A Week in the Life of Anjali

I struggled to decide what to name this post. “A week in the life of Anjali” or “How to Get Your Head in the Game When…” Those were the two I was debating. For those of you who want the abbreviated version of my week, read the bullets below. For those who want to know the backstory behind any of the following, feel free to read on.

This week:

• I found out my mentor, friend and academic advisor is leaving the University in a month.
• A Japanese beetle flew down my shirt when training and bit me.
• I found out I passed my General Field Qualifying Exam, the really really big exam in phd school about everything in the field.
• We got a huge invitation from some top government officials in Kenya to go on a disability outreach trip this summer.
• I found out my educational kids coloring book is ready to sell!!!!!
• I got on a plane for my first track meet of the season.

Academia

Academia is always unpredictable. I am so excited that my mentor and advisor will be headed to an incredible new job. But, the unexpected news of his earlier departure than what I had originally thought (January was the original departure date) sure can cause a rollercoaster of emotions and questions. I mean, realistically, how do you take 8-months of PhD school and put it into a month? Yikes. I know now, that it will all be okay. I think the hardest part about all of this has been not the figuring out how I’m going to graduate and do a dissertation with my advisor physically being elsewhere, but the sadness and feeling of loosing a friend. The logistics of graduating are merely logistics, it will work out and luckily he can remain my advisor and still chair my committee. But, I’ve lived through many people coming and going in my life, and no matter how much you say, it’ll be the same, it’ll be fine, it’s just a plane ride away, it does change. Change is not always bad, I know that too. So I’m trying to remain optimistic about this one.
I would be remiss if I didn’t say that this news didn’t come with worry, uncertainty, frustration, sadness, happiness—really a little bit of everything. Thankfully, sports is an incredible outlet for me so I was able to channel most of these emotions into my training. But, channeling negative emotions is kind of like playing with fire. It can be really dangerous.

Our little cohort of advisees have already started weekly gatherings to make the most of our time left. We’ve got a lot of great adventures planned for the summer --- including the second road trip adventure to see Lady Gaga. So, you know, I think we’ll pull through this.

Japanese Beetle

There’s not too much more to say here. Other than, when a bug who bites gets stuck down your shirt, they get very angry. I’ve got the welts to prove it! Ridiculous.

General Field Exam

It hasn’t even hit me yet. The story behind this one goes back a ways. I spent spring break studying for this exam, because I had to write it the Monday we got back, for 4 hours. The most challenging part about preparing for the exam was to remain focused on studying. I had just had a breakthrough on thinking about my dissertation topic and wanted to be spending time thinking and reading up about that, but alas sometimes other things have to take priority. I had to reprioritize school over athletics, something I’ve never been good at doing. I studied really hard, made an insane amount of color-coded flashcards and went in to this monstrous exam.

Exam day. I went through three computers before finding one that did not take 10 minutes to simply open Microsoft Word. The exam began at 9am. The first 10 minutes I was a good little student and spent some time outlining my thoughts. Then, disaster struck. I realized that my brain could not function in the current work conditions. If ANYBODY knows me, you know that I multitask to the extreme. That is just how my brain works. As I write this, I am actually writing 2 other papers, I have 4 .pdf files open that I’m reading too, I’m listening to music, and flying to LA. So you see, the silence, the lack of windows in the room, the lack of visual and auditory distractions…it was painful. I literally spent the next 30 minutes watching the time tick by on the little clock on the computer and having a dialogue in my head with myself about how, well gee if I didn’t at least write SOMETHING then I would fail!! So, after 30 minutes went by, I took a deep breath and did what I know how to do best--- do them both at the same time. I was very scared with this approach, as I wasn’t sure this dinosaur of a computer would be able to handle my jumping from page to page answering the question. Thankfully, it worked. I just filled in what I knew, got my brain fired up and finished with time to look everything over, fix typos and grammar. 4 hours and 14 pages later, I was done. Glazed over and truthfully unsure of my fate, I walked out of the building to go to lunch with friends. You have to have friends in PhD school, it’s a must. And then, the waiting game began.

You typically have to wait anywhere from 2-3 weeks to hear back. That’s a long painful time!! The first couple days you are still in that antsy, anxious stage, and then you reach the point where you can’t put your whole life on hold waiting to hear back, so you just plow through and move on.

I got my exciting news last night, just ten minutes before starting to co-teach our first online class of the term. But, ten minutes was enough time for my roommate to crack open the champagne and have a drink in celebration before I had to teach! After teaching, I decided it was pretty necessary to pack for this trip, so again I moved on to the next one and as I’m here now on the plane I’m beginning to realize that, hey, I passed that exam!!

Disability Outreach

It’s public knowledge that one of my childhood heros was Jean Driscoll. She is an 8-time winner of the Boston Marathon. In third grade, I wrote my biography project about her and wrote a story called, “When I Meet Jean Driscoll”. I even dressed up as the winner of the Boston Marathon for several years on Halloween --- I’ll have to ask if we have pictures of this anywhere.
Anyway, Jean and I have been planning a trip to Ghana this summer to co-teach some track clinics and meet with the Minister of Sport and Minister of Education to discuss sustainable ways of improving the lives of people with disabilities in this country. Incredible, right? It’s one of those opportunities you just don’t say no to. I have yet to figure out how it will all work out logistically, but I trust that it will. Well another Illinois alum, Linda has connections in Kenya and since we’ll already be in Africa… why not go there too? Well it turns out, her connections in Kenya aren’t just small time connections. My dream, my passion, I’m living it. Every moment. Last summer I came back with incredible stories and memories from India, and this year, Ghana and Kenya here I come!

Sidenote: At 26 years old (not quite there yet) I will have been to six of the seven continents. So, my question is who is up for a cruise to Antartica sometime before I turn 30? I mean it just sounds pretty cool to say I’ve been to all 7 continents before I was 30… Think about it, I’m dead serious.

What color will you color me?

Color Learn & Play is ready to launch my coloring book!!! More information coming as soon as I talk to my web designers to figure out how to get all this info up on here ☺ (If you are reading this, ahem, we should chat). The basics are, I have a prototype available electronically that can give a flavor of what the book is all about. If your organization places an order, we can put your company/organization logo right into it and tailor it to your needs. It has activities, word searches and it’s way cool. The catch is: before I can sell orders of smaller quantities, I need to get one big order done first, as in 500-1000. So, PLEASE help me to spread the word. My new PR manager/event planner is working on a launch party idea so stay tuned for more.

LA Here I Come

And, now I’m on the plane. I tried to keep everything relatively in line with how it occurred chronologically to give you a sense of a “week in the life of Anjali”. Somehow, after teaching last night (the voicemails and emails about the Africa trip came in yesterday sometime), I managed to get everything ready to leave. And now, my focus shifts to racing on Saturday in the Mt SAC Relays! I’ll be racing in the 800m at 12:35 pm and the 1500m at 5:27 pm. The event website is: Mt SAC Relays

As far as how to get my head in the game after a week like this, there is no easy answer. A lot of it comes from within. It’s trusting your training, believing in yourself and taking advantage of the downtime to recuperate. I am definitely grateful to all my fans and friends who have been an exceptional support for me. That also helps to get me through. And, truthfully, it’s the serene moments like this --- flying a few thousand feet high, looking out as the sun is just setting, the crescent moon shining brightly, and reflecting on this week realizing that, life is good. Sure there have been some emotional ups and downs this week, but in the grand scheme of things, wow—what a week. If all that can happen in a week, think about the possibilities yet to come!

In the meantime, I think it’s time for me to catch some zzz’s, it’s been quite the week!