The first entry was typed on a tablet–there are a few typos. The second on a constricted keyboard–there are a few excrescent words and misspellings. But I hit submit. I should enlarge the minuscule font to something readable.
And now for another story. Perhaps because of my condition I have allowed others to exploit my good will. I mentioned that my parents were artists. I will digress a moment. When I was a boy, I drew cartoons. My father told me a story about Picasso and Picasso’s father. The story was that Picasso was a prodigy whose paintings were so good that the father decided to stop painting altogether. Now fast forward to the present. I decided to begin drawing again. My instructor suggested that perhaps my father did not want me to compete with him. I certainly had to overcome the sense that I was competing with him, even now. I chose to study mathematics in college. I ended up supporting myself for a while as a programmer and system administrator. I did not like system administration, and decided to pursue a doctorate in mathematics. This was some time after my father had died.
Eventually I earned a Ph.D. in mathematics. I now believe that was a mistake: I found academia exploitative. Here is my “shtick” on the subject:
I left academia after joining the staff of a research group, where I was relegated to low-academic-value technical support. I was not included as a coauthor in any of the peer-reviewed publications of the group. Whether my non-inclusion was my fault, theirs or some combination, it does not matter. Salary increases that were promised were not forthcoming. I left and resolved not to provide technical support to academics–I have done more than enough for one lifetime. If academia must be winner-take-all, then the winners should be satisfied with their winnings–I will not compound my losses with any further participation. While it is true that life is tough, that cuts both ways: you don’t have to help your predators. This year I have turned down requests to serve as Senior Personnel on two NSF grants. I’ve turned down an offer to participate in an NSF workshop this year. After that, there was a peremptory demand to edit another grant proposal I wasn’t involved in–one year after I left! Next, a professor needed assistance rebuilding a computational cluster. Pay or no pay, as a matter of principle I refuse to do any more low-academic-value work for academics. I could list other collaborations that led to publications for others, as well as teaching and service that wasn’t counted by the local administration, but this would be tedious.
I am perhaps omitting details that would be helpful. This will have to do, until someone asks for clarification of this “confession.” I have had a nagging sense that my differences, some of which I manage to disguise somewhat, have kept me back; also that others perceive, consciously or otherwise, someone vulnerable, exploitable. I hope this isn’t presumption or paranoia. (Joke: “I’m not paranoid–am I?”) For this reason I decided to stop playing winner-take-all games that I was systematically losing. It is not always possible to avoid predator-prey behavior–behavior often relegated to the animal kingdom, an unforgiving domain from which humans imagine their superior evolutionary development and civilization afford them some protection.
I began drawing again.