Musings of a bored grad student

I sit writing in my lovely little office on the third floor of Alumni. It's a glorious autumn day and through my window I see giant oaks, their leaves still green as the summer. But here and there a little golden leaf drifts down, the sun catching its final dance. But reminding me that there is beauty beyond the realms of nature is the Corinthian pillar that stands so close to my window. Its curlicue tops almost within reach--the only thing that redeems this otherwise unremarkable building of grayish yellow. All of this seems like an indulgence amid my prosaic pursuits of the day: more drafts of pithy abstracts and proposals that attempt to play mind-games with over-worked reviewers. The pointlessness of this exercise is not lost on me. How bizarrely conceited I feel...pimping my research, worrying about my Dickensian writing, dotted as it is with passive -voice and an over abundance of clauses.
I crave moss-covered silences. I crave a place where my deadlines and my rejected proposals do not chase after me; where the stillness of a moment is not interrupted by the guilt of unaccomplished goals, the pestering of tasks left undone. I am no longer the Ulysses who craved the roiling waves of an open ocean; I want to linger with the Lotus Eaters, content in the languid warmth of each day.