A Breather
by zunguzungu
So, last Saturday, I was sitting on a street corner at 3rd and Jackson, typing some notes into my MacBook while I waited for some friends to arrive; the cafe I had been working in had just closed, so I was finishing the thing I was doing while I waited. In that ten minute window, I became the victim of a crime that I’ve since learned is quite common in Oakland: a kid, about 19 or so (and pretty well dressed), snatched the laptop out of my hand and ran around the corner, where his friend in a getaway car was idling. I tried to chase him, but of course couldn’t catch up; I got a look at the license plate — something like “601z159” — and it was a silver sedan, but that approximation will not get you much, and my laptop has probably already had its memory wiped and been resold by now. It was over very quickly.
On Sunday, I went with a friend to Laney flea market, and watched as lots of people’s stolen laptops were resold. Mine (serial number C02GM6RYDV13) was not among the fifteen or so 2011/2012 Macbooks that I saw being passed from hand to hand in exchange for big wads of cash; presumably if you arrive at 7, when the flea market opens, you’ll see the thieves arrive to sell the laptops to the dealers, who were doing a busy business at 8:00, and were mostly done by 10. I don’t know that those computers were stolen, of course, but I also don’t know that the sun will rise in the east tomorrow. Chances are good, either way.
I bought that laptop in a moment of unusual financial solvency, a moment which has passed. Last Thanksgiving — on “black Friday” believe it or not — I bought it with money I had made writing this article for Technology Review, a bit of freelance writing that paid me nearly half a normal year’s total income (Thank you Jason Pontin and Technology Review!). I spent the rest of it paying down some debts, and that money is gone now. I have no savings with which to replace that laptop, and I probably won’t. The New Inquiry pays its writers as generously as they can, and I can’t emphasize enough how happy I am to write for a publication that prioritizes paying its writers over its editors (name another publication where management mostly works for free and revenues go to pay for labor? I’ll wait.) But TNI’s pool of subscribers isn’t (yet?) at the point where they can pay me anything like enough to defray the cost of being a human being in the world, even in the Oakland part of it.
Thanks to the kindness of a friend, I now have a year old, new-to-me chromebook that I can use for internet and portability, and I also have the six-year-old Dell laptop that the Macbook replaced, a tank of a computer whose battery and wireless card no longer work, but which I can still use for word processing. With any luck, that machine will keep me afloat for a while. But much worse than simply the loss of the laptop is the fact that I lost parts of my dissertation which I hadn’t fully backed up. Here, I can save you the trouble of stating the obvious: “Aaron, back your computer up, so this doesn’t happen.” Done! But the fact remains; lots of it wasn’t. It’s an eerie feeling to realize that documents I’ve labored over may be being erased, right now, never to be seen by anyone again. I wrote 1500 words on Foreign Policy magazine’s failed states index, and that’s gone; I had a written much of an essay on California’s Master Plan for Higher Education. But the dissertation is the important thing. The most important parts were backed up, but lots of it wasn’t.
The breakdown isn’t important, though. The point is this: I’ve been set back, significantly, on the work I need to do on my dissertation, and my deadlines haven’t changed. So to catch up, I will need to make up that time and that work some other way. If I’’m going to replace the stolen computer, I will need to do more outside work to make the money to do it, which will cost me time and energy. And since I will need all my time and energy if I’m going to get back on track, I’m probably not going to replace it, at least not any time soon.
The calculus is quite simple: I have more to do, and less to do it with (though if anyone wants to kick in a few bucks to defray the cost, a WePay tip jar is here, or PayPal here).
One of the great and terrible fallacies of our time is the idea that you can “do more with less,” or even that you can do the same with less. The managerial notion, for example, that it is possible to cut away the resources a person or institution has without thereby degrading that person’s or that institution’s ability to do their job is a fiction, but a useful one. It’s a way of making it someone else’s problem to make up the shortfall. If funding to a government agency or university is cut, and the workers there are told to “do more with less,” they will try to do the things they already do, but they will do them more cheaply and worse. If an employee is told to get the same job done, but she is given less to work with in doing so, she will either do a shittier job of it, or she will have a shittier life as a result of having no other choice but to work harder and longer and be paid less. In other words, great ideological energy goes toward making us overlook what is simple and obvious: the cost of doing something will always get paid somehow. Either it will be done less well, or the cost will be shifted from the managers of the system, who give the orders and have the power to enforce them, to the people who have to do the work and make up the difference with extracurricular, unpaid time.
