Watson Report IV

Being back has been an adventure of its own. After such an epic end to my year, I was on an ultimate high. I needed to rest, to come down, but upon returning it was hard to find a place to do that.  I was busy right from the start. Registering for classes, job searching, moving to Canada. Just because I’d returned to the states temporarily didn’t mean my Watson had ended. I was still on the road of becoming.

I landed in the states a week or so before the conference. I spent that time in Memphis with my girlfriend, catching up after being separated for a year. It was surreal. She was disturbed though because after the first few days, I was back on my laptop dealing with the business of leaving her again. Dealing with bank accounts, consolidating loans, skimming student and working visa policies, I was back, but in a sense I was already gone.

She broke down crying one day, because she needed me to be in the moment with her. So I tossed aside my laptop and we hung out doing nothing and doing everything we could possibly fit in together. I left for the Watson conference for a few days and then we made our way to her folks’ place in Chattanooga. We lazily ran around her house, doing random stuff for a week. Smashing cheesecake into each other’s faces was the highlight (and the most work) we did during those two weeks. Then I was back on the road again.

Part of me was glad to be traveling. It was as if starting the Watson was the impetus for a life of world exploration and I was off to my newest adventure, graduate school in Linguistics. Excited to get back in the classroom, I landed in Vancouver and was greeted by old friends (I took summer courses at the same institution after freshman year). Then it hit me. I’m now a poor grad student.

Being a poor grad student is something all of my friends who’d already started would talk about. I had no idea what they meant. Now I do, haha!, and in some ways it’s great to be absorbed in the life of the mind, but on the other hand, that mind needs food for which you have to pay. So I set out to conquer the task of finding a job.

I put in applications for every type of job imaginable, because after all doing my masters is part of heading toward my career, I just need something to make that possible. After spending three weeks glued to my laptop, I finally landed a few jobs, a collection of various types of work to clock in the amount of hours I need. I’ll be at the writing centre, tutoring ESL, and working construction. Haw haw a renaissance man if I do say so myself! Whatever it takes.

Anyway, it’s been insane. Settling into life in one place has been its own adventure. I secured a place to stay within the last few months of my trip (I’m sharing a department owned grad house with a bunch of guys). The house has become a true community and now I’m surrounded by the world of language and linguistics.

Upon arrival everyone was thrilled to know how the year went and all of the things I discovered about language, culture, and language documentation. Where it was hard before to explain my experience, that is, to give people that 30 second spiel they wanted, I found eager listeners ready to hear about the entire experience and ready to discuss the particulars.

A few weeks after setting up in Canada, I flew back to the states, to Sewanee, my old college. I gave a presentation on my Watson and met with students that want to apply for the Watson this year. I surveyed my year expanding my 10 minute presentation to about 40 minutes, explaining along the way all of the things I did and how the Watson helped me grow through my interest in language documentation. All of my professors were glad to see me. I met up with my girlfriend (she’s a senior at Sewanee) and we did some camping and hung out a bit more before the school life returned to full swing. I flew back up to Vancouver and began classes.

Because of the Watson, from day one, I already know what I want to do for my masters. For my master’s thesis, I’ll be writing a sketch grammar of the Pa’umotu language, an endangered language of French Polynesia. I fell in love with this language during my trip around the Tuamotu islands, hopping on and off cargo ships. I’ll be writing the grammar and then applying the data to answering questions of language shift and ecology change over time.

Now that I’ve completed the fellowship, I excited to see what will become of the knowledge and wisdom I acquired this past year. I explored the culture of language documentation during my Watson year, now let’s see what becomes of me as I become a member of that culture. 

Watson Adventure Continued.