The Party's Over

Tomorrow, my contract at school starts and I’m more or less required to be there more or less five days a week for more or less, the next nine months. I dread it a bit, in part because I feel so unprepared, in part because I’ve gotten so used in the last twelve weeks to not being bound by a schedule or a place, and in part because I’m essentially a lazybones who prefers to putter around the house, ride bikes, read novels, and overindulgence in alcohol and cannabis than being a professional post-secondary educator responsible for challenging young minds and preparing them for good jobs in today’s increasingly competitive global marketplace.

Fortunately, we’ve got a week or so before classes start so I can dry out and shape up and get ready to do the job I’m trained for and for which my fellow citizens of Washington state so generously support me.

The summer itself hasn’t been an entire bust, productivity wise: I did, along with my mentor and co-author, Richard Leider, finish the final first draft of our new book, Something to Live For: Putting Your Whole Self Into the Second Half of Life; I attended a four-day yoga and Buddhism workshop in Santa Fe; a couple of minor house projects got attended to; we traveled to LA and I got to swim in the ocean with my daughter; along with my friend, Stuart Smithers, I facilitated a three-day philosophy camp; I rode my bike a lot, including in several alleycat races; 327 words were poked out on the computer nearly every day and posted to the blog; and I did read a bunch of fiction, some literary, most popular.

I wish I would have done a short bike tour somewhere; I regret not painting the downstairs bathroom; and I should have read more philosophy. I probably succeeded in getting stoned as much as I needed to, but I’m not exactly sure I’m remembering correctly.