I say all this to explain why the theft of my laptop — and the loss of a significant amount of work on my dissertation and on other things — means I’m going to stop blogging and tweeting for a while. I don’t have the resources I need to do my job the right way, and the fact that it was a snatch-and-run theft rather than a funding cut doesn’t change the basic logic of the situation. Rather than “do more with less,” and keep waking up at 2 a.m. in a panic over undone things, therefore, I am going to do less with the less I have. Rather than fool myself into thinking I can just make it up magically, I am going to be realistic, and revise my plans and expectations according to my diminished pool of resources. I’ve lost time, work, and money and I need to make up the work without the money, so something’s got to give. In administrationese, I have to Be Realistic, and “being realistic” means deciding which of my priorities I am going to eliminate.
I spend a lot of time on twitter, which I value. Gone. I spend a lot of time writing blogposts, and trawling the internet. Also, gone. At least for the duration, I can’t spend time and energy doing this. There just isn’t any left over. I’m paid enough to be a graduate student, but not enough to be much of anything else, and if I’m to have any hope of getting a job better than the month-to-month, hand-to-mouth, paycheck-to-paycheck existence I currently enjoy, I need to get eight months worth of work done in the next four. I’ve got to do that, and only that.
If you are reading these words, I want you to understand how much I appreciate that you are, how much it means to me that a decision of mine, like this one, would be of interest to anyone other than me. It means a great deal to me. If you’ve read this far, thank you. The academic world frustrates me by the extent to which we labor on writing that such a very few people will read, and that’s why I have a blog. It’s a way of doing a more capacious, more open version of intellectual labor.
But: having this kind of precarious existence means the privilege of spending so much time and energy writing for free about whatever I think is important is only one disaster away from becoming unaffordable, and I am one disaster past that moment.
There are greater tragedies in the world than this, obviously; losing one’s laptop and parts of one’s dissertation are the worst thing that can happen to a graduate student, but I’ve been joking to people that being a graduate student is already one of the worst things that can happen to a person, so the glass is half-empty either way. There’s a certain amount of truth to that: this experience has forced me to think about ways I can interface with the world not through a computer screen, and that’s important; I’m going to make this experience into something healthy, a way to re-focus my intellectual energies. But it’s also kind of a bitter joke. Being a graduate student is much more stressful and anxious than people often realize. The psychic and physical toll you pay is significant (there are those costs again!), and the end (when you face the seemingly non-existent employment prospects) can be rough. I tell people starting out that they should expect to fuck up their backs, to maybe need or go on some kind of anti-anxiety medication, and to spend their twenties intimately aware of the price of peanut butter. Your ability to be a graduate student for the next 7-10 years will be totally contingent on finding new strategies to keep yourself healthy.
But, of course, all of this only makes graduate students a lot like most latter day American workers: a paycheck away from missing rent, physically damaged by the work they do, and often waking up at 2 in the morning consumed with anxiety about the future. Like most people of my generation, it can be hard to imagine doing the things that my parents saw as the good life. That doesn’t mean I won’t have a future endowed with health insurance; that doesn’t mean I won’t be able to financially support a family, that doesn’t mean I won’t be able to “have it all,” as they say. Statistically, a person with an advanced degree like mine is still way ahead of the median American worker, and I’m well aware of that fact. But at the moment, I look at my bank account, I look at my job prospects, and I look at what I’ve got on my plate, and it makes me tired just to try to figure out where all the time and energy is going to come from even to get to the place where something good can happen.
So, for the time being, the next few months, maybe the rest of the year — depending on how the dissertation comes — I’m not going to cannibalize body and mind to do more with less. There’s a certain kind of politics to this choice, maybe, but the main thing is just an honest account of my situation, and an effort to make an actual choice, rather than coast along on momentum. Writing this blog and having you read it has been a real privilege, but it’s one that I don’t think I can afford any longer. I will lack the time and energy to put together the Sunday Reading posts each week, so the great Jane Hu has kindly agreed to do it in my stead. I’m going to hand my twitter password over to a friend and ask them to change it, so I can’t log on (and believe me, that’s what it will take to keep my addiction in check; I haven’t yet gotten up the courage to do it, but I will, soon). I’m not going to blog for a while and I’m going to try to chill out on the internet in general, try to read a few books and maybe go outside every once in a while. Feel free to drop me a line, aaron AT thenewinquiry.com.
