My post on Granada and Cordoba is coming tomorrow but I felt compelled to write this post today:
Thursday two weeks ago Veronica and I went to visit Michael in Saint Vincent's Hospital in Dublin following his bike accident which left him in a coma for two and a half months. He has been awake since early December but his recovery is slow as it was a horrific accident. I have thought about it consciously and subconsciously for the past two weeks and felt compelled to write in order to frame the the huge role Michael has played in my academic life for the past two years and how at the same time how incredibly fragile we all are. On reflecting on Michael it lead me to reflecting on how lucky I am with all the incredibly inspirational people I have in family members and friends.
Many of you will be aware of what a roller-coaster of a ride my PhD supervision journey was with leaving two supervisors at the University of Sussex to come to Dublin with a third whom for reasons only known to herself could not continue to play this role a year and a half into my time at UCD. Enter a very down to earth social economist Prof Brian Nolan who may not be a Geographer by any stretch of the imagination but who took the time to work with me when I was incredibly frustrated and lost. The second inspirational figure came in the form of Veronica whom if one day I can be half the teacher and mentor she has been to me I will be over the moon. Stepping right back from having been friends she took me on as a PhD student even though Labour Geography was not her area of expertise. But she also maintained that she needed support in this role and hence we were introduced to the incredible Michael Punch.
His first interaction with me was an email from a coffee shop in Damascus in which I outlined my work at that point and described where I wanted my PhD to go - I got a reply within 3 days which said he would be happy to have me as a student. Our first meeting was in his office when I got back to Dublin in August 2010 and what was supposed to be a quick introductory meeting ended up being an hour and a half discussion on everything about immigration and inequality in Dublin from education to policy to the area where it turned out we both lived. We had another meeting with Veronica three weeks later and that was the beginning of many meeting which rather than dread as I know some of my PhD colleagues do when they are meeting their advisors, I also looked forward to and which usually lasted 2 to 3 hours at a time! We had the most wide ranging discussions which of course were related to my PhD but also took in everything we were all working on and all the places we were going. I know that both Michael and Veronica would have come to Vancouver with me in August 2011 if we could have worked that one out somehow! The last conversation I had with Michael in person was on the 23rd of Augus last year t when I was at the photocopying centre in UCD preparing my colour photocopies for submission of the PhD thesis that afternoon. He stood with me for a few minutes and then said "I think I will leave you be as this is a one person job but know Siobhán that this is a good thesis and you have done a great job". We passed each other once outside in September but he was in a world of his own as only Michael seemed able to do while being in a crowd so all we said was hello, and two weeks latter on a horrible wet Thursday he was involved in a hit and run. The man that Veronica and I went to see in St. Vincents is a man still recovering from a horrific accident that has taken so much from him both mentally and physically, and it was a very difficult visit for all of us. So because I never got the chance to share the excitement and joy of my viva or to tell him what an incredible inspiration he has been to me I write it here in the hope that one day I might be able to share it with him.
As I said at the beginning of this post my reflections these past two weeks have made me think of all the inspirational people I have in my life from people that overcome personal tragedy to fight on, to people who dedicate a great portion of their life to raising others, to people who overcome addictions to travel on the path of their true life's passion, to people who free themselves of the shackles of organised religion and institutions to live their life in the best way they can, to people who follow a vocation because it is their passion, to people who continue to follow their dreams even when it is exhausting. These are all people I know!
I end this post once again by thanking Michael for the incredible role he played in my PhD but also by reflecting that our lives are also so incredible fragile. Even those people who inspire me all the time are delicate and so I live in the now as it is present and known to me.
Thursday two weeks ago Veronica and I went to visit Michael in Saint Vincent's Hospital in Dublin following his bike accident which left him in a coma for two and a half months. He has been awake since early December but his recovery is slow as it was a horrific accident. I have thought about it consciously and subconsciously for the past two weeks and felt compelled to write in order to frame the the huge role Michael has played in my academic life for the past two years and how at the same time how incredibly fragile we all are. On reflecting on Michael it lead me to reflecting on how lucky I am with all the incredibly inspirational people I have in family members and friends.
Many of you will be aware of what a roller-coaster of a ride my PhD supervision journey was with leaving two supervisors at the University of Sussex to come to Dublin with a third whom for reasons only known to herself could not continue to play this role a year and a half into my time at UCD. Enter a very down to earth social economist Prof Brian Nolan who may not be a Geographer by any stretch of the imagination but who took the time to work with me when I was incredibly frustrated and lost. The second inspirational figure came in the form of Veronica whom if one day I can be half the teacher and mentor she has been to me I will be over the moon. Stepping right back from having been friends she took me on as a PhD student even though Labour Geography was not her area of expertise. But she also maintained that she needed support in this role and hence we were introduced to the incredible Michael Punch.
His first interaction with me was an email from a coffee shop in Damascus in which I outlined my work at that point and described where I wanted my PhD to go - I got a reply within 3 days which said he would be happy to have me as a student. Our first meeting was in his office when I got back to Dublin in August 2010 and what was supposed to be a quick introductory meeting ended up being an hour and a half discussion on everything about immigration and inequality in Dublin from education to policy to the area where it turned out we both lived. We had another meeting with Veronica three weeks later and that was the beginning of many meeting which rather than dread as I know some of my PhD colleagues do when they are meeting their advisors, I also looked forward to and which usually lasted 2 to 3 hours at a time! We had the most wide ranging discussions which of course were related to my PhD but also took in everything we were all working on and all the places we were going. I know that both Michael and Veronica would have come to Vancouver with me in August 2011 if we could have worked that one out somehow! The last conversation I had with Michael in person was on the 23rd of Augus last year t when I was at the photocopying centre in UCD preparing my colour photocopies for submission of the PhD thesis that afternoon. He stood with me for a few minutes and then said "I think I will leave you be as this is a one person job but know Siobhán that this is a good thesis and you have done a great job". We passed each other once outside in September but he was in a world of his own as only Michael seemed able to do while being in a crowd so all we said was hello, and two weeks latter on a horrible wet Thursday he was involved in a hit and run. The man that Veronica and I went to see in St. Vincents is a man still recovering from a horrific accident that has taken so much from him both mentally and physically, and it was a very difficult visit for all of us. So because I never got the chance to share the excitement and joy of my viva or to tell him what an incredible inspiration he has been to me I write it here in the hope that one day I might be able to share it with him.
As I said at the beginning of this post my reflections these past two weeks have made me think of all the inspirational people I have in my life from people that overcome personal tragedy to fight on, to people who dedicate a great portion of their life to raising others, to people who overcome addictions to travel on the path of their true life's passion, to people who free themselves of the shackles of organised religion and institutions to live their life in the best way they can, to people who follow a vocation because it is their passion, to people who continue to follow their dreams even when it is exhausting. These are all people I know!
I end this post once again by thanking Michael for the incredible role he played in my PhD but also by reflecting that our lives are also so incredible fragile. Even those people who inspire me all the time are delicate and so I live in the now as it is present and known to me.
1 comment:
what a beautiful post! thank you.
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