A New Semester Begins

The first day of classes are always exciting to me. And it looks like I'll be able to take two classes I'm very excited about: International Political Economy of Women (which I'm in the process of trying to add. Hopefully everything works out*) and Western American Literature.

I also have an incredible internship opportunity lined up with a local non profit that prepares underprivileged teens for college. The directors of the nonprofit also want me to direct a qualitative evaluation of student experiences with the program and this will permit me to plant "Research Assistant", as well as intern, on my CV, since I'll be doing it with a professor in the Sociology Department.

My problem? I have a narrow window of opportunity in the middle of the day to do homework and finish the report for the research I did this summer, and my toddler, inexplicably, no longer likes to nap during this time. I had carefully arranged my schedule to fit around this traditional naptime and it seems it's blowing up in my face. sigh.

I've tried lots of things. In fact, as I calmly write this post I am listening to the cries and screams of my daughter, since I took away her "sleeping sippy" and left her alone in the crib. I am doing this in the hopes that when I return it to her in about 20 minutes she will have worn herself out with crying**. Cruel, right? So be it.

This isn't a post to solicit advice about nap-time woes. I know we'll weather this and be just fine, with time. I guess my point is simply that just when we think we've reached a balance and can juggle all those balls just fine, we're thrown a curve ball. The great thing about being a woman is that I can learn how to catch that new ball and not drop everything else. It is good to be a woman.

*I got in!
**It worked!