What I Did On My Fall Break

I have one day.  Not even one day. I have five hours of child-free time.  Having all children in school, while my school is closed is like a blood moon phase in this house. They are rare and I pine for them like a wild animal.

How on earth did I spend my time?

I did two YouTube guided meditations.  I ran four miles. I passed not one, but two baby joggers and took note that I am not in that group anymore.  (Phew.) I did three quarters of a load of laundry. Ate an almond butter sandwich.  Made two phone calls.  Scheduled three well-visit appointments. Drank three cups of coffee. Took a shower. Shaved both legs; above the knee even. And  I had numerous complete thoughts. It was so quiet I could hear the dog breathing.

And it is now 12:32.  My four year old has to be picked up in 28 minutes.

The panic is setting in. You have 27 minutes left of your Fall Break.  That’s it. Did you do everything you needed to do? Did you do too much? Not enough? You won’t have these five hours again until early December. What were you thinking with the laundry?!  You should’ve finished it.  It’s never going to get folded. It will sit on that chair in the living room for days. Shaving, Andrea? Really? Two meditations? Who do you think you are, Buddha? You could've cleaned Stella’s room.  Her room…how does a seven year old girl play that hard to make her room that crazily cluttered? There’s no floor in there anymore. You were going to write today, and this manic chatter does not count. But no…you sat on the back porch with that third of coffee. Dear God, those papers are never going to grade themselves.  You just keep moving them around the house.  You could’ve graded while you drank the coffee on the porch.  It’s 12:42! You have to get in the carpool line soon or they will charge one dollar for every minute you’re late.  And you can't be late, because you haven't done anything. Tomorrow two kids will be gone, but HE will be home with you.  Your dear, sweet four year old who can melt your heart with his I Wuv Yous, but you know. You know whatever you got cleaned will never survive the afternoon.  And there’s no more break for you. 

It is OVER.

That second YouTube meditation was totally worth it.

Back to School

I can’t remember my blog password.  That has been my excuse for not writing for quite some time.  Never mind the fact that ideas and subjects and thoughts have been racing through my head, dying to come out.  I can’t remember my blog password. Oh well.

 

And when it’s been so long since the last entry, I have struggled with how on earth can I pack all that in to a unified paragraph or two.  I can’t. So I’ll just do what the professionals suggest.  Just start.  Somewhere.  Anywhere. Just go.

I’ve been teaching a class at a university. It’s my first time at a giant four-year public school.  The campus is constantly buzzing with activity. (Unless it’s raining.) Fraternity pledging. Sorority bake sales. Weekend by The Hills blaring from some microscopic iPod (boom boxes are long gone). Existentialism –Paris in the Spring sign-ups. Skaters. Cyclists. I even saw a kid on a unicycle. And this probably goes without mentioning, but everyone, everyone is looking at their phone.

I suppose it should be exciting to be in an objective place of observation.  After all, I am not a student.  I am not a full of wonder Freshman.  I am not a twenty year old who has settled into life on a college campus. I am a 42 year old mother of three who has a couple of decades between herself and her own four-year university experience.  

But it’s a strange phenomenon that is happening this semester, every time I walk across campus to my classroom. At first, I even dared to consider that what I was flooded with was a James Taylor-esque sweet nostalgia for my collegiate days of yore.  But I know.  Even when I was at my own giant four-year public school I was never any of those things.  Not really. Sweet, I do not recollect. It’s a sensation I have never been able to name. Certainly couldn’t name it as a twenty year old.  Lonely would imply that it was almost fixable; that I just needed friends around me.  Melancholy is far too The Smiths and nearly romantic.  Empty makes it sound I felt nothing at all during those days.  But I felt a lot.  I was not numb.

I still can’t name it.  

I’ve even tried to ignore the feeling over the last month or so.  Blamed it on being busy.  Pegged it for being overwhelmed by teaching, and three kids, and a new dog, and wanting to sleep, and wanting to breathe for just a second before I get asked one more question, or get slammed by one more demand outside of myself.  Those discomforts are very real, but that’s not it.  That’s not the cloud that is hovering over me; haunting me. 

It’s an ache.  It’s an ache that I feel for that girl.  That twenty year old girl who hurt so much from something that had no name.  

And it comes in flashes.  

Winter.  Junior year. It was exam week and you’re sick.  Not with the flu or strep or even a bad, bad cold.  It’s the kind of sick that happens when you haven’t slept in a while.  Like really slept.  Skunk beer comatose doesn’t count. It’s the kind of sick that happens when you’ve smoked too much and it’s been cold and raining and you refuse to take the bus that stops outside your apartment and dumps you off at campus.  You can’t get on that bus because you’re afraid. Of what? The bus might move before you sit down and you’ll fall down.  You might forget where to get off the bus and you will be on the bus for the rest of your life, not knowing when or how to get off. You don’t ever take that bus.  So you walk. Two miles to campus.  And now you’re there.  And it’s raining.  And it’s cold.  And you’re sick.  And you have one more exam.  For which class? Not really sure.  But you can’t muster the energy to walk that two miles back home. In the rain and the cold.  And you do not take that bus.  So you walk to the Student Rec Center and you find the energy to climb onto the Stairmaster beside the other girls that are there every day.  Just like you.  But you figure they are not at all like you.  They probably go to class.  They probably laugh.  They probably don’t smoke a pack a day. And they definitely don’t drink a case of beer that they purchased from the gas station beside their apartment complex. They probably eat.  And like it. You feel better while you’re on the Stairmaster. The mix tape your brother made is perfect for the Holidays and exam time.  Snoop Dogg’s Gin and Juice blends into Steely Dan’s Don’t Take Me Alive giving way to Run-D.M.C.’s Christmas in Hollis is the perfect precursor to Sting’s Gabriel’s Message. You get off the Stairmaster and you feel sick again.  It’s raining harder and the two mile walk back home seems beyond dreadful.  And you’re pretty sure you have a fever now.  You find yourself in a coffee shop.  But not really a coffee shop.  Not like a Starbucks because there wasn’t a Starbucks then.  You don’t remember the name of the place, but you do know it’s beside the record store.  You’re in the coffee shop by yourself and acutely aware that you are by yourself.  You get a hot cranberry juice and try to do the calorie math.  Stairmaster calories burned minus cranberry juice. But you have a fever and you are sick and you almost don’t care. You think you study for a while, but really you fell asleep. It’s safe to assume that you walked back home. In the cold and rain. 

Your grades were really good that semester.  For the last time.

I have been feeling, and I have been beating it off.  Those flashes.  Those aches.  

Back on campus. I have felt like her again.