…finding it hard to believe I’ve been away from this space for so long. This was not a planned absence, believe me. I have wanted to come here, to write, to reach out (AGAIN) for a long time now and haven’t been able to muster up the energy? courage? will? to do so.
….kind of wondering why I am here. I don’t want to use this space as a place to complain, and I suspect that is the reason my writing mojo has left me recently. It’s been a tough summer, friends, so instead of focusing on the past, I’m going to go with a Currently post to try to get my head together and get back in the game.
…Loving the ATGIB book club that Engie started. This has been such a bright spot in my summer. I’ve never been in a book club before, and the experience has far exceeded my expectations. I find that I am reading more carefully, paying attention to what resonates with me, so that I can share (too much) with my fellow readers. I love that the book is holding up for me, and that I am experiencing new insights. I just love everything about it, and will miss it when this is over!
…Also loving all of your blogs, and the beautiful snippets of summer joys (and, well, challenges, a la San’s tile saga) you’ve shared. Thank you for reminding me that there is a world out there, that it’s kind of fun in many ways, and that I should maybe try to engage with it a bit more (as I hoped to do at the start of 2023).
…Dreading the start of contract next week. I’m not ready, friends. It’s been a long summer of working without a break, and I’m kind of fried. So I am playing hooky on the first day. Why? Keep reading. š
…Looking forward to a day trip to Chicago on Monday. This is a just-for-me trip to the Art Institute to see the Van Gogh exhibit they have this summer. I cannot wait. I have a parking reservation, tickets ($$, yeesh) to the AIC and the exhibit, and plans to wander a bit before everything opens.
…Sleep deprived, thanks to my (new) neighbor, who decided that this morning at 12:15 AM (so, 15 minutes past midnight) was a good time to crank up the bass on whatever music they were listening to. Not. Cool. Dude. This is a new neighbor, and I admit that I was the cranky old lady who emailed apartment management in the middle of the night to ask them to stop this asap. Quiet hours, for the record, start at 9 or 10. I’m cool with that. I’m not cool with someone thinking that it’s okay to crank the bass when they share a wall with someone. Yeah. No.
…Grateful to my brother’s kids, who are prioritizing time with my parents (their grandparents) in their brief times at home before going back to college. My brother and sister in law did an amazing job, raising two sensitive, loving young adults (HOW?) who value the time they spend with family, and actually make the time to do so. My brother’s oldest just spent two days with my parents, who were just over the moon happy. So thank you, A&M. You’re awesome. <3
…Getting back to work, and hoping that by posting this pathetically superficial overview of my life right now that I’ve managed to break through whatever weirdo barrier my brain was putting up to writing on my own dang blog this summer. Sheesh.
And finally, because I am feeling a bit unmoored and uncertain right now… a bit of a quote to share…
āIĀ see my path, butĀ IĀ donāt know where it leads. Not knowing whereĀ Iām going is what inspires meĀ toĀ travel it.ā ~Rosalia de Castro
Take care, my friends.
The book club is a lot of fun! I’m enjoying it too.
I’ve never been in one! I never realized they could be so much fun. (My mother belongs to two book clubs that make, um, questionable book choices. Her experience is about as far from mine as you can get! :>)
Oh gosh Anne, it doesn’t matter how often you post. I’m just glad that you do! I know what you mean about not wanting to post about the bad times, but it’s OK. Sometimes all you can do is say “I’m not sure where I’m going with this, but here’s what’s up”.
Boo to the end of summer and the reboot of work! Yay to the CHI trip! The Art Institute was one of the first places that I went on my first solo trip and it was a near religious experience. Also boo to your neighbor and in that situation your choices are to put up with whatever or to play the cranky old lady card. You made the right choice.
I don’t know where my path is leading either, but here’s to the journey!
Thanks, Birchie. I love reading your posts, maybe even especially when you share your work- and life-related trials. (Side note: Why does no one ever say just “tribulations”? I almost typed “trials and tribulations” and was tempted to just put “tribulations” but.. it sounded weird! And wow, that got me off track…)
I love love love the AIC and can’t wait to get there tomorrow. Wish me luck with the drive + parking. Egads.
Toasting to your (soon-to-be-free-from-work) journey!
Hi! I’m Daria from momofchildren. Welcome back and enjoy your exhibit- would love to read about it when you come back. Be well!
That’s the plan – as long as I can get there and park with minimal trauma. š (I am not a city person, yikes, which is kind of hilarious considering I lived in West Philadelphia for YEARS…)
If you can’t use your blog space to complain, where can you complain? I feel like if I categorized by posts appropriately “whining/complaining” would have the most number of entries!
