Road Tripping

Feeling landlocked last week, I decided to hit the open road. Sometimes, some sweet highway miles, good tunes, the morning sun on paddocks, and lots, and lots, of coffee, are just what I need.

Some would say that road tripping is running away, but I say, there are some problems, writer’s block among them, that benefit from eating some dust. A road trip won’t get the writing done, for sure, but it will take me out of myself.

What I love best about road tripping - apart from the opportunity to sing loudly, without fear of reprisal, to Bon Jovi - is that Normal is bent just a little out of shape. Danishes, usually eschewed in favor of rye toast and vegemite, become suitable breakfast foods. I drive bare-faced with the windows down; I wear my hair in a bun and don’t worry about combing kinks out when I let it down. I wear my oldest, comfiest pair of flats. Loose tees and second-wear jeans are de rigueur, along with a thrown-in-the-car-as-an-afterthought cardie for windy truck stops. I take photos of silly things, things that normally aren’t snap worthy, but somehow, when I’m road tripping, are irresistibly Instagrammable.

And while that all sounds pretty hard to beat, it gets better when my destination is somewhere, and someone, lovely: last weekend I was road tripping to meet my friend Clementine Kemp, and her puppy, in Clem’s lovely little town.

Knowing a cup of tea, apple cake, walks along the main drag, glorious thrift shop finds, juicy gossip and inappropriate conversation await at my destination just makes those sweet highway miles all the sweeter.

Plug Yourself In, Switch on the Power (Ballads): Thesis Secrets

I’m not above admitting low brow musical tastes. Those of you who tune in regularly will know I’ve confessed on this blog that: I Heart One Direction; my pet fish are named after Prince songs; the fact that Big W’s in house radio station played I Want To Know What Love Is made my day; and Wham! and I share a profound spiritual connection, especially at Christmas.

But, I don’t feel I’ve fully explained to you the extent to which I am the Reigning Princess of Truly Awful Musical Taste (if that doesn’t deserve a pink rhinestone flashing tiara, I don’t know what does).

You see, I was that drunk chickybabe whose Big Night(s) Out started AND ended, rather than just ended, at ICBM dancing to Whitney Houston, my sticky dance floor times punctuated only by the briefest of interludes at the Phoenix (so so mouldy) where I promised/threatened to dance on the table if My Sharona was played.

Whether or not this event actually occurred shall remain a mystery.

I am that colleague of yours who sings Don’t Stop Believing while I help you file a backlog of paperwork, even thought I can’t carry a tune in a bucket and falter on the high falsetto while imploring you to ‘hold onto that feeling’.

I am that person at the traffic lights in the vehicle next to yours, head back, eyes closed, thrashing my head side to side, in a particularly emphatic sing along to Love is A Battlefield, while you wonder if I’m having an epileptic seizure.

I am the woman who covers the screen of her iPod on the bus so you can’t see that I’m listening to You Shook Me All Night Long at 8am on a freezing Canberra morning.

I am Richard Kingsmill’s worst nightmare.

I am, indeed, the Reigning Princess of Truly Awful Musical Taste.

Being royalty of this nature has its advantages. The most important of which is that I have at my disposal a superior armoury of epic ballads for those moments when you need to plug yourself in and turn on the Power.

These moments occur frequently when you are writing a PhD, or any piece of writing that is long, hard, and, ultimately, 100% worth the effort. Over the years of my PhD candidature, I’ve honed the perfect power ballad playlist for belting out a 500 word chunk of thesis.

Intuitively, you’d think tunes to mellow you out would be the best accompaniment to an intense writing sesh. However, I’ve found that the only way I can work with my thesis, rather than against it, is to embrace the high baroque drama of intellectual endeavour and thematically arrange my playlist to work me through the peaks and troughs that characterise my writing patterns.

Now, the cool part of you is saying no, but there’s a little bit of you, your inner dag, that’s curious to hear what’s on my Power playlist. Don’t try to hide it, I know it’s there.

Or, at very least, you want to read my justification for why it’s these songs, these deeply embarrassing, terminally uncool songs, with cheesy, dreadful, lyrics, some of which I’ve incorporated here, which help me pound out some serious wordage more than anything else.

