Today was a long, long day. I’m rolling on fumes, so I’m not going to dive into the big things I have in mind, but look for a couple of interesting updates coming this weekend.
For today, a story.
I remember, coming out of graduate school, all of my mentors telling me about “hot shot” up-in-coming scholars who I shouldn’t try to compete with, with the caveat that “you’ll get there.” Two of them in particular insisted that it was just a matter of time before I was a “star” in the field. And you know, I won’t lie… there’s an attraction to that.
I’m going to open up and be as unfiltered as possible here: I’ve always wanted to be looked at as a “star” relative to my peers in academia, and really in most of everything that I do. I know that sounds incredibly selfish, but my reason for it is purely selfish but also, I think, a pretty good indicator of who I am. I know people think when I say this I’m not being genuine, but believe me, this is the uncovered truth of my life: I want to be respected as important because of the fact that people don’t think people “like me” should be.
I’m Native. I’m first-generation college. My parents were poor/are poor. Julie and I live paycheck to paycheck. I’m fat. I’m stubborn as hell about what I think is right.
I’ve been told over and over that people “like me” aren’t meant to be in positions of power and influence. I’m not supposed to be the star. Some attractive white dude from a rich family is. I get that. I mean in a movie, the “lovable loser” (me) is the best friend of the person who is a star.
So it’s not for me. But it is for me. If that makes sense.
There’s a scene in Buffy the Vampire Slayer (season 7, I think) where Buffy has a conversation with The First Evil (long story, and I know that heaping praise on Joss Whedon is not cool these days). This ancient evil explains to Buffy that her whole problem is that she thinks she’s a nobody but subsequently thinks she’s better than everyone. I think what I’m trying to say about myself is similar to that. It’s not that I think I’m better than anyone, really. It’s that I don’t think anyone is better than me. And I feel like I’m part of a legacy of people who just “take” what people want to heap on them, of kind-hearted people who get sort of bullied into submission.
I realized at about 20 that other people like me looked at me, and if I did well, they felt like there was something there, but if I failed, I just reinforced their sense that they couldn’t do the things they might want to do.
So I realized that I CAN have an impact on other people who might think they don’t belong BY belonging. I can encourage others to try to be leaders by being a leader. But that also means that I have to do something I don’t usually do: I have to stick up for myself. I have told people before that when I make a big deal about something– like the way someone reacts to me– it’s not about me. And that’s me being honest. I have suffered much worse things in my life than the bad things that have happened in my academic life. But I can make enough noise in academia that it might matter to people. I can make my small differences here.
I never wanted to be a star. I’d rather be the guy who blends into the woodwork, who does his job well and is a good team player.
But I want to be a star if I can because I want people to see a chubby poor first-generation college Native American star. I never saw someone like me in a position of esteem or authority. If *I* can make it so someone younger like me knows that there is a chance to achieve whatever he or she dreams of, I have done what *I* wanted to do in this world.
And ultimately that’s either selfless or the most selfish thing of all.
And I don’t care.
Because that’s what I’m about. Love it or hate it, you have to respect it.
Seriously. I checked. Giving me PhD means you have to respect it. It’s written on the degree.