Work

I'm working too hard! And it's beginning to make me crabby.

Teaching classes via long distance is more demanding and time consuming than doing it face to face. Much that I usually do by scrawling notes on papers now has to be typed out in emails, a far more demanding process. Also I'm converting my lecture notes for Script Analysis from their ragged nature into a form that can be handed out, read, and discussed in class. While this task may make class preparation easier in the future, right now it eats up a huge amount of time.

Maybe now that I've read and responded to the thesis of one of my MFA students and the dissertation of one of my PhD students, things will settle down a little. 'Course I've got 15 scripts to read tomorrow for the selection process for our one-act play festival, and today I received 20 papers to grade, probably on Sunday. I've also got a set of PhD quals to read—and so it goes, on and on and on and on.

As a result, I go to the support groups, the patient potlucks, etc., but have yet to check out the gym, although we're urged on a daily basis to exercise. This is turning out to be anything but a "proton vacation."

'Course, unlike many of the other patients here, I'm not on vacation. And I'm very thankful that I can be teaching my classes, etc. instead of finding it necessary to take a leave without pay.

But then I have to wonder if it's the demands of my job, or if I'm just doing it to myself. Again.

I come from a long line of forebears who considered it a point of religion to work. To work was to do our Christian duty. Recreation was only acceptable in so far as it prepared us for more work, and even then it was a little suspect. If you worked, you were a valid person; if you didn't, you were worth-less. I watched both my grandfather and my father, in their last years, sink into what must have been a kind of depression. Just sitting. Just looking out the window, seemingly seeing nothing. Their work was done, but they were still alive. Why? What do you do when you have nothing to do? Who are you if you have nothing to do? Perhaps it's partly the fear of being the next Bert to end up sitting there staring out the window that keeps me from thinking about retirement.

I have long thought I need to develop the ability to enjoy life and feel worthwhile even though I'm not being productive. However, I don't really have time to do it, 'cause I have all this work to do.

Well, at least I'm not bored here in Loma Linda.

Treatment count: 9 down, 36 to go.