Thanks for the input on my poll from last week.  I have made a decision about my job.  I have decided to withdraw my application for the position.  I will finish up my current contract, which ends in June.  After that, I am free to do whatever I want.

This decision has not come easily.  I have gone back and forth, many, many, times.  I have talked to many friends about this.  And ultimately, intuition has prevailed over logic.  Logically speaking, I should have come to the conclusion to keep my job.  We’re in a rough economy, and I should be grateful for the job I have.  I should also keep my job until I have another one lined up.  Etc. Etc.  Blah Blah Blah.

The reason I am not doing any of these sound and reasonable things is because:

1)  I feel like I am going to throw up every day before I teach.  This feeling has not gotten better in the 5 years that I have been teaching.

2) I found out from the Dean that the college will not support my development of a research program.  I could deal with the nausea associated with #1 above if I had the opportunity to do something I truly love, but there’s no sense in putting up with the teaching/nausea situation if I can’t do the research.

3) I have WAY too many conversations with parents of COLLEGE STUDENTS.  This should not happen. I also get lots of e-mails from entitled, snarky, and otherwise dim students, who detail at great length all of the ways that I am unfair and am ruining their lives.  I am not even remotely joking about this.

4) If you’ve ever taught before, you know that the prep is CONSTANT.  I work evenings, weekends, all day long during the week.  I feel like I never see Holden.  The first day of classes this semester, I was away from the house for 13 hours.  I just can’t do this anymore.  I worked constantly in grad school, and also worked quite a bit as a postdoc.  With a young, very active child, I can’t keep up with everything.  Holden doesn’t see enough of me, I don’t see enough of him, my house is a disaster area pretty much constantly, the house needs major renovation (and there is no time to do it), and I never have time for myself.  Ever.

So there it is.  My completely self-centered reason for withdrawing my job application is that I want my life to be easier.  It feels like a copout, but damn, it feels like the right thing to do.

Because I am curious what others think, I am starting a poll.  I would like to know whether:

1)  I should renew my teaching contract for next academic year (if not, this would mean I could be finished with my job in June).

2)  I should interview for my job next month and see whether the students get less crazy and the work load gets any easier to manage.  This would mean signing another 1-year contract for the 2011-2012 school year, if I get the job.

3)  I should interview for my job next month and renew my contract for the 2011-2012 school year, if I get job, while surreptitiously training myself for another job under the guise of introducing students to new, career-relevant material in my courses.  Once I have sufficiently trained myself (via teaching my students about this new area), I quit my academic job, and start my own consulting business.

4) Other

As I snuggled with H in his bed tonight (our daily going-to-bed ritual), he chattered away about “needing” a brother or sister.

“I need a baby,” he demanded.

“Oh, really?” I inquired.

“Oh yeah, but I have YOU mommy.”

“Well, thanks…I think.”

“I need a sister!” he demanded.

“But then you’d have to share our attention with your sister.  Are you sure you’d be OK with that?”

“Oh yeah….”

Thankfully after that, he changed the subject.  I felt like telling him that I need my son to start sleeping through the night (we’ve recently been reduced to bribing him with morning chocolate if he sleeps through the night).  Or, that I need my son to start taking naps again (he hasn’t taken a nap over an hour in length since he was 18 months old, and dropped naps completely by the age of two.)  And he has the nerve to ask for a brother or sister….

Kill me now….

I’ve been taking Kaye’s death really hard.  Surprisingly so, given that we weren’t altogether close.  I keep thinking about her at odd times during the day.  I checked out her blog again after a long hiatus, which chronicled her time in VT since moving here in late 2004.  I realized that she embraced VT as her adopted home (in much the same way as Rob and I have), and that she grew to adore everything that our little green state has to offer.  I found myself surprised at many points, especially when reading about her depression (she was constantly smiling and surrounded by friends).  This made me feel particularly crappy that I was not there for her in the ways that she really needed.  I hope she had friends to fill that niche for her.  It’s also really weird to read someone’s blog after they have died; everything about a blog is so conversational, so present.  It’s hard to believe that the writer could really be gone.  I read about the tough project that she and Rob had to work on together, over night, after putting in a full day at the office.  I had forgotten about that time (I think it was in 2005 or so), but as soon as I read her words it all came back—the insane deadlines, the stress, the expectations.  A lot of her blog entries were about work….about the 12 hour days, about the 2nd job she took at the grocery store, about stress, disappointment, and longing.  It just all feels like a waste.  So anticlimactic.  I don’t want all of *my* blog entries to be about work, stress, disappointment, etc., because I don’t want my *life* to be about work, stress, disappointment, etc.  But I think that many of them are.  And I think that my life is.

