It’s Fine
Last Sunday I received a thin rejection letter from a scholarship fund. I’ve been waiting for a reply for about 6 months (and the application process had dragged on for 6 months before that). It was my last chance to get funding for this sprawling PhD project, it didn’t come, it’s not happening and I just have to face it: It’s not going to get easier than it has been. I’m not going to be able to pay my assistants without seriously cutting into my food budget, or taking money off my credit card (real talk). I’m not going to save 300 dollars a month against the impending landslide of my student loans as I’d been rosily picturing in spare moments.
In one way, I’ve lost nothing, I’m at the same point I always was, having to work alongside doing my research, which will likely double the completion time. That’s fine. I guess it has to be, as I’ve designed this project myself and am committed to seeing it through. And, so few people can win the big scholarships after all, they must have thousands of applicants, so it’s hardly even a let-down. It’s just—
I needed the vote of confidence in my project, almost as much as the money.
Every other person I know who has finished a PhD has had funding in what I can only imagine were princely amounts. (They probably weren’t, but from the outside, that’s what it looks like). And more than just their having the ability to devote more time to their research, they could relax on an existential plane, knowing that someone with authority had said “wow, it’s really WORTH IT that Student X does that particular PhD study. That’s what the world needs!”
And no one is saying that to me.
As this is hardly the first rejection, as I am basically a hard-boiled egg with legs by this point (bobbing in the Sea of First World Problems) I didn’t even shed a tear when I heard of the death of my last hope. I just cancelled my evening plans and breathed rather forcefully through my nose for awhile. Everyone I know who has finished has had funding. The whole time. But not me. It’s fine. My debts are something I’ve grown expert at repressing, but it’s fine. My project is a good one, experimental, self-designed, it’s going to answer a question that actually fills a gap in the research, but it’s not going to get funding. Fine.
It’s fine it’s fine it’s fine at least I believe in me it’s fine.
There is a lot that could be said about the big questions of whether we have to suffer for our art, or to what degree we are our work. I am not going to get into those today. I just want to make the point here that no one can prove that you aren’t what you think you are capable of being. And that you can say NO—to the assessments of others– and even to the assessments of funding bodies who pay people just for the purpose of assessing you. You can grit your teeth and not believe it.
So I sat outside on Tuesday this week, searching my soul with the aid of an Aperol Spritz (truly the Queen of cocktails) and allowing for the possibility that my soul might whisper back to me “I don’t want to do this anymore.” I paused, but nothing spoke. It seems to still not even be a question. I’m not going to stop. I couldn’t stop if I tried. As someone once said (I think it was Harry Potter) “They’ll know…in the end.” They’ll see, when it’s done. Then it will be “And you did it ALL, without support?” That’s right. It’s been several years since I bought stocks in the vindictive refusal to quit—it’s really amazing how much power they can generate! And how much interest they accrue over time.