7 April 2018: Today I've been thinking about this post from last month and, connected to it, this larger question of how I am spending my time this year. Something has changed--something small in some ways--but meaningful, I think. Simply put, these days, I find myself doing what I want to do more and not feeling bad about it.
Since college, I guess, I just pushed myself to keep going, keep working, keep saying yes. And it was easy because I loved it and I still love my work so much. (And as always, I realize what an incredible blessing this is.) I haven't been hugely successful by any definition of the word, but I've done okay (and lucky as heck) and it's been so rewarding and wonderful. My life is good.
But maybe it really is something about applying for full professor (the last (ever?) big push in terms of a promotion), turning 40, losing my friend Shannon, and just deciding that it was okay to be a bit self-focused and enjoy life more. Like the nerdiest (and therefore most "me") midlife [non]-crisis ever. And that's meant seemingly silly things like having entire evenings or weekend days where no work gets done. Or leaving the office some days as soon as my office hours are over to go for a long walk. (I practically skipped to my car yesterday at 3:00.) Or seeing two movies in a weekend. Or not stressing about passing on an event on campus.
Today has been a good day: got some work done this morning, did a bit of cleaning, then saw a movie and went for a walk with Amy, and hung out with Anna and Josh in the evening. I'll spend a big chunk of tomorrow volunteering as a judge at a trivia tournament that raises money for a local literacy program. At some point today, I realized that I am probably not going to get that stack of papers that I collected yesterday graded by Monday (thus the thinking about this post). And once again, I realized that's fine..
If this is 40 for me, I am (gradually becoming) okay with that.
No comments:
Post a Comment