I could write a book on how to juggle a full-time job and a research career! My own story is certainly not intended as a blueprint!
I can’t say there weren’t disadvantages to juggling. A trip to Glasgow University for a supervision meeting or even just to visit the Library meant allowing for travelling time. Visiting the University Library’s fabulous Special Collections – my favourite place in Glasgow, what with the collections, the view, and the deep, deep peace up there in the sky where nobody would disturb me -meant rearranging the weekend to spend Saturday morning there. And I was lucky that Special Collections didn’t bring in the Monday-Fridays only arrangement until after I’d finished!
The alternative, of course, was to use my annual leave for library trips and research visits further afield. Yes, I had chosen a subject where most of my raw materials would be close to hand. But even a trip to Edinburgh University Library or the National Library of Scotland meant allowing a whole day – it wasn’t worth going for less, when I had to allow over an hour to get there from the centre of Glasgow.
Last year, I couldn’t understand how I suddenly seemed to have more annual leave available – until it dawned on me just how much I’d been using for research! I also burned more midnight oil than was good for me, and regularly fell asleep over my books at night.
To add to the mix, my husband had one knee replacement operation four weeks before I was due to submit my thesis, and the other one just after my viva, when I had revisions to get done to a tight deadline. Things did get a little tense.
What I would say to anyone else travelling the same research journey is that you need to look for short-cuts in your domestic arrangements. In our case, we already had a cleaner for two hours a week – more than worth the investment! – and I hired a gardener and decorator for one-off jobs during the last year of my research, too. (Teenage boys and ironing don’t naturally sit together, but even a fifteen year old youth will find that he can iron one or two of his own shirts in an emergency.)
You also need a certain amount of staying power and sheer bloody-minded determination. Anyone who knows me would agree that I can be extraordinarily determined when I put my mind to it!
