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1. How did you like going to MIT? Did you find it hard in a male dominated world?
2. What was your Army experience like?
3. How did you get involved in square dancing?
4. What is your favorite airport to fly into and your favorite flight route?
5. Do you miss doing technical work or are you enjoying your time off?
1. How did you like going to MIT? Did you find it hard in a male dominated world?
Wow, cool question! I have to think back and put this into words, which I haven't really tried to do before.
I liked being away from home. My mother and I were NOT getting along well at the time I left, and I was immensely relieved to be anywhere but home. On the other hand, I was homesick. A day after I arrived, I was phoning my parents and saying "Remember that movie Revenge of the Nerds? It's JUST LIKE THAT HERE!" (I think I had seen my first few people who never bathed.)
It was incredibly challenging, stimulating, and invigorating being in an environment with so many brilliant people. This, I thought, was what school should have been like: students were actually interested in learning. (Unlike anyone I'd met in public schools.) Brains were a positive attribute in a person's social standing, not a negative as I'd seen in high school and earlier. It was a whole new universe opening up to me. There were things worth working on. Homework took time, taught things, and wasn't just make-work. My mind stretched. On the other hand... I had never needed good study habits before, and suddenly I needed to learn good habits FAST. I had never had much chance to be social before, and suddenly I needed to learn how to do that too, and FAST. I had never needed to build an image of myself before -- I knew exactly who I was: the brainy one. Boy did I need to figure out some more detail on that, and FAST. When I wasn't the only brainy one, nor was I the most brainy one, I had to figure out what was the point of being on the planet at all. Some days it was rough. Very rough. I had my suicidal moments.
There was a vibrant energy there unlike anything I've felt before or since. High-tech startups are a pastel version of it, and the closest example I can name, but they're still only a distant relative. Creativity is everywhere. "Let's try it and find out" is the most popular follow-on to "I don't know". Sleep is for the weak and sickly. People climb on the rooftops, or stay up all night writing programs, or build a catapult that could hurl a fridge, or drive to Maine for the night, just because they can. The place is incredibly ALIVE.
The dating scene is best described as a feeding frenzy. Someone female shows up. WHAMMO! the sharks close in. Most sensible female persons interested in things like coursework will, in the interests of practicality, soon learn to simply choose one from the slavering horde. It saves time, you see; that way she needs to deal with only one of them. The rest fall back, wary, polite, watching. The instant a break-up occurs, WHAMMO! the cycle begins again. I did get some kind of concept that I was pretty. True or not, it was certainly interesting. I sure hadn't been worth looking at in high school!
Going through ROTC at the same time was also a challenge. I'd never been anything but a bookworm. Heh - major change. I had to learn to rappel, run, shoot, give orders, take orders... yowza. This too was an amazing growth experience.
MIT is a great place to be from. For that alone, it was worth every drooling virgin male, every soul-searching can-I-really-measure-up moment, every sleepless night. All the other benefits, like learning how to have friends and learning how to study and learning how to prioritize and oh yeah, while I'm at it, learning anything the professors taught, those just tip the balance even further toward being glad I went. But it sure wasn't calm or easy.
2. What was your Army experience like?
Beyond the transformation from bookworm to physically capable person, I can sum it up in one sentence: I was The Girl. This is the theme of my life, I suppose. It'll be on my headstone. CJ Smith, 1967-????: The Girl.
It was mind-expanding to realize that I actually shot a rifle fairly well. It was empowering to learn that I could do things I would otherwise never have imagined. I could run. I could stay awake three nights in a row. I could put a rifle back together from its component atoms while not really looking. I could eat match heads so the ticks wouldn't like the taste of me. I could take orders from someone I had no respect for whatsoever. Not that I would now necessarily choose to do all these things frequently... but I learned they were possible.
It was full of unexpected humor. Tension doesn't last forever, even when a drill sergeant is screaming red-faced two inches from your nose. We joked, sang, and just generally goofed off. I can remember trying NOT to laugh during a barracks inspection when some Grand High Pooh-Bah was coming through. A friend of mine had to get rid of an orange, because while we always had food in the barracks, it was technically not allowed and we'd failed to get rid of the orange and an orange was really hard to hide during inspection. So while HER side was getting inspected, and we were all supposedly standing at perfect rigid attention, and the Grand High Pooh-Bah's back was turned, she rolled that orange across the floor to MY side, and when MY side got inspected, I bowled it back over to HER side. I cannot for one minute believe Grand High Pooh-Bah did not know. I am positive he was just better at holding back his smirks.