I know I said this to you before, but I’m so glad that ATGIB book club has been so successful. It is fun to read so closely and hear everyone’s different takes on the plot and personalities. I never would have imagined there were so many Sissy defenders out there!
True, that. I just feel like I go AWOL and then come back here and dump my whiny complaints all over. There is some good in life – right? – and so I just feel like I should be able to write about that, as well. (OTOH, that has been hard to come by recently… recent connections with people notwithstanding…)
And yes, oh, my goodness. If this book had not held up it might have broken my heart.
So happy to see you pop in my Feedly (haha – hey, at least your posts are showing up, even if you haven’t posted for a little while)… and no need to apologize or downplay your post by saying it’s a superficial update. I love updates of any kind, friend!! And sometimes just sitting down and writing a (supposedly) boring life update is just what you need to get your mojo back… we all go through ebbs and flows with our blog (or life, for that matter) but this space is yours and you can show up as often as you like and you should KNOW that people are here waiting for you!
I vote superficial overview (which it is NOT, just believe all the comments!) over no overview š
Thanks, friend. I really wish your Feedly issue would magically fix itself, because I really dislike missing your posts (and I am not on top of things enough to wander by every day, sigh). I do love being in this space and sometimes just need to remind myself of that, if that makes sense? I think of “all of you” living your lives and it makes me feel just a bit more connected to the world. So, thanks, for the support and the comments and, well, everything. <3
What a happy day to see a post from you.
ATGIB has been so much fun – that said, the book is SO much sadder than I remember. I forgot so many details from reading it just over a decade ago. I think I read it through different eyes now that I’m a wife and mother?
I would be all over that art exhibit. Van Gogh is my favourite artist and my husband and I even made a spontaneous visit to a temporary exhibit when we were in Rome last spring. It was AMAZING! If we had all the money in the world one of the first things my husband would want to do, I think, is secure a Van Gogh. And then install a chair in front of the painting so he could spend the rest of his life staring at the painting. He loves art that much!
Oh, Elisabeth, I will email you All The Photos of the Van Goghs. You and John would have loved this. There were other artists represented, too – they contextualized it along a timeline when Van Gogh was interacting with and painting alongside four other artists – Georges Seurat, Paul Signac, Emile Bernard, and Charles Angrand. (I got that from the website for the exhibition, ha. I don’t have THAT good of a memory anymore!) Anyway, I kind of fell in love with Signac’s work, too – I already knew of and loved Seurat. If you are ever in the midwest you MUST hit the Art Institute. They have an astonishing standing collection – including several Van Goghs! – and it was so fun to visit old friends during the rest of my visit.
And yes! ATGIB is so poignant and sad. I wonder, too – do you think your perspective is framed by the fact that your daughter is about the age of Francie in the book? I was wondering how the parents in the group were perceiving it, particularly if their kids were near in age to Neeley and/or Francie…
I, for one, would love to hear all of your complaints. You read enough about all of our complaints! But I totally understand if you don’t feel comfortable talking about them. Just know that we are here and want to hear from you, no matter what kind of post you give us!
You may regret this comment, friend. š (KIDDING! I wouldn’t dump them all here, but there are minor things that pop up that sometimes I just need to get out of my head…) You are so right, though, in that we all face challenges and things that drive us berserk – and sometimes sharing them is the best way to deal with them! That said, while there are things to grumble about most days… there are also good things, and I need to remember that, too!
But why do you work non-stop all summer and now all of a sudden the autumn contract starts? Don’t you get any summer holidays?
I’m glad you got to participate in the book club – was that just a summer thing? Your trip to Chicago sounds exactly like something you needed, I hope you enjoyed it!
Susanne, you’ve hit on my problem. I technically am not paid to work in the summer – I have a 9-month contract (typical for faculty in US Universities) and so I’m “on contract” from ~mid-August (this year, it started Monday 8/21) through ~mid-May. If I do not pick up a summer course, then my paychecks stop in early June, and restart in early September. Because of that, summer is technically my “vacation”. I don’t get paid vacation like people in regular jobs do. I’m not (technically) supposed to take time off during contract, but pretty much everyone travels or takes some time off over winter break. I work through the summer – and so do many of my colleagues – because we honestly can’t get to all of our work during contract year, when we teach, and have official meetings, etc. Summer is “our” time, and is often when we work on grants, manuscripts, or (in my case) getting a student to the finish line with her dissertation. That was WAY more info than you wanted, I’m sure, but it’s a bit of an odd situation. My parents honestly don’t get it, and I’ve been doing this for over 10 years now (that’s a whole post on its own…).
Book club is awesome! I think we go through mid to late September. Engie has been fantastic at spearheading it, and I am so going to miss the interaction when it’s over! And Chicago was great, though overwhelming. I hope to post more on that soon!
