bigger than my britches.

Yah, I know I should be working on like, the bazillion things technically due tomorrow, and I will get to them, honestly (AND I will make it to the Humanities Graduation! boo-yah!). Admittedly the barrage of good news this week has left me with an impressive lack of urgency in wrapping up my semester (I'm not really sure how there's a correlation). As many know, not only did I get official affirmation of my assistantship for next year (and a raise for the summer!--probably to make up for all the hours not worked this semester) but I found out that I got accepted to an oral history seminar at the RivalSchoolThatMustNotBeNamed that includes (!) getting published in a book (it's like I start freaking out--in a good way-- every time I think about this and a big inevitable smile crosses my face) (talk about the most money writing sample for PhD applications ever) (excuse my boastfulness, this is all just really, really affirming). So yah, I got my big break this week. Excuse me if I stop to savor it oh, every ten minutes or so.

But I assure you that my laziness is not cocky-ness.

You know why? Because I just cozied up with my Oral History Association newsletter (I am so proud of myself for joining! I feel so legit now!) and some of the people accepted to my seminar were interviewed for their role in doing a 150 person interview project.* Holy shitbuckets!** Featured in the national newsletter! Now I admit that after I googled everybody who got into the conference-- and I'm the only MA student and one of 3 students admitted-- but the more I get a feel for the caliber of people going to the seminar, the more out of my league I feel. I mean cool, I got accepted, but shit, now I have to produce a paper for these really accomplished people with research I have yet to do. It's daunting. Really daunting. And humbling-- the uncomfortable kind of humbling that makes you want to crawl under the desk. It's like the strangest and most potent combination of ego-boost and self-doubt I think I've ever experienced.

But, as I say all the freaking time, grad school is a confidence game, and I can only benefit from playing up to their skill level, right?

*that is an pretty huge project. I'm hoping for 10 for the conference paper and 20 for the thesis and that's pretty good size, at least for one person.

**that's the word of the week... it emerged in a fit of pseudo-Tourettes road rage on Monday and has yet to go away (the word, that is--the road rage is long gone).