3. How did you get involved in square dancing?
I was on active duty during the Gulf war (ahem, er, Gulf War I) while Rob was just starting his first semester of graduate work at Stanford. He missed me, and would telephone me to whine about being lonely. I figured in a few months I'd be in Saudi Arabia, so I told him to get USED to being LONELY, go find something to DO, [click] [dialtone]. I guess I wasn't very sympathetic. Anyhow, he found the Stanford Quads square dance group. Well, by the time I got released and headed west for California, he had really gotten into it, and it was verrrrrry clear that I had better like this hobby. :-)
4. What is your favorite airport to fly into and your favorite flight route?
I'll take these as two separate questions, just for grins. My favorite airport is probably Sedona, Arizona, because it has a nifty restaurant right by the runway and because it's on a mesa so the approach is weeeeeird. (Hm, I'm a good eight hundred feet above the ground. WHOA! Now the pavement is two inches from my wheels!) It's in very pretty red rock country.
My favorite flight route is anything aerobatic. Straight up! Pause...pivot on a wingtip...Straight down! Pull horizontal and ride uuuuup and over in a loop. Another half loop and a half roll at the top. Too high now? How 'bout a spin? Swishround, swishround, swishround, now stop. :-) But for "routes" getting from point A to point B, my favorite is anything that takes me over the high Sierra range. Over Lake Tahoe is beautiful, as is Yosemite and Mono Lake. Anything crossing that whole general area is great for me. It's stunningly lovely.
Seeing one sunset twice is also cool. Take off minutes after and climb 'til you see the sun again. Ah, flying is so full of fun.
5. Do you miss doing technical work or are you enjoying your time off?
Yes. :-) Both. I'm becoming more convinced that though technical work isn't a PERFECT career for me, I'm going to go back to it, because it's a very GOOD fit for me and nothing is PERFECT and I do miss it. For now I'm having a great time. I'm baking cookies and playing my wood flute and traveling around and sewing a baby quilt and reading lots and lots of books. It's terrific. :-)
2. What was your Army experience like?
3. How did you get involved in square dancing?
4. What is your favorite airport to fly into and your favorite flight route?
5. Do you miss doing technical work or are you enjoying your time off?
1. How did you like going to MIT? Did you find it hard in a male dominated world?
Wow, cool question! I have to think back and put this into words, which I haven't really tried to do before.
I liked being away from home. My mother and I were NOT getting along well at the time I left, and I was immensely relieved to be anywhere but home. On the other hand, I was homesick. A day after I arrived, I was phoning my parents and saying "Remember that movie Revenge of the Nerds? It's JUST LIKE THAT HERE!" (I think I had seen my first few people who never bathed.)
It was incredibly challenging, stimulating, and invigorating being in an environment with so many brilliant people. This, I thought, was what school should have been like: students were actually interested in learning. (Unlike anyone I'd met in public schools.) Brains were a positive attribute in a person's social standing, not a negative as I'd seen in high school and earlier. It was a whole new universe opening up to me. There were things worth working on. Homework took time, taught things, and wasn't just make-work. My mind stretched. On the other hand... I had never needed good study habits before, and suddenly I needed to learn good habits FAST. I had never had much chance to be social before, and suddenly I needed to learn how to do that too, and FAST. I had never needed to build an image of myself before -- I knew exactly who I was: the brainy one. Boy did I need to figure out some more detail on that, and FAST. When I wasn't the only brainy one, nor was I the most brainy one, I had to figure out what was the point of being on the planet at all. Some days it was rough. Very rough. I had my suicidal moments.
There was a vibrant energy there unlike anything I've felt before or since. High-tech startups are a pastel version of it, and the closest example I can name, but they're still only a distant relative. Creativity is everywhere. "Let's try it and find out" is the most popular follow-on to "I don't know". Sleep is for the weak and sickly. People climb on the rooftops, or stay up all night writing programs, or build a catapult that could hurl a fridge, or drive to Maine for the night, just because they can. The place is incredibly ALIVE.
