We are about 1/5 of the way through the semester. Â Not that I am counting. Â Things with work are going well, although it has been very challenging. Â I teach six 75-minute classes each week, all of which involve intensive discussions, group work, demonstrations and in-class experiments. Â It’s a lot of planning. Â Plus, I am advisor to 40 students. Â Plus I work with admissions on marketing initiatives for recruiting students. Â Plus I have to work on improving student retention. Â Plus I manage the adjuncts, substitute for them when they can’t make it to class, evaluate their performance, and give them guidance. Â Plus I work on curriculum development and course proposals. Â And run panels on choosing majors. Â And choosing careers. Â Plus I am starting a Psychology Club. Â And I am on a committee to establish an IRB at our institution. Â And I have appealed to the Systems and Software Committee on behalf of our division for a major software purchase. Â And I serve on the Library & Academic Resources Committee. Â And I supervise a work-study student. Â And I update our bulletin boards and website. Â And write letters of recommendation for former students. Â And hire people to teach courses in the spring. Â And decide what those courses are. Â And when they should be offered.
So I am a wee bit tired.
I miss Holden a lot. Â I try to be really available for him in the mornings before we all leave for work and school. Â And I try to be available for him in the evenings (although this is usually trickier b/c I have to juggle making dinner with also giving him attention). Â When Holden wakes up at 5 or 5:30AM, I usually let him crawl into bed with us for a while, so he can get some good snuggle time with us. Â I try to grab these little snippets of time with him, however I can. Â We do fun things on the weekends, nearly every weekend, and every evening, (even though I promised myself I wouldn’t), I end up doing work, simply because that’s the only way it will all get done. Â I do think it will get better as I get more experience with my job. Â The courses I am teaching this term are all new preps, so although I did a lot of work on the courses over the summer, I am still familiarizing myself with how to teach the material, pretty much as I go. Â I’ve adapted to teaching in this new environment fairly well, even though it wasn’t as seamless as I had hoped or expected. Â I came from a large research university where teaching was done in a very lecture-based way. Â At this new institution, things are much more interactive. Â It is requiring some adjustments on my part, but on the whole, I feel like I made some progress this week with feeling more comfortable with the back-and-forth that should be a part of a good college dialogue. Â I am confident it will get easier. I just think I am in for a very hard year.
Some of the things I wonder about:
1. Â How will I find time to exercise more than once each week?
2. Â How will I master the art of having meals planned for each day of the week?
3. Â How can I manage my time better so I don’t have so much work to do in the evenings?
4. Â Related to #3 above, how will I have time to read a novel, watch a TV show, or learn to knit in the evenings?
5. Â How can I feel less guilty about spending so much time away from Holden?
6. Â How can I get people to stop asking me ridiculous questions about when I plan on having a second child? (Um, I am too tired, and I don’t want to be more tired than I already am, thankyouverymuch!)
7. How can I fit in a massage?
8. Â How can I fit in a optometrist appointment, since I recently lost my emergency back-up pair of glasses at a local park, and they are nowhere to be found, and I can’t see when I teach or when I drive, but there is no time to deal with this b/c I am too busy blindly doing my job?
9. Â How can I sleep in?
10. Â Sleep?
11. Â More sleep?
So yeah, things are going well. Â I still really enjoy my job. Â I love the challenge of it. Â It’s just a matter of finding that balance where I feel as if I am doing as much for my personal life as I am for my professional life. Â I feel like finding the fulcrum is not a generic act—rather, with each new situation you encounter, you have to find a new way of supporting yourself and your family. Â Balance is situation-specific. Â And here we are in a new situation, trying to gain solid footing, trying not to fall.