9 December 2004: Freezing Ritualists

This morning I attended the final session of my Interpersonal Communications class, and handed in the project that's accounted for much of my homework time in the past six weeks. I'll be getting an A in that class. This coming Tuesday is my Biology final, Wednesday is my Native American History final, and then the semester is over and I'll have four weeks off from school. As is my wont, I've done well enough throughout the semester that I can afford to do a half-assed job on both finals and still get an A for the semester in both of those classes. Too bad that even though I know this, I still won't kick back and allow myself to do a half-assed job (although I did manage to resist doing an unneeded extra-credit assignment in the Native American History Class).

Next semester is going to be the busiest one yet. I'm aiming to transfer to my four-year college (and future grad school) of choice in September of '06, by which time I need to have accumulated the full 84 credits that said school will allow me to transfer. The idea being to do as much of my schooling as possible in the community college system (where my high grades and nearly-nonexistent income make me eligible for a full tuition wavier). Another year-and-a-half of community college means that afterward I'll be able to do the final much-more-money-per-semester phase of my BA degree in three semesters instead of the customary four. Provided I can come in with 84 credits. Which I can, if I'm willing to take a very heavy course load for a few semesters. Which is what I'll be doing.

The good news is that I've now completed all of the specific general education requirements that my future school wants me to transfer in with. This means that the huge courseload I'll have to take can consist of whichever courses I want, as long as there are enough of them, and as long as at least a few of them are related to my eventual field of graduate study. So coming next semester: Astronomy, Intro to Philosophy, Social Psychology, and History of European Civilization. (Can you tell that I registered for next semester's classes while I was in the middle of reading Neal Stephenson's The System of the World? Finished it yesterday, by the way.)

When last I updated this journal, I was about to embark on a Paratheatrical Research Halloween Field Trip to Pinnacles State Park, with the rest of the participants in the Song-as-Vehicle Lab. The trip was magnificent, despite the brutally cold nights. Great hiking, great ritual work, and great company. If I hadn’t been plunged into midterms immediately upon my return home, I would have written a long entry about it. But this thing shall not be, for the only way I could persuade myself to starting to write journal entries again was to promise myself that I wouldn’t require myself to try to write detailed accounts of everything interesting that’s happened to me in the past six weeks. But here’s a picture of our whole merry band of cheerfully freezing ritualists, after the rituals of our trip’s final evening...

The lab is almost over now. In my estimation, it’s been one of the best Paratheatrical Research labs to date – equalled only by the previous one, the famous Initiations Lab about which I wrote so many journal entries a year ago. This lab is very, very different from the Initiations Lab (and so very much gentler, thank God). It’s also the lab I’ve most enjoyed so far. The work feels really good this time around.

This lab will culminate in a single, one-night-only, very-limited-seating-capacity live public performance, entitled Songs as Vehicles, on the night of Monday, December 20th (8:00 pm sharp at the Finnish Brotherhood Hall, 1970 Chestnut Street, Berkeley).

Bedtime now. More entries soon.