The dating scene is best described as a feeding frenzy. Someone female shows up. WHAMMO! the sharks close in. Most sensible female persons interested in things like coursework will, in the interests of practicality, soon learn to simply choose one from the slavering horde. It saves time, you see; that way she needs to deal with only one of them. The rest fall back, wary, polite, watching. The instant a break-up occurs, WHAMMO! the cycle begins again. I did get some kind of concept that I was pretty. True or not, it was certainly interesting. I sure hadn't been worth looking at in high school!
Going through ROTC at the same time was also a challenge. I'd never been anything but a bookworm. Heh - major change. I had to learn to rappel, run, shoot, give orders, take orders... yowza. This too was an amazing growth experience.
MIT is a great place to be from. For that alone, it was worth every drooling virgin male, every soul-searching can-I-really-measure-up moment, every sleepless night. All the other benefits, like learning how to have friends and learning how to study and learning how to prioritize and oh yeah, while I'm at it, learning anything the professors taught, those just tip the balance even further toward being glad I went. But it sure wasn't calm or easy.
2. What was your Army experience like?
Beyond the transformation from bookworm to physically capable person, I can sum it up in one sentence: I was The Girl. This is the theme of my life, I suppose. It'll be on my headstone. CJ Smith, 1967-????: The Girl.
It was mind-expanding to realize that I actually shot a rifle fairly well. It was empowering to learn that I could do things I would otherwise never have imagined. I could run. I could stay awake three nights in a row. I could put a rifle back together from its component atoms while not really looking. I could eat match heads so the ticks wouldn't like the taste of me. I could take orders from someone I had no respect for whatsoever. Not that I would now necessarily choose to do all these things frequently... but I learned they were possible.
It was full of unexpected humor. Tension doesn't last forever, even when a drill sergeant is screaming red-faced two inches from your nose. We joked, sang, and just generally goofed off. I can remember trying NOT to laugh during a barracks inspection when some Grand High Pooh-Bah was coming through. A friend of mine had to get rid of an orange, because while we always had food in the barracks, it was technically not allowed and we'd failed to get rid of the orange and an orange was really hard to hide during inspection. So while HER side was getting inspected, and we were all supposedly standing at perfect rigid attention, and the Grand High Pooh-Bah's back was turned, she rolled that orange across the floor to MY side, and when MY side got inspected, I bowled it back over to HER side. I cannot for one minute believe Grand High Pooh-Bah did not know. I am positive he was just better at holding back his smirks.
3. How did you get involved in square dancing?
I was on active duty during the Gulf war (ahem, er, Gulf War I) while Rob was just starting his first semester of graduate work at Stanford. He missed me, and would telephone me to whine about being lonely. I figured in a few months I'd be in Saudi Arabia, so I told him to get USED to being LONELY, go find something to DO, [click] [dialtone]. I guess I wasn't very sympathetic. Anyhow, he found the Stanford Quads square dance group. Well, by the time I got released and headed west for California, he had really gotten into it, and it was verrrrrry clear that I had better like this hobby. :-)
4. What is your favorite airport to fly into and your favorite flight route?
I'll take these as two separate questions, just for grins. My favorite airport is probably Sedona, Arizona, because it has a nifty restaurant right by the runway and because it's on a mesa so the approach is weeeeeird. (Hm, I'm a good eight hundred feet above the ground. WHOA! Now the pavement is two inches from my wheels!) It's in very pretty red rock country.
My favorite flight route is anything aerobatic. Straight up! Pause...pivot on a wingtip...Straight down! Pull horizontal and ride uuuuup and over in a loop. Another half loop and a half roll at the top. Too high now? How 'bout a spin? Swishround, swishround, swishround, now stop. :-) But for "routes" getting from point A to point B, my favorite is anything that takes me over the high Sierra range. Over Lake Tahoe is beautiful, as is Yosemite and Mono Lake. Anything crossing that whole general area is great for me. It's stunningly lovely.
Seeing one sunset twice is also cool. Take off minutes after and climb 'til you see the sun again. Ah, flying is so full of fun.
5. Do you miss doing technical work or are you enjoying your time off?
Yes. :-) Both. I'm becoming more convinced that though technical work isn't a PERFECT career for me, I'm going to go back to it, because it's a very GOOD fit for me and nothing is PERFECT and I do miss it. For now I'm having a great time. I'm baking cookies and playing my wood flute and traveling around and sewing a baby quilt and reading lots and lots of books. It's terrific. :-)