Hope you are doing well, my friend. I still lament the fact that we were not able to get together this summer. Some day!!!
That sucks about having to continue working without any real holidays. I certainly hope you get paid for what you do for that studentās dissertation? Or is this work you had ādragging behindā from the spring semester? The whole concept seemsā¦. not good to me.
Yes, a bummer about your Ireland trip – and my injury. But it will happen!
Iām doing good thanks. Re-learning to walk is keeping me busy!
Well, to be fair, this is my choice. On the other hand, if I didn’t do it this way, I wouldn’t be able to get everything done that I need to get done to get tenure. It’s pretty frustrating, to be honest. (I was paid this summer but just for teaching my class, not working with that student…) And if the concept seems not good, well, that’s because it really isn’t. š
Yes, it will happen! I am glad you’re getting back into things, learning how to walk (no joke, seriously – I have been there and done that). I hope you feel your stamina improving!!
So happy to read from you. I am sorry your. summer is a bit meh and hard and stressful. I am hoping you can find joyful moments. That art exhibit sounds like a wonderful thing. I would love. to hear more about it. And I just talked about Van Gogh today on the. blog too. So funny.
You will definitely hear more about the art exhibit – not this morning, as I’m in the office and writing a longer post is weird and hard here, but this week, for sure. I have pictures. Not good ones, but even a bad picture of a Van Gogh is good. š
I love reading about how you have brought joy and magic into your life – I need to bring more magic into mine, for sure. Van Gogh was a start, now I have to keep it up!
Yay! I’m glad to see a post from you. As you can see from the comments, people enjoy your blog posts no matter what the topic- and honestly, doing a bit of complaining isn’t a bad thing- it gives me a feeling of “we’re all in this together” because my life isn’t perfect either. Of course, I’m not glad you’re struggling (just to be clear on that point!) and I get that some things are private. But, complain all you want!
i’m also loving Engie’s book club. I’ve never been in a book club either. I’m secretly hoping she’ll pick another book and do it again once ATGIB is over. But it’s a lot of work for her, so I don’t want to put any pressure on (I’m just dropping subtle hints now and then.)
I hope you enjoyed the Van Gogh exhibit, and good luck with your school year! I love the quote : )
Thanks so much, Jenny. I really do love interacting with all of you in this space, and on your blogs, too. It helps to know that, no matter how (in)frequently I show up, everyone will still be here. <3
OK, I am glad you said that about book club. I LOVE it. And I was also selfishly hoping that we could find another book to read. It's been wonderful to read different takes and perspectives on what happens in the book, things that I NEVER would have thought of! I guess that's the fun of a book club!
The school year is bearing down kind of like a tsunami right now. š Lots of excited, anxious students milling around at orientation activities... those finish up today, and things really get moving next week! I hope your kids' first weeks have been good, I know they've both been back for a while now! (We start soooo late... do not get me started on that one!)
I’m very late in landing here. Sorry about that. I clicked over, then got distracted and just found the open tab. My kids make fun of me for having so many open tabs . . . but that’s the only way for me to find my way back to whatever it is that I try to do before I get interrupted by life.
Mini just attended the Van Gogh exhibit with my Uncle. I hope you enjoyed it. I hear you on parking in the city. I freak out if I haven’t parked down there in awhile, but I’ve decided if I fake like I know what I’m doing then everyone just sort of buzzes past me and no one really cares.
Hope getting back into the swing of things at your job is better than anticipated. Sorry you’ve had a difficult summer. I’m up in the middle of the night and it isn’t because I enjoy being sleep deprived. I just wrote a few fairly complain-y posts – right now they are all one post, but I will need to fix them up in the light of day.
Great that you your brother’s kids are so kind to spend time with their grandparents and that you recognize that. I might have to look into this book club that is all the talk over here. What are you all reading?
Ernie, I am your twin in the number of open tabs. I fear it reflects the state of my brain most days. (Also, what did we DO before tabs? Look at one site at a time?)
And yes, re: the parking and the driving. No one honked at me although some of the insane drivers did zoom around me (one on the left shoulder, no you cannot make these things up). That’s their problem – I’m just trying to stay out of their way.
Ooh, book club is (unfortunately) almost over. NGS (or, Engie, as we have dubbed her) is hosting an online book club for A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. It was one of my favorites as a tween/teen, a sentiment apparently shared by many in the blogosphere! Some of us are hoping to continue it in some way, but it’s a LOT of work for Engie, who is awesome in every way (https://ngradstudent.blogspot.com/). I’ve never been in a book club before and I am loving it!
(Also, I love your blog – your life is so different from mine, and I love learning how others navigate their days.)