I didn’t write at all yesterday and I wonder if that contributed to my overall somewhat foul mood. If yesterday was foul, today feels rancid for sure. Don’t want to be here, don’t have the energy to care about my charges, too frustrated by the not being able to hear that instead of leaning in I’ve disconnected. I’m reasonable enough and self-aware enough to tell you what is happening but I’m not superhuman enough to provide my own course correction at this time. I feel disparately angry that both comforts and invades like the hum of idling buses at the start of the line.
Grrr.
Exorcising.
I’m doing most of the things I’m supposed to do to help myself but none of them are making me feel any better at the moment.
Exorcising. I need a room to yell and dance and scream in. I need a body that can move the way I feel, the courage to yell with the force of my current weight, I wish that screaming would provide relief.
I’m going to give a lighting demonstration lesson this morning. I’m not going to be able to wear my face shield, or my glasses (fogging) so I’ll be less protected than I’d prefer. I’m going to break the 6-foot distance several times as part of the lesson, not because I want to because that is the nature of the craft- to point out icons on the camera, to instruct students by example, to read the displays on their LCD screens, to, to, to… Proximity. Intimacy. Revelation. Introspection. Showing. Doing, together.
I’ve a shit-ton (a specific unit of measure used by teachers worldwide) of grading to do and none of the mental energy required to do it. Too many high anxiety day to day tasks leave little to no room for long-form thinking. Sure, I could relax the home/work balance and did through it in the evening hours but that is stealing from tomorrow for a modicum of satisfaction today. This human is having a hard time and really wants to run away. Like a galaxy far, far away- away.
I’m supposed to engage in some joyful collaborative work around pedagogy and curriculum later today and I’ve got naught for it. In fact, the idea of it makes me want to vomit right now but I know over the course of the next six hours before the meeting starts I’ll find a way to settle my feathers to be the person I’m expected to be- the joyful contributor.
The base of my pyramid does not feel firm. I feel that if I begin operating out of the safety expectations of others that I will somehow miss something I need specifically for me, then I’ll be the one who has the consequences and THAT will be another contortion to manage that sets me apart, and not in a distinctive OMG we see you, we know how much you are doing to be here and we acknowledge that your ‘over the river and through the woods’ is a greater challenge than our ‘across the street’ let’s make things easier and provide wide respectful berth to access your gifts and contributions. I’m afraid of once again being set apart then managed, tolerated, and accommodated in ways that diminish demean, disregard, and eventual disinvite. Not born of malice, but exhaustion brought by the inability to manage the nuance because there has been no practice- every anomaly is new and special and specialties are exhausting to the lowest common denominator flow…
Today is not a day for banter.