Better than expected, yet weird

The conference paper went over better than I expected it to - I really had expected to be challenged about my work, and although I saw a few puzzled faces, there were also a few smiles, and the questions/comments after were encouraging. One other presenter said he liked my style, which was pretty nice to hear since style is something that I've struggled with developing over the last few years.

It has also been weird being here. I found myself contemplating going to the graduate caucus meeting two days ago, then realized that I was no longer a graduate student. So those concerns, although still important, are not directly my concerns anymore.

That felt weird.

And I still find myself gravitating toward talking to graduate students at meet and greets and those kinds of things. Part of that is because graduate students are usually more open to complete strangers approaching them and they attend these things without having an already built-in network of buddies to hang out with.

It means I meet interesting, new people. But unless we both show up at the same conference a few years in a row, it usually doesn't amount to an ongoing connection. Not that those kinds of professional connections will actually be useful. None of us as grad students (or now as a newly doctored but untenured underemployed sessional) have any power in this game. So connections are comfortable, but their networking power will only emerge several years down the road.

There's a sizeable contingent here from my alma mater, and they are all quite intent on sticking to themselves, which unfortunately means that the people who I know from previous encounters don't seem interested in expanding their circle at this conference. So I find others to talk to.

I've talked to some very interesting people, including an international scholar whose name is the same as a very famous actor and who consequently has even better stories than mine about border crossing guard questions. It's been a productive conference so far and the bigger meet and greet is tonight, so I'm interested in meeting other new people as well.

But it will be nice to get back home again, as always.