UPDATE: Thanks to the generosity of a really humbling number of people, I now have enough to replace the computer, and then some (over $2k in total). I don’t have the words to express my gratitude, so thank you will have to do.
Deeply sorry that you’re in such a shitty situation and best of luck.
I will obviously miss your writing and your voice, which is one of the most engaged and vital on the internet, but your decision is totally understandable and even commendable. God knows how I’d react in your situation, but it would probably result in spending even more time on Twitter and getting seriously depressed. It’s easy to write off our own personal tragedies as “Not a big deal compared to other people’s problems,” though I wonder if this doesn’t lead us (especially if we’re in a precarious if relatively “good” position such as a graduate student) to actually undervalue and undermine the work we’re doing, work which we DO believe to be important and which we spend so much time and energy defending.
And anyway: the internet will still be here in all of its fucked-up glory whenever you’re ready to come back. Good luck, and go write the shit out if that dissertation.
Oh my god. If I’d lost even a chunk of my dissertation (and I was always moments away from that catastrophe, having never backed up much) I would have been catatonic in bed for weeks. I’m so sorry.
I think you’re making a wise decision to conserve your writing self. It’s worth looking into ways to save your back – what helped me was switching between a ball chair, standing desks, and regular chairs, and doing a few exercises which I learned from a physical therapist. Absolutely ensure that you’re using a monitor at the correct height. I often got to the point where I was physically unable to go on before I figured this out.
Good luck.
Do what you must. It sounds to me like you have your priorities straight (not that you need or want my affirmation). With this reply, I’m sending psychic waves of friendly, peaceful energy your way. As a Catholic, this means prayer. In any case, I’m sure others are doing the same in their own way. – TL
Found this via fb. Of course, so very sorry to hear. What shit. I mean, pure shit. Nothing but weeping and gnashing of teeth done on your behalf by the myriad of those who root for you, to be sure. Brings to my mind Pharoah’s expectation the Israelites could continue to make the same amount of bricks while with-holding straw. In any event, may there be moments of renewal, hope and restoration away from the wired world in small breathing moments amid deep anxiety.
PROTIP: set up a gmail account and email all of your papers to yourself.
Follow-up Tip: Set up two-step verification on your GMail. (Which I did, only after my GMail was hacked last year and several years’ worth of emails and attachments were irretrievably lost.)
Backup GMail to your hard drive; try Dropbox and Google Docs; consider something like Carbonite for completely automatic overall backup.
Best wishes as you move forward.
I’ve always wondered how the hell you managed to write so much quality stuff for the internets while simultaneously working on a dissertation. Good luck with the breather & the writing–as one says in Turkish, upon seeing someone working hard or attempting any heavy lifting, kolay gelsin: may it go easily.
Also, this–
“Your ability to be a graduate student for the next 7-10 years will be totally contingent on finding new strategies to keep yourself healthy.”
is something we need to hear, and say, more often.
Good luck! Heading to the “tip jar” now.
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God, I just had a laptop die (currently writing this from my girlfriend’s) and almost lost a bunch of work – I can’t imagine how it must feel to lose parts of your dissertation. Best of luck. I’ve been a fan for a while, I will try to hit the tip jar, though I’m a grad student too.
PS Dropbox is an easy way to back up files to the cloud. Not foolproof, but a little easier than remembering to manually back stuff up all the time.
Your voice will be sorely missed. Come back soon!
You’re a brilliant writer whose given me a lot to think about. Thanks.
I had a laptop’s hard drive irrevocably self-destruct just after I returned from an overseas archive, and I lost a substantial portion of the notes I had taken. So I can sympathize. (Regrettably, it takes something like this for most people–including myself–to become absolutely rigorous about backing-up.) The combinatorial possibilities of that license plate and color/type of car seem like they’d be workable. Did you file a police report?
