It's that time of the year--time for Christmas shopping, tree decorating...and finals. December is honestly my favorite month of the year; I love shopping for gifts (more and more I could honestly care less about getting them), holiday baking, parties, advent calendars, chilly weather (ok, not here, but still), hot cider and hot chocolate..I could go on.
But since Brian's been in grad school, I DREAD this time of the year. Starting at the end of the November, when paper deadlines and finals loom, most students go into hibernation in the library. Meaning that I rarely see him, as sometimes he doesn't even make it home for meals. When we do see each other, he's generally so stressed that all we talk about is his various school assignments. He starts having heart palpitations from stress and doesn't sleep well (which means I don't sleep well, either). This leaves me to order and send Christmas cards, do all the Christmas shopping, make our plans for the holidays when we go back to NC, get the car maintenance done, and do even more of the housework than I normally do. Plus our occasional dates fade into nonexistence.
Needless to say, this is not fun. Perhaps it is naive of me to expect his professors to take into account that he (and many other grad students here) have families and allow that they need time to spend with them. But I really think the "total commitment" philosophy is the worst part of academia, because it burns out everyone involved, students and their families alike.
Anyway...I don't have anything truly meaningful to say in this post, except that I will sure be glad when May 5 rolls around.
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