Daze

There were many things I expected to be doing this summer, particularly writing, but it turns out that hasn't been happening so much.  In fact, the majority of my time has been spent reading, watching movies, and lounging by the local public pool.  I have worked in my classroom some, I'm house sitting for some friends, I've had some really wonderful dinners and lunches with colleagues and former students, but I haven't been terribly productive in the sense that I have produced anything.

And you know what?  I could care less.

Sometimes, it turns out, even the most well intentioned people with the loftiest of goals--well, okay, maybe not the loftiest--turn out to need to just stop.  To breathe.  To reconnect with what it is in them that makes them fundamentally who they are, and it turns out, for me, it's water, words, and movies.  They're a pretty great foray into my little mess.  There are other things that make up the sum total of who I am, namely the fact that I am a fiercely loyal friend and daughter and sister and aunt, a teacher who loves her job, and a woman who dreams of one day sharing her life with a good man, but all of that stuff has been on the back burner this summer.  Not because it isn't important, but because--when I pulled my head up from the daze that is every day life during the academic year--I realized that I am important, my mental health, my sense of self, my, well, me-ness matters, and so I'm getting back in touch with that.

Does that mean I'm lazy?  Unproductive?  Wasting a lot of time doing a lot of nothing?  Some may think so, but for me, this is the best summer I've had in years because there is no point, there is no pressure, there's just me and the sun and the words and the images I love, and we're all--it turns out, much to my total shock--doing just fine.