While the World Cup was generally an enjoyable festival of football it was, of course, tarnished by England’s rather woeful performance. I would like to outline here briefly why I personally will not (or should not) be too despondent about life at the moment.
1. When England eventually do win the World Cup again, and assuming I won’t be too old and decrepit by that time, it will be something truly fantastic to celebrate. Celebrate the achievement itself but if we do win it we will have won it in some style as well (i.e. by not being as unlucky and generally rubbish as usual)! This will be a reason to celebrate and so is something to look forward to. It will happen, it has to happen! But at least in two or four years time we won’t play that badly again! Surely not?!? And also cheerful because we did a lot better than France and Italy!
2. It is summer and summer is something to be enjoyed. Laptop in the garden, day out at the cricket or just having a nice beer in the sunshine. All of these things will be enjoyed over the summer so long as I have done sufficient work to deserve them. I must make the most of the summer to enjoy these opportunities and having all these things to be happy about actually helps me to be more motivated when it comes to doing PhD work.
3. I have also found a new network of people interested in Portuguese stuff which should give me cause to be cheerful. Although I have known about the Anglo-Portuguese Society for some years now I had never actually attended one of their events. Largely because they all take place in London! But when I did go down to London this week for a talk held at the Society by the British Ambassador to Portugal I was impressed. The talk itself was useful and worthwhile but the experience of meeting Society members and committee members was also positive and it is a potential outlet for my own research as it would be good to give a lecture their on my own work. It’s good to meet people with a passion for Portugal and a love of the country but I also met an academic who has, like me, been asked many times “Why Portugal?”. We both agreed that “Why Not?!” was by far the best answer we could give!
4. Actually doing some thesis work! This is a very good reason to be cheerful. For the moment, at least, writing about my research is not in the future tense! I have written, and redrafted, so many proposals over the years and set out what research I am going to undertake, but now I have research to write up and while drafting substantive chapters takes time it is enjoyable because it means that I have research findings already which I need to disseminate, data to analyse and theoretical frameworks to tweak.
5. More fieldwork to look forward to. Hopefully I will get back to Brussels in September and do some more fieldwork. I enjoyed my time in Lisbon and that seems like such a long time ago already. I need to get to know Brussels and exorcise the demons of my previous visit which didn’t go to plan. Before that I will need to finalise my travel and accommodation arrangements but I have my eye on somewhere to stay which looks feasible. Hopefully I will meet lots of interesting people who give me lots to think about!
6. Opportunities to present my research. I already have a major conference to look forward to where I will be presenting my research. Of course, one of my tasks over the summer is to prepare for this before I go to Bruges and give my paper. But I am looking forward to this and it seems that my supervisors and progress panel are pleased that I am making the effort to get out there and present. I have also agreed to present my research to the School of Modern Languages research seminars at Newcastle and will do this in February 2011. I have also submitted a proposal to present a paper at a workshop at the University of Maastricht in November. I don’t yet know how I have got on but if I can go it seems that the European Commission will be able to cover the cost of my travel and accommodation expenses. Nice!
7. Getting back in the teaching groove. While I have enjoyed not having the responsibility of teaching since Christmas I cannot deny that I am looking forward to getting back to Newcastle and doing seminar teaching again. At least it will be easier having done it before. Hopefully I will also have the opportunity to supervise one or two final year dissertations as well. And I have been asked if I would like to contribute to the lectures as well as the seminars and prepare and deliver a couple of lectures on the topics of EU foreign policy and Europeanisation. This will be excellent experience and I’m looking forward to it!
8. A new year of Politics Postgraduate Society events and challenges ahead. Again, as I have been away from day-to-day life in Politics at Newcastle I have not only missed teaching but have missed the general sense of community in our Politics Postgraduate Society. While organising events takes time, it is rewarding and helps bring us all together, so it will be good to get back in the groove there as well.
9. With age comes wisdom. In my next blog post next month I will reflect more upon this as I celebrate another birthday. For the moment at least I am telling myself that this is a good thing! Although with fewer and fewer birthdays in my twenties it is a little scary!
10. Most importantly I should be cheerful because I am doing something I enjoy and I have an income. I do not (yet) have to contemplate dole queues and for the moment, although searching and getting a job post-PhD will be a struggle, I should take comfort in the fact that my present and immediate future are relatively stable and, so long as the effects of the budget aren’t too destructive, I should be able to get on with my PhD and get it finished soon.
Reasons indeed to be cheerful!