The two most chilling entries were these:  the next to the last entry she ever wrote, was about how she gave up carpooling, public transportation, and walking, to indulge in buying a car (the same car in which she ultimately lost her life).  She talked about the freedom of being able to go wherever she wanted, whenever she wanted.  I read this and winced.  Of course, how could she have known?  How could anyone have known?  The other chilling entry was a self-effacing rant about the state of her apartment, how messy and unkempt it was, and what other people might think about it if it were the apartment of a dead person.  Her family is here this week to collect her belongings.  They are in the apartment of that dead person.

All of this foreshadowing–how much of our own destinies do we script?  How much of my own future ending can be gleaned through my writing?  How much of what I write about will be meaningless when I am dead?  I need to find a way to do what I want with my life and my time, while I can.  I need to let all of the other bullshit go.  I need to really not care so much about my stupid job or career.  So what if I worked so hard for it?  That time is gone now, and I’m not getting it back.  H is here now, and he is what matters.  And we’re off to a good start in 2011, H-wise.  Every Saturday from mid-January through the end of March, H and I will be sharing a special yoga class together.  I have been wanting to do this for a long time, but kept finding excuses about the cost or about being able to fit it into our schedule.  I finally just reserved our slot in the yoga class, money and time be damned.  It’s time to just start doing things, instead of thinking about doing them, and ruminating over not having done them.  I also took H to the ENT today, and got the scoop:  If he has 2 more ear infections between now and April, he will get tubes again.  My H-related New Year’s goals are already well underway, and I am feeling really good about that.  My year is really going to be about doing all the shit that I’ve always wanted to do but never have permitted myself.

As H would proclaim:  “Cheers!”

It’s New Year’s Eve.  I am surrounded by family.  I am alive.  I am healthy (relatively).  I am content.  The events of this past week have brought into sharp focus all of the joy that is in my life.  I am a lucky person.

In no particular order, goals for 2011:

1.  Holden has an ear infection.  He has an appointment to see his ENT on January 4th.  My goal is to get tubes in his ears again, so we don’t go through what we went through last winter.

2.  I have been invited to give a presentation as part of my application for Program Director at my job.  I will give the talk, and I will get the job.  Anything that happens after that is anyone’s guess.

3.  I will learn how to knit.  I want to take a class at the local yarn shop.  I’ve wanted to do this for quite some time.  Now is the time to do it.

4.  I have been pretty good with exercising.  Not great, but certainly better than I had been.  I keep getting sick, and that keeps derailing my efforts.  I have a cold right now, so I haven’t gone running since Monday.  I hope that this weekend I’ll be back on it, and I can get back into a routine of exercise 4 times each week.

5.  I want to take a yoga class with H.  I don’t know how in the world I will fit this in.

6.  I want to give H swimming lessons next summer.

7.  I would like to have a cleaner house.  I am not above hiring a housecleaner to help me with this.

8.  I WILL maintain better contact with my close friends and family, and tell them how much I care.  I missed the boat with Kaye, and now it’s too late for that, but I won’t let that happen with the other people in my life who I love so dearly.  Relatedly, I won’t sweat the small stuff.  Life is indeed, too short.

9.  We will replace all of the windows in our house.

10.  I will finish the paint job I started in August, and I will paint two more rooms in our house.  It’s taking me FOREVER to get any of these little projects done.

11.  Rob and I will plan a long weekend getaway for our 10th wedding anniversary this summer.

Think I can pull it off?

Edited to Add:  Other things I would like to add to this rather lengthy list:

12.  Go on a rock climbing date with Rob.

13.  Learn to cross country ski.

14.  Get regular massages.

15.  Drink more water.

Fin!