Dear Lorrie, Marty, Ray, Pat and the entire fmialy.Oma (Irene), Amala and I are sitting together this morning remembering our dear Johnny and we are flooded with his presence as if he were here with us this very moment. For me personally, I will never forget the support and love that Uncle Johnny and Auntie Lorraine gave us when we were first married. We were searching and questioning the meaning of life and the part we would play in it. Our meanderings would certainly be unconventional and probably gave pause and maybe even alarm to many of our relatives. It led us to many parts of both the United States and Canada. Everywhere we went our parents, Keith and Irene would come and visit and flood us with their love and support. There was someone else too who would come and visit and flood us with their love and support Uncle Johnny and Auntie Lorraine. I remember them coming and staying with us in Berkeley, and willing to stay in a house that would . . . well let’s just say “rustic” comes to mind. It was the kind of affection we would never forget and held a special place in our heart all our life . I remember once in British Columbia when we were living in an old log cabin Uncle Johnny and Auntie Lorraine came to visit and insisted we come to Vancouver with them and they took us to a five star restaurant, and encouraged us to have a wonderful meal. We were far away from all fmialy and friends and this act of kindness was so generous and loving. All through our married life I would call Uncle Johnny for financial advice. He was always so generous with his time. He had given me my first big “stock tip” that turned a few hundred dollars into a few thousand. It prompted me to start studying the financial markets and when I finally become a bond and stock broker with Birr Wilson I felt, and feel today, that without the support of my father and Uncle Johnny this very positive time in my life would have never happened.We are so happy that Oma (Irene) was able to travel with Uncle Gord to see Uncle Johnny not too long ago. It meant so much to her and many weekends I would hear her talking to Uncle Johnny on the phone. We are all truly blessed for having Uncle Johnny in our lives. Every year Uncle Johnny and Auntie Lorraine would stop in Paradise on their way to visit Pop and Grandma. We would all be laughing to bursting with Uncle Johnny’s stories. We always looked forward to these wonderful times together.Marty has come to visit us many times in Hawaii and given us all the news and updates of their life together. I am so proud of Marty for the loving care and support he gave Uncle Johnny for so many years. Such an example to the world.Affectionately,Deva, Amala and Irene
One thing of the things I am looking forward to doing, upon finishing my degree at the end of the year, is having enough money to give something back to this blog, which has been such a formative influence in my own intellectual development so that, by the end of 2013, you may be able to afford a diamond-encrusted macbook (or a secure savings account.. whichever you prefer).
Sounds like you’ve already gathered laptop money, but I put some more in the pot anyway because, frankly, this is one of my favorite blogs and I greatly appreciate the work you’re doing. You deserve it. Good luck with the dissertation, sorry about the laptop.
Life can suck sometimes! Shiit. The worst part about it is hopelessness in the situation at hand. i.e. being stolen.
Definitely wishing you the best while you fix up your work. I store everything on a hard drive now after a computer incident, and don’t take my laptop to uni, but rather take the HD instead. Seems to be less traumatic for me, and hopefully you.
Best of luck, and soak up the support you have, you are a magnificent writer, and I thoroughly enjoy your blogging- and I am not a fan of blogs in the first place ha.
X
AB–I just contributed a (very) little bit before seeing that you’d made the laptop goal–in any case, I hope you can use whatever was leftover for whatever self-care you require (books, beers, a yoga class once in a while, whatevs). Hang in there.
xo
ajmcc
That sucks! I threw a bit more into the hat (I know you’ve already hit your laptop goal, but I’m sure you’ll find some use for it). Good luck with the dissertation! I do on occasion consider pulling out my laptop to do some work, but I’ll be sure to avoid that temptation. I’ve had my phone snatched in the subway, although I was able to wrest that back, and I’ve been considerably more careful since then.
By the way, some unsolicited advice on buying laptops: since you are in mac air range, it’s really the best option. I got a windows about a year ago after my mac died, and while it’s a fine machine, everything just seems to go slightly slower and less smoothly than it did on my mac.
[…] best. There’s something to disengaging with it, and with taking a ‘breather’, as Aaron Bady is doing at the moment as well (albeit prompted by […]
I’m glad that the computer replacement worked out for you! I am someone who made a minor donation after reading a twitter comment about your predicament (was it Glenn Greenwald ?) Here’s a case where a lot of people doing trivial donations makes a big difference. Hooray for twitter and other online fundraising venues.
So sorry to hear this happened. That hole in the stomach when something important is stolen must be so much worse when the thing is your dissertation, but it’s heartening to hear you got enough money to replace the laptop. Breaks from the internet can be wonderful things – I hope yours is fruitful. Thanks for writing.
Sorry to hear of your misfortune. I stumbled on your blog a couple of years ago and check it now and again. Have always enjoyed your insights. I’ll be watching for your return.
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Thanks, everybody!And Joanna, there is awayls time for cupcakes. We’ll be out of town for the next bit, but I hope we’ll overlap in the Twin Cities for at least one day before we move!
It’s in fact very complicated in this busy life to listen news on Television, thus I simply use web for that reason, and get the latest news.
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