More Anna

Friday morning I meet with Anna to talk about the disaster otherwise known as my dissertation. Anna immediately sets me straight on a number of things I have to do (most of which involve the creation of a giant map... don't ask). Then EDC interrupts. She has some question about dialect in some piece of the Attic scholia (again, don't ask). Anna is the dialect expert. Anna answers EDC's question without batting an eyelash. Then she adds a couple of her own observations.

It is sort of like watching fireworks. I am also filled with a strong sense that this is a club I would really like to belong to. I like to think that I could hack it in Anna's world, as a pioneer without female role models, but who am I kidding? Every so often, it is just really nice to witness every misconception about women's intellectual and professional capacity so elegantly and effortlessly disproven.

It is also kind of awesome to watch EDC defer to someone. I am not sure why - I think it's because she projects a little bit of the Better Than God image. I wonder whether I would feel the same way about a male professor. I think I would. My Infinitely-Better-Than-God thesis advisor (that dude is no dummy--and no shrinking violet in the ego department; he also never sleeps) messed up a date in an email he sent me last week. It was sort of gratifying.