Summers Off - Yeah, Right

I finished reading papers and figuring grades on Friday. By noon. Grades aren't due until Tuesday at 2:00, and I'm waiting until the last minute to submit them just in case one of my students doesn't like what they see on the online grade posting. That and one last paper just came in yesterday, so I'll have to sit and read it and figure one more grade. That was an okay late paper. One of my students starting having seizures during the semester and couldn't drive to classes anymore. What can you do? I figured out a way to have him complete the class via e-mail. It's the only class he'll be able to finish. Not to complain about colleagues, but I'm disheartened that more of his instructors couldn't have worked something out with him. He's a brilliant young man and has been responsible about doing everything I asked of him. Maybe online will be the way he needs to go from now on.

Since Friday, what have I done?

Cleaned the house bottom to top.
Laundry.
Went running every morning.
Went for a walk every night.
Yoga every day.
Read the paper front to back.
Completed two crossword puzzles.
Went grocery shopping for 2 hours.
Went to the Goodwill 75% off sale and got a huge bag of clothes for $7.
Went to burger day at the River Rock and played Yatzee with my husband.
Slept in (until 7:30!) and took naps two days in a row.
Cooked. No, I mean actually put more than three ingredients together, not including spices, which account for at least another three, and came up with something that did not look like anything I started with and with no picture on a box it could match. That kind of cooking.
Sat and watched a movie start to finish.
Two hours of yardwork.
Blogged.

I know this might all seem a bit mundane, but it really is everything I can't do during the regular school year, and why people who say teachers have it easy will never truly understand just how much we don't get done in our own lives so that we can focus on others. I love my job, but I love my own life too, and I love having summers "off" just so I can have my life for a little while, even if it's all just crammed into three months out of each year. And not even, as I look at my schedule and see this school likes us to attend meetings after the semester, so this week and next week and the week after, I have meetings to attend. And I did sign on for a seven-week spring class. All the same, I know there will be at least one solid month in there where I won't have any scheduled commitments to school. And that's when I begin to prepare for next year!