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Last night I had a dream that I was hanging out with my some of my family (Dad, Mary and Pat) and we were watching a music video for some new up and coming female artist. My subconscious is a strange place, so I don't really know how to classify what a typical dream is for me or if this would qualify as one such dream. I had never heard of this artist before, but there's nothing surprising about that. It was a bit odd to be sitting around watching music videos with my Dad and Mary though, and not just because I haven't watched music videos on TV since like, the 90's. What was disturbing about this dream was actually my reaction to it when I woke up this morning: "Hmm, apparently I am doing queer readings of made up music videos in my sleep now." Welcome back to Academialand Dr. Jones!

I have been slaving away over my Neverending Methodology Chapter, and fell asleep last night expecting to have nightmares about it. But nope. Queer readings of made up music videos. And I'm not even touching queer theory with a ten foot pole!

The video was pretty typical for today's pop market, or so I imagine. Close ups of the singer heavily done up, her dancing in sexually suggestive ways with two men, her covered in rainbow coloured candy in a bathtub with a couple other women. Seems pretty run of the mill to me. The following queer reading of it came, as it always does, from a debate with Pat. As soon as the music video started up, I took one look at the heavily made up singer whom I had never heard of before and announced to the room that she was a lesbian. I proceeded to yell at the TV as she suggestively danced with two semi-nude men that this was completely nonsensical as she is clearly gay. Dad laughed at me and Pat baited me. Obviously neither of them were buying my story when she appeared, candy-clad, in a bathtub with a couple other women. This is just what the straight girls do these days. So I turned to Pat and yelled: "Dude! That chick is 100% dyke!" I argued that she had been advised to stay in the closet, hence the weird dancing with men scene, and that the candy-bath scene was her subtle signal to the lady lovin' folk that she's one of us. Obviously they weren't picking up on it; they weren't meant to. Geez!

It's the fact that the first thought I had this morning was that I had constructed a queer reading of this made up music video that bemuses and terrifies me. The fact that I'm now considering the pronouncement of "Dude! That chick is 100% dyke!" as a queer readings goes to show that I am well along the yellow brick road, leading away from sanity and towards Academialand. I have been resistant to going on this journey because, well, because I see it as a departure from sanity, and I feel my relationship to sanity is tenuous enough as it is!

But, what's a girl to do? Five years ago a younger, more naive version of myself decided she wanted to be an academic, and like it or not, I've now got to honour her wish. That is more harsh than how I actually feel... mostly. The me of five years ago who thought being an academic would be super-neat didn't place as much value on having a stable grip on her sanity as the current version of myself does. She was also completely unaware of exactly how crazy making doing a PhD is.

Truth be told, I don't mind academia. It's more that I don't want to be an academic. I don't want to be defined by my day job. I want to be more than the thing that pays the bills. My problem with academia is that it's not exactly a profession known for having work/life boundaries. It can't; it's thinking work. You can't structure your most inspired thoughts to occur between the hours of 9-5. It don't work that way! So the challenge is to find a way to engage in academic work without completely surrendering myself to it.

For you Eat, Pray, Love fans, Elizabeth Gilbert did a great talk on TED about this. And if you have 20 minutes, I highly recommend checking it out!



Everyone keeps telling me that once I have my PhD, it'll be worth the sacrifices. I'll be handed the keys to the kingdom or whatever. I'm a bit dubious of these claims, but I remain hopeful. At the very least, I'll have satisfied the desires of my younger self and can start satisfying the desires of my current self. Which may, on occasion, involve queering made up music videos.