Rooibos Chai
patreon
Important Life Update
🕑 Added 2022-07-29 23:37:50 +0000 UTCHey everyone!
TL;DR summary: I got a new job! That might mean less writing in the immediate future as I get used to a new schedule, but I'm still working on everything I'm working on. Feel free to alter your pledges if you need to!
Okay, and now a longer discussion of exactly what's going on with me...
For the past few years, I've been in grad school and working on a dissertation (though on average, I think I wind up being more productive in writing words of trans fiction rather than words of scholarly value, lol). During this time, I've gotten by through stringing together a couple of fellowships, each of which provided a small stipend. Your support has been really helpful to me throughout this whole time, as it's given me more stability and allowed me to stretch my resources a lot further. Nonetheless, this year I hit the end of my funding, and found myself facing a lot of uncertainty as both my stipend and health insurance go away as of August 1st.
Because of that, I've spent the past month or two thinking about what I'm doing with my life and what my plans are for the future. After feeling pretty stuck with my dissertation and pessimistic about my job options even were I to get my degree, I've ultimately decided to take a leave of absence from academia and go back to data analysis work in an office setting. Thankfully I have some applicable skills that got me a nice position, doing work that's maybe a little boring but very stable and secure.
Alright, so what does this mean for you though? Well, two things...
1) I'm not entirely certain what my schedule for writing is going to look like now. I've already preeetty sporadic in my productivity (I'm sorry!!) but in the immediate future it's even more of a question mark. I'm spending 40 hours a week in the office now, and those hours are all pretty busy as I try to get up to speed with the new job. I really hope that once I settle into my new routine, I'll figure out good opportunities to set aside for writing, because it's really important to me (and this job actually takes work/life balance really seriously!), but I want you to be aware that it might be a while before I figure out how best to do that.
2) Now that I'm making an actual living wage, I sooort of have complicated feelings about taking money from y'all. Like, I really, really appreciate the support, and it's been super helpful, particularly in the past year!! But now that I'm going to be in a better financial position, one thing I'm really excited about is the opportunity to start providing more monetary support of my own to other creators and people I care about (esp. once I get my first paycheck and can plan for my future).
Nonetheless, right now I think I'm going to continue to run this patreon for people who wish to support me... However, I want to reiterate that if you feel like you could better use your funds in your own life, or if you have the opportunity to support someone else who is in need, it will never hurt my feelings if you reduce or cancel your pledge to me.
So that's basically it! Thank you once again, and heyyy as a secret reward for actually opening this email and reading the whole dang thing, here's a link to a story that I'm working on: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cVf1KbSY3PNSS2u_5jNYfXViSv06kndG63wZruDlqCk/edit?usp=sharing
(I had hoped to finish it by the end of the month, but I wanted to go ahead and send this update now before the month rolls over and everyone's charged again on patreon. There will be a proper story post once I've finished ch3 & the epilogue, so this is just a sneak peek I guess, lol)
<3
Rooibos
Comments
Darkenedone
That’s such a mood tbh. I adore the teaching and the research, and I would love to keep doing both forever but, like I just can’t see it as something that’s a realistic career plan for basically anyone atm. So it’s super nice to hear of people managing to get out and land somewhere secure!
abyline
Thank you! It is sort of remarkable how much the response from people I know within academia isn't, like, disappointment or condolences but more like "You got out!! That's so great!!" lmao. It's still sort of a shame, because I really love teaching, but for so many reasons it seems like a really tenuous thing to aim for right now... In addition to teachers being compensated terribly and having to work very hard outside of class hours, higher ed is an awful job market that relies on exploiting adjuncts as real tenure track jobs vanish. And being trans at this particular moment in history is even more cause to worry, esp. in connection w/ teaching... Sigh.
Darkenedone
Congrats on the job! Speaking as another trans girl who's slowly running through a bunch of small fellowships after exhausting her phd stipend without finishing her damn dissertation, it's super great to hear that you've successfully escaped academia and found something that will keep food on the table! Please take all the time you need and don't feel pressured to produce content! Your writing is always well worth the wait.
Samantha Louise
Congrats on the job!
