So...it's, um, December.
The end of December.
I think I underestimated this little job of mine. And I'm not sure why; I grew up around teachers, knowing that their evenings usually consist of lesson plans and a pile of papers to grade. But somehow I neglected to consider that all my ambitious projects might become, well, too ambitious, once the school year really kicked in. Especially since the first year of teaching is supposed to be the hardest.
(And I sure hope so, because I can't imagine another year like this semester.)
December found me lying on the couch every night, pretending to do work when all I could really manage was watching TV. All my plans to research, to work on this little blog, to write, even to read for my book club: out the window. Instead I was racing to grade research papers, create lesson plans, and play handbells in the school choir (but that's another story). And I surfaced about a week ago, back home on winter break, to discover that the year is basically over.
Really, the only manageable goal for this first year of teaching seems to be: "keep calm." Or, as a poster in my coworker's office says, "Keep calm and drink coffee." (Adapted from those WWII-era Brits, who knew what was up.)
So that's what I've been doing lately: keeping calm. And drinking a lot of coffee (and tea). And one of these candles my sister gave me for Christmas has been helping, too. It makes me think I'm strolling on a windswept beach somewhere, instead of holed up with a backlog of research papers.
