Fall Festival

I've battled my first bad bout of homesickness in the last week or so, for several reasons.  The days are getting shorter and darker (dark by 5:30 now, and by 4:30 when exams end...sunrise just beginning at 7 am).  I've been overwhelmed by work:  I inadvertently scheduled two major projects due the day after fall break, and I've been frantically trying to dig out from under my own self-inflicted torture.  And I just flat-out miss everyone.  I haven't had time to meet many people or develop many friendships here, and I haven't had the time I've wanted to be in touch with everyone from home.  I'm at that point in the semester where you feel like you've been working so hard for so long, and yet you still have so far to go.  All of that left me quite cranky by the end of this week.

So on Friday, when I had graded the last of the first set of projects, I left my office a little early and got in touch with my domestic side.  I cleaned the kitchen for the first time all week.  I made some bread (it's "Five Minute Artisan Bread," so don't get overly impressed), some pumpkin soup, butternut squash casserole, and apple crisp.  I roasted some little crouton-size pieces of butternut squash to garnish my spinach salad.  And I had myself one delicious fall dinner.

When the kitchen was (finally) clean, I went to CAT on Tap, a social gathering for catechetics (CAT) majors.  They invited the CAT professors (of which I am one) to sit as a panel and answer their questions.  They mostly wanted to know what to expect out in the field, lessons we'd learned and challenges we'd faced, so their questions were easy to answer.  Afterwards we mixed and mingled, and I enjoyed talking to many of my students about themselves and not just their assignments and class concerns.  Everyone considered the evening a rousing success:  about 40 students were present, up from six at previous events.

Yesterday, I went to the Big City with a gal I've been getting to know.  She knew of a few consignment shops and we went to check them out.  I came home with a warm & cozy cashmere sweater for about $20.  She found two suits for close to the same price.  We took a little detour to Trader Joe's, a store I'd never visited before but which I intend to visit again - yum!  We enjoyed a beautiful sunny Saturday with the last of the fall colors shining brightly.  Best of all, we laughed and talked and enjoyed getting to know each other better.

One valuable lesson I learned while teaching high school:  sometimes you just have to stop working.  I hate the feeling that my work isn't finished; it nags at me and the black cloud hangs over me when there is work still undone.  But if I keep working and trying to keep up, I end up tired and cranky and frustrated and with little joy in life.  I learned that lesson again this week, as I struggled so hard to keep up with the many and varied tasks I faced.  A few hours in the kitchen, a delicious meal with plenty of leftovers at the end, and some social time, all put me in a better frame of mind.  I renewed my resolve to break away from work periodically, to give myself the mental break necessary to do that work well.  I have to learn this lesson all over again in these new circumstances, and figure out how to make it work in my new life.  But I believe it's an important lesson, and I'm glad I learned it again.

Hopefully I can live by it in these final weeks of the semester.