Another thing that helped

[cremains]

... today as I was secretarying away, the sweetest Iranian rabbi came to visit me and said it was a horrible shame that "with all your learning" I was working a shitty secretary job (she won a place in my heart when she told me how proud she was to learn how to play the drums, but could never give a concert, because "first woman Persian rabbi cannot play drums in concert!"). Earlier a man I'm doing thesis-editing work for said the same thing and said he hoped my bosses were grateful.

I'm really not into the whole philosophy that blue collar jobs are for dumb people and the special ones must be rescued; I'm especially not into the idea that scholars shouldn't have to work.

But since I hate my job and feel such despair, it really helped.