Well. Here it is. Don’t say I didn’t warn you about the Power surge:

Eye of The Tiger (Survivor) Any Power montage has to start here. It’s the only music you can do pre-typing stretching to. Take your time, take your chances.
If I Could Turn Back Time (Cher) You’ve opened the chapter you’re working on, and, if you could turn back time, you’d take back all those words you wrote yesterday, as they’re kind of awful.
Wanted Dead or Alive (Bon Jovi) The times when you’re alone, and all you do is think.
When Doves Cry (Prince) This is what it sounds like when doves cry.
Total Eclipse of the Heart (Bonnie Tyler) You’re living in a powder keg and giving off sparks. You’re at the 200 word mark. Every now and then you fall apart.
I Would Do Anything For Love – (Meatloaf) You’re hitting 250 and the words don’t come easy. Take a vow, seal a pact. You will do anything for this to work.
November Rain – (Guns and Roses) Nothing lasts forever, even cold November Rain. Gunners are all that will get you through the 250-350 word doldrums.
I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing – (Aerosmith) Your work has turned a corner, but it’s not quite there yet. This means it’s time for a serious strings section. You could stay lost in this moment, this moment of knowing that you are so close to the finish, forever.
Can’t Get Enough of Your Love, Babe – (Barry White) Debate this soul classic’s inclusion in a Power list all you want, but it’s at this point, where you’re whomping through that last 100 words in big, easy, sentences – something’s moving - that you need some serious soul.
Freedom ’90 – (George Michael) I won’t let you down, I will not give you up, you’ve got to have some faith in the sound, it’s the one good thing that I’ve got.

That, and a completed 500 word chunk of your thesis. Power to you.

PS: if you got all the references to all the songs on my Power list, the title of Reigning Princess of Truly Awful Musical Taste falls rightfully to you. But I’m keeping the pink rhinestone flashing tiara.

Labels

As a classically trained sociologist, it’s my duty to rebel against Labeling and Labels as a postmodern, patriarchal, capitalist social construction.

Lately, however, I’ve been pondering the value of other sorts of Labels. No, it wasn’t as a result of a stuff up where two important Labels (Hons, Phd expected completion 2013) were left out of my list of qualifications.

Needless to say - Not a Happy Camper.

Rather, my recent pondering of Labels has come about as a result of wearing my first ever big Label garment, borrowed from Clementine Kemp. I’m going to be a tease and refuse to tell you what Label I’m referring to here. Suffice to say, though, it’s a good'un.

The true appeal of the Label doesn’t lie in any inherent property of the dress itself, although I appreciate the technical genius of the cut (it really is a marvel). The appeal of the Label lies in its very Labelness – that this garment signifies something over and above its garmentness, that it's special, significant.

To a Marxist, this is a classic illustration of commodity fetishism. But sometimes (and I can feel the ghost of Marx haunting me here) a little of a fetishised commodity is exactly what you need.

As Bill Cunningham writes: ‘Fashion is the armour to survive the reality of everyday life’. Whilst no-one but myself and a few eagle eyed fashionistats would know, once it’s on, that Clementine’s dress is a Label, knowing makes all the difference to me. The Label makes me stand taller, pull my shoulders back, and look the world square in the eyes, because there is this deliciously potent secret sewn into the cloth that grazes my shoulder bone. Like Katniss Everdeen’s dress of flames in ‘The Hunger Games’, a Label can make you a Girl On Fire.

The effects of the Label last long after the dress itself has been taken off. Typing this in my thirty dollar maxi dress, my worn out cardigan, and my woolly socks, I still feel that Label magic – taller, stronger. And this is why, I suspect, people will always be willing to part with more money than is decent for the privilege of owning and wearing a Label – this feeling of being lit up.

Listing

I write lists. Shopping lists. Wish lists. To-Do-Today lists. To-Do-This-Month lists. Just-Do-It lists. Lists that masquerade as other things. Lists drawn as ideas maps. Lists in the round. If I do it, want to do it, or have done it, it’s on a list somewhere.

At the moment, there are six lists on my office wall. Looking at them is like looking at a portion of my brain, splattered onto A4, although slightly less gory. There’s an ideas map for a course I’ll be convening this summer. A list of my responsibilities for another summer course I’ll be involved with. Tutorials times, rooms, and essay due dates for the first year course that I’m teaching semester. A list of seminars I’m going to be running for a masters course, to prompt me to find some relevant readings. ANU principal dates. And, last but not least, a list of monthly targets I’ve set for my PhD thesis.

I never meant to have this many lists occupying wall space in my office. After all, isn’t the purpose of a list to collate information into the one place, efficiently, economically, putting all the pieces of the puzzle into their correct places? Theoretically, yes. But in reality, my lists seem to breed, one list begetting another, until suddenly my office is decorated with blu-tacked pieces of scribbled-on and crossed-out pieces of paper.

I looked at this disorder this morning, and, after momentary frustration, laughed. Because this tendency to write lists is one half of a symbiotic relationship with another tendency of mine: I love to cross things off. Is there a better feeling than running a thick, heavy pencil line through that particularly bothersome task that is now, in the words of a certain opposition leader, dead, buried, cremated? Or doodeling loopy biro circles over a list-task you did and enjoyed?

I write so many lists so that I can give myself that little moment of satisfaction, that feeling of a job, if not well, at least competently, done, and the restoration of some sense where there was previously befuddlement. And all triumphs of sense over befuddlement, in my humble opinion, ought to be celebrated.