) had no idea what a prudent reserve was.  Once again, puking time is upon me.

In any case, their sobriety is not my own, and they can do what they want, but they give the impression that it is OK to just go to meetings and so forth.  They take it all for granted.  Blah, blah, blah…listen to me go.

Good news is all around me…Mom is doing much better (reading, with it, etc…) and the world still spins on its wobbly axis despite my disappointment with a bunch of whinging old ladies.  I am going to finish my thesis and photo class by the end of next week and move along in life.  This, I declare, is my goal today.

Johnnyboy

I have all but finished this current semester.  I have a project due for a class in dramatics which will round out the whole thing nicely.  I am directing the first scene from the Sam Shepard play ‘True West’.   I have my work assigned for the summer session during which I will write my senior capstone thesis on unification in the former Yugoslavia and be done  with that.  So far so good.

I am still waiting on the results of my CBE work for my previous career and as they have made me jump through many flaming hoops of fiery shit, I have a feeling I will get nothing for my labors.  For Christ’s sake…16 credits?  It’s not like I’m asking for a degree or anything…

I leave for the Balkans on April 27th..23 days from now I’ll be sitting in an airport waiting to fly to Vienna.  I’ll attend the AA convention in Zagreb, head to Belgrade to hang with friends for a spell, and then off to the AA convention in Greece.  This will be my fifth Greek convention and my third in Croatia.  I am hoping for nice weather.  During this time I will also be conducting interviews with Balkan locals in Serbia, Croatia and Bosnia about there lives during the Tito years.  There is nothing like field work to pump up the old thesis!

Mom is doing well and we are trying to getb her outside once in a while for some excersize now that the snow has gone away.  The current raininess doesn’t help, but there are sunny spots in our lives here in Somewheresville.

I’ll try to be more bloggish in the future, but to be honest I have another blog that is not so anonymous that I have focusing on these days. I’d show it to you but…

Johnnyboy

I spent last weekend in Portland, Maine for the NERAASA Convention.  For those who do not know, it is the Northeast Regional AA Service Assembly.  This is a working weekend about service.  By service I do not mean coffee makers or chairing meetings.  The service I am talking about is the type that gets literature to the outside world so parole officers, nurses, doctors, judges, clergy, and treatment centers know what AA is and, more important, what it is not.  It is a convention of GSRs, DCMs, Area Delegates, Trustees, and so forth.  These are the 15% who do all the work.  It is because of us that AA groups (as opposed to ‘meetings’) have a say in the affairs of AA worldwide.  What’s the difference between a meeting and group?  A group has a ‘group number’, a vote in the governing structure, and a firm connection to the program.  A meeting does not.  It is easy to become a group.  Go to the next District meeting and sign up.  Then you hold a business meeting, elect officers for the group, and proceed in the bigger world of service to the alcoholic who still suffers.

It was a great weekend and I learned a lot about the program of AA and myself.

School is moving along and I have a lot of work to do this week.  I still have to finish that damn Digital Art and Design course from last semester before April 10th…

Mom is doing brilliantly.  It seems as if the Synthroid is working very well.   Her under-active thyroid was dragging her down.  Now she has more energy during the day and all that.  I can breathe a little easier.

That’s about it for now…

Johnnyboy

Life goes on here in Somewheresville. Nothing gained, nothing lost. I have been working diligently on my Senior Thesis–writing, re-writing, submitting, re-writing again…etc…This could go on forever, except that eventually my faculty mentor will tell me it’s done.

I am also reading ‘Death of a Salesman’ by Arthur Miller for my “From Page to Stage’ course.  This is an interesting class, with a diverse group of adult students.  Some of us have had theater experience and know things about art, etc…the rest are not as knowledgeable but bring a certain naive charm to the room.  One student (the youngest at 22) is very morose and has a ‘been there/done that’ attitude, which is fun to look at, seeing as I used to act that way, and still can on occasion.  In any case, lots of reading to do for me.

I have added two more photography links on the blogroll.  One is for my dear friend Stephanie, who is a wonderful photographer and the other is another dear friend, Barbara, who is also pretty fabulous.

I am still working on my resentment towards my sister.  Although my amends have been made, our relationship, or lack thereof, still irks me.  There is a small child-like part of me that wants her praise and love, and I am not going to get it no matter what, at least not today.  I go for months without a thought about it and then, like a frost heave on a winter road, a small bump appears and grows.  As it subsides I repair the internal psychic damage the best I can, but as soon as the weather shifts, there it is again.  It is becoming a drag more than anything.  A real nuisance.  I have an appointment this evening with my sponsor before my weekly Step meeting  and we will hash this out some more.  I really don’t like feeling this way about someone I should love.

My friend and I will be going over to a nearby place tomorrow morning to take pictures of pro/am ski jumping, as in the long-distance Nordic style, not freestyle.  He is hoping to get a lot of great images so he can post them on his new website.  He told me the other day that taking pictures of sports is similar to taking pictures in combat, except it is much safer and, for the most part, people are having fun.

Johnnyboy

I have school tonight, so in a few minutes I’ll jump in the Mini and head off north to Fort Orange and college…When will this end?  I am very close, so close as to smell the ink on my diploma, yet the college is holding me up over a technicality:  They will not accept any of my credits (not to mention the Associates Degree) from my previous school because it is a “technical college”.  What horseshit.  If I had spent two years in the army and learned how to kill…But I’ve said all this before.  How boring.

I panicked this morning when I realized I hadn’t finished my homework for my “Page to Stage” course.  I scrambled and had that and a re-write for my thesis statement done in about 2 1/2 hours. Too close for my comfort.

Mom is doing very well this morning. The exhaustion she has felt seems to have just gone away. Tomorrow she gets a check-up from the MD…

My school has changed so much since I first enrolled, and not in a good way. It has become a place for bean counters and people whose asses expand as they sit for hours on end in their office chairs and eat donuts and chocolate. Not that I have anything against any of those pastimes, but mixed together they are a bad thing.  Gone are the days of Knowledge for the Sake of Learning.  Most pof the current students are there to get one or two courses and move up the executive ladder.  Each to his own, I suppose.  Live and Let Live.  Que  sera, sera…Blahblahblah.  I have 24 credits left to complete, provided the school sucks it up and gives me the credits I am asking for.  I am finished with my required courses…well over, actually.  The rest of my time will be electives.

I hope.

Johnnyboy