The odd starts and stops of a life “on break”:

My spring break vacations started Friday. I don’t think we are going to manage to go anywhere. I have lots of work to get caught up on – because after a full day of teaching you have another half day of grading ahead of you. Ah well, I have thirty-seven teaching days until my seniors graduate, and then I have that two month vacation (summers have lost a month somewhere along the way – May 28- Aug. 7).

I had a bad day Friday, as the kids were more than ready to be gone. It seemed ill advised to start a new topic before the break, so I made the mistake of showing a film in my last two classes that the kids had no interest in. I created a situation where I had to monitor/discipline bored children, where the effective thing to have done would have been to simply teach the next lesson – break be damned. Live and learn.

Jes taught today at Third Degree this afternoon and E was having a “don’t put me down” day, so I am not off to any kind of start on my break workload. Bastian is still having some issues related to his vestibular short circuit – the occasional middle of the night “accident”. I got up at four a.m. to clean up a digestive mess and I just stayed up as that time is close to the regular start of my day. I grabbed the latest New Yorker and went up to Uncle Bill’s for a crack of dawn steak and eggs spring break breakfast. Jes called at 6:30 wondering where I’d gone. I came home and took E. so she could sleep in. Later, we hit some estate sales with Vanessa. No major purchases to report.

Neither Jes nor I feel very well. Jes might have a spring cold and I am detoxing stress. I took a nap after Jes got home from teaching and I dreamed that our house was being invaded by my students – apt image. They’ll remain in my knotted muscles until well into this break.

It’s now “late” Saturday night and we are both on laptops, listening to NPR. I read through the list of topics on – stuff white people like – and currently embody much of their satire. The graduate school essay (#81) was particularly funny to me as I just taught both Lacan and Zizek to my A.P. kids. I am burnt out – good thing I have nine days off.

I am missing the energy and financial wherewithal that used to propel me out into the night on a night like this. Alas, I’m in a different phase of life. I need gas in my car and diapers on my kid more than I need to celebrate St. Pat’s. I also will need to go to bed long before the night gets hopping. Speaking of which … g’night.