Lunatic

Last night, as I was tossing about in bed getting ready to sleep, I noticed quite a bright light coming in through my blinds. As I live in the middle of the fields and there usually isn't a lot of ambient, urban-type light around here at night, I got up to look out the window and see what all the brilliance was about. And no, it wasn't some brand-new street lamp grinning in the window, but the moon--a just-past-half-full moon visible beyond the black branches of the tree in the side yard.

I've always had a thing about moonlight. I remember the first time I really noticed moonlight: I was twelve, and I'd got up to go to the bathroom. On my way back to my room, I saw a strangely bright, bluish light striking the wall above the stairs that went down to the first floor. There was a semi-circular window high up above the front door--we had one of those two-story foyers that were all the rage--and its shape was perfectly replicated in blue-white light. Intrigued, I went down a few steps until I was standing right in the gleaming half-disk. Before me, framed in the window, was the full, white moon. I stood there for a while in a kind of awe. I was a kid who loved fairy tales and fantasy, and the moon had some kind of resonance for me--This is what they're always talking about, I must have thought. The bright white moonlight. A moon so bright you can see by it.

I've noticed the moon here, often--almost every time I've come home after dark, in fact. I'm amazed at how clearly it lights up the yards and the houses, the shadows it casts through the trees. The moon always fills me with a weird kind of yearning: that's the word for it, yearning. I don't know what I yearn for, exactly, when I see the moon, but a powerful desire for something comes over me, a desire mingled with a nostalgia for a time I can't remember. If I had to guess, I'd say that I'm yearning for a life in which the moonlight matters, if that makes sense. In which I'm aware of it on a daily basis, and it makes a difference.

So last night I opened my blind, and then lifted the screen so that I could actually put my head and shoulders out the window and see the sky more clearly. The stars were out, too, though somewhat dwarfed by the brilliance of the moon. It's more than a little trite, I know, but it's easy for me to imagine the vastness of the universe when I look at the stars. I find them somehow reassuring. The world is big and wide and the moon is high and cold; the stars burn on and on and on. I knelt there for a long time, looking at the moon and the stars and the blue light on the grass, the black branches against the sky. When I finally went to bed, I left the shade up so that the moonlight could rake across me in my sleep.

Attention to such things: it's something I've usually lost--or never had, more likely. Not with any kind of consistency. Mindfulness, awareness of the existence of your own life, starts in such long looks. I also spent fifteen minutes last night watching a tiny bug that I had rescued from drowning dry itself off in the palm of my hand. Perhaps I needed these moments last night. Watching the bug slowly uncoil its antennae and reach a trembling limb out to the tip of my thumb, or the spinning of a leaf black in the white of the moon, I felt a kind of connection with things outside of myself (and my job). I slept well and dreamed vividly in the moonlight.

Ho Hum

It's Saturday night, and the plan is to watch a movie I've had sitting on my desk for lo these many (3) weeks. But my to-do list for the weekend is so long that I feel I have to do some more work before I get into that. Also I haven't done the dishes yet. The truth of the matter, however, is that I don't want to work any more. And so I'm mucking about on the internet, instead.

Today I have:

• read and prepped for 2 classes
• read for a third class
• ordered books for some down-the-line course prep
• graded 9 mid-length papers, 5 one-page papers, and two batches of a quick homework assignment (this grading, in toto, took 2.5 hours--my hand hurts)
• gone to the grocery store

I really feel like I did more than that. I mean, I worked pretty steadily all day. One course reading/prepping session took about three hours, so I suppose that that slowed things down--but still. I must grade the rest of those mid-length papers this weekend (six to go!), and there's a whole bunch of job stuff that I need to get a handle on immediately. And I need to prep the third class--although that should be quick, since we're actually reading excerpts from a text that I did significant work on for my dissertation, so I can very easily give lots of contextual stuff and whatnot.

Weekends are just too short, though. I'm not at all used to this kind of schedule (o graduate school! how I miss thee, already!), and the weekdays just pass in a blur with no time to do anything outside of what's immediately required. Then there are the meetings, of which there are a lot more than I would have anticipated--departmental meetings, all-faculty meetings, new faculty meetings. And I've agreed to advise a student organization, which shouldn't take up too much time, but they're getting their year started and are meeting rather a lot at the moment. Oh, and yes, I'm trying to get some exercise a few times a week, since my new location doesn't give me the long daily walks that I'm used to. It's astounding how little time there is for anything else--even things like cooking and keeping the apartment reasonably clean--once all of that stuff is added up.

