Let's get ahead of ourselves!

[ScreamingHairyArmadillo]

I want students to quiver with fear at the thought of my presence, and exclaim, "Read the (insert my last name here), or you'll never pass this class!"

*snicker snicker*

But on a more personal level, I want to teach and in some way have a lasting, relevant, life-altering effect on my students the way professors, classes and books had on me when I was an impressionable young undergrad.

I want to read and write into the wee hours of the night, sleep for 3 or 4 hours, frantically put together a lecture, run to class and deliver it effortlessly, then spend the rest of the day intimidating students during office hours or lounging around in a cafe with fellow academics.

You sound just like my boyfriend. What is it about aspiring historians who want to be scary and intimidating?

[moralresearcher]

@melusine:

Are you kidding me? I'm pretty much exchanging my life for an office! LOL I'm so not ashamed of it, either.

One of my mentors has an office that would make you sign up for an online PhD in ESP if it guaranteed one like it. It's a corner space in the second level of a modern theater conservatory. It's large enough for a desk, bookshelves AND a table and chairs for guests. And the windows curve around and are almost floor to ceiling. And she always has tea and just the book you need. It's like...like...nerd girl porn. I love it so.

JEALOUS.

[moralresearcher]

Dreams, huh?

I would like to get a tenure track appointment in psych (or dual in something, depending on how interdisciplinary my research gets) at the school where I did my undergrad, because I love the weather in my home city (I absolutely abhor the cold), and my entire family is here, and I would like to put down roots near family when I raise my kids, although I wouldn't mind working at a school near the beach on the West Coast. I want an office with lots of windows, because I hate fluorescent lights, tucked in some corner (and not right next to the department secretary, because I need quiet to work) with a lot of trees outside, with lots of books and files that are in a state of organized semi-chaos. I want a bowl of candy on my desk (which I think I want to be black for the moment...) and a mini fridge stocked with yummy drinks and snacks (because I eat when I work). I want pictures on my walls of beautiful sunsets. I want a lab full of students who ask questions incessantly and with whom I enjoy spending my time. I want colleagues who have enough overlap in interest that I have several collaborators in my department, but I also want to have collaborators scattered here, there, and everywhere so I can go visit and get out of my routine every once and a while. I want to be a wildly-cited author and an expert in my field.

Can you all tell that I'm a planner?