No, this isn't one long whine, although I know that it looks like it. I'm truly just amazed at how busy I am this year; I knew that I'd be busy, intellectually, but I don't think I'd quite absorbed the reality. (I've used that phrase hundreds of time in my life, I think. No wonder my dissertation had to do with experience as a means of gaining knowledge, eh?)

Meanwhile, a small mystery:
I received a yoga DVD in the mail the other day, with no note. The Boyfriend didn't send it to me; neither did my mother. There are a few other suspects, but I haven't fully investigated yet. I assume that I'll eventually figure out where it came from, but in case I don't, I would like to extend my appreciation here--thank you, anonymous sender! Even if you never read this (and unless you're a particular one of my suspects, you probably never will), my gratitude and pleasure is hereby publicly broadcast.

For Some Reason

I don't know why, exactly--maybe I'm just tired--but this morning I want to stay home and hide.

Well. It's the last day of the 5th week of the semester. We're officially in the middle of things; perhaps that has something to do with it--the need for a break? Last weekend, while wonderful, wasn't exactly restful. It's true that my weekend to-do list is appallingly long, but at least I'll have two whole days to work on it.

All right: I need to pull myself together here. Everything is going to be fine. I even have a fun activity planned for my last class of the day; I mean, okay, it's seriously nerdy fun, so I'm not sure that all my students will think that it's as great as I do, but whatever. I'm looking forward to it.

Happy Friday, everyone!

Trying to Work, and Failing

I need to prep for tomorrow--we're talking about Plato, for Christ's sake--but I'm having some problems focusing. Why?

Some theories:

1. The relatively huge number of jobs in my field this year. (Twenty-five straight-up medievalist jobs on the JIL so far, by my count. And that's not including all the "early English" and "Medieval or Renaissance" jobs.) And some of them would be amazing--of course, these are jobs I almost certainly* won't get, but I do love the dreaming part.
   (*The "almost" has no business in that sentence, obviously. Nonetheless....) (See? The dreaming at work!)
   
2. One of the jobs that's posted is a job I had an MLA interview for last year. Why might this be? And what are my chances this year? During market-season I develop a highly idiosyncratic system of statistical calculation; it's time I get back into that.
   
3. I dunno. I'm tired. Got in at about 10:30 last night after a solid 11-hour journey (door to door). The Metropole is too damned far away. Not a place to go for a weekend. This makes me sad.
4. I just went to a "tenure and promotion" info meeting. Of course, I'm not on the tenure-track here, but there's a chance that I could be eventually. So this was somewhat interesting.
5. My two comp sections continue to be dialectical opposites. Intriguingly, however, they have switched poles: the formerly-sluggish is now lively and fun, while the other one has gone from happy and talkative to downright mute. Ech. (But the lit classes are great! I love them!)
6. I have promised myself that I can have a beer when I'm done prepping, but I really want a beer now, and thus I am not prepping.
7. I have been very stupid in the arrangement of my Netflix queue, to my aggravation. So I have a stack of movies I don't want to watch (or don't have time to watch), and the TV shows I enjoy will not come until I have watched them. Why do I do this to myself? Oh, why??

Okay. I want that beer. Reward system, I command you to work!

2pm EST? Are you kidding me?

Argh! So it's entirely likely that, what with my travel plans and all, I'll get through the entire day without seeing the new JIL. After the months of waiting!

Responsible Mihi says that this is probably for the best, given that I'm not exactly over-prepared for today's classes (this seems to be a regular Friday phenomenon). But Responsible Mihi has been getting too much airtime these days, says Irresponsible Mihi. Sigh. It doesn't matter which Mihi is in charge. It's out of the Mihis' hands.

At any rate I won't be blogging or blog-reading during my Metropole Weekend. Rest up, y'all, and I'll see you on Monday....

J to the I to the L

The fun is about to begin.

Anyone want to join me in a rousing chorus of "One Day More"? (Yes, I sing tunes from Les Miserables whenever they can be even remotely linked to the events from my life. Who's asking?)

I am not sick!

It was option no. 3: allergies + lack of sleep. Last night I slept for 9 hours with the windows shut, and today I am right as rain (whatever that means). Hooray! The trip to the Metropole will not be tainted!

I do have an awful lot of work to do today, though. I must:

• comment on 9 more papers
• prep two classes
• read for one of these two classes
• figure out what on earth we're doing in the other class next week
• teach one class
• meet with two colleagues (about different things and at different times)
• laundry
• get ready for my trip

Um. This is looking more than a little daunting. And I'm pretty sure that there was something else...but what?

Seriously, I can't remember the last time I was as busy as I have been this month.