Return to Normality

Spring semester: day forty-six

So today I return to my job, the status quo, back to normal teaching and sleeping schedules for the foreseeable future. My Spring Break ended last night, and from this point forward it's the proverbial mad rush to the end of the semester.

Don't get me wrong; I don't necessarily want to return to teaching this week and for the next seven or so weeks total, but I do like my job and I do like the routine of it. When I'm given a lot of unstructured time (such as on breaks between semesters), I tend to get depressed, usually because I have all the time in the world to do whatever I want or need to do, but because I'm not working during that time, I don't have the money to do anything. That's what causes more of my depression and stress than anything else, I think -- being so poor that I can't even enjoy daily life without some sort of structure to keep me occupied. When I have a lot of money to spare (which isn't often, of course, but it's happened in the past), almost magically, I don't get depressed or stressed out.

Returning to teaching this week is just one of the many things I have to do as my life returns to normal; I have to get gas in the car this morning, for one. I went to Walmart last night to do my normal grocery shopping for necessities, and while I could've gotten gas then, I did said shopping at 5:30 PM when the gas station was swarming with busy people, and wasn't about to wait for ten minutes driving around in circles looking for a stall to open up. I'm also putting one of the fuel system cleaners/restorers (an $8 bottle of orange stuff) into the tank when I fill up this morning, too. Have to keep the car as ship-shape as possible, you know.

I also have to pay the rent this week, and mail it out around Thursday or so. This weekend I took out the trash and found a bag full of envelopes taped to my downstairs door from the landlord -- they've now changed their address and their corporation they used as the umbrella for all of their properties, and the envelopes had the new address and new information for it. They were also sweet enough to include a self-addressed stamped envelope for this month's rent, and with it an updated information sheet to fill out for all tenants' contact info and the like. I think that's pretty cool. I don't talk to my landlord much; I have only had to call him once in the past two years or so, and when he's in the neighborhood and around when I go outside to check the mail or when I'm mowing the grass or something, I always wave and the like. He and his wife, who also helps him manage the properties they own and rent out to tenants, and really, really nice and helpful people.

I get paid again on Friday, which is good because I have that aforementioned rent to pay, and I'll probably get my electric bill today or tomorrow. I don't think it'll be as high as it was last month, obviously, as I've only had to run the furnace about 1/3 as much, but I still doubt it will be incredibly cheap. I probably have enough money in  my bank account right now to cover both, though it would leave me with little left. This is another reason why I'm waiting on my tax refunds to come in soon. I also got my insurance cards in the mail for my dental coverage and something else from the state for insurance, but I haven't opened that stuff yet -- I'll look at it tomorrow, as I'll be working all day today and don't have time to mess with it yet.

Speaking of tax refunds, Daisy is going to call about a few apartments she's found this morning when she gets off work. If she can find something soon, the majority of the tax refunds I get (that won't be used for bills and other living expenses in the here and now) will basically be given to her to help pay the first and/or second month's rent and deposit on our new place. As much as I'd like to save some of that money to funnel it into the wedding costs and/or living costs for after the wedding is over, most of it is probably going to go into that. I've told her that before we can actually get an accurate budget on how much money we'll need to survive on a monthly basis after we're married, we have to first find a place to live. Everything is pure speculation until we have a place to live and know how much it's going to cost to live there every month for rent, and then we can budget what's left for everything else.

This considerably stresses her out, of course, and for good reason -- a lot of it is, for the moment, totally on her. I can help out by helping to look for places online and by applying for jobs up there (remember, I applied for several over this weekend, and Mama sent me two more last night that I need to look at and apply for if possible), but the fact remains that she's there and I'm not. It's up to her to pick a place that's do-able for us on our current budget and do the paperwork for it to secure it, and I can't do those things since I am here and not there. It's a really stressful, really shitty situation, and for a lot of it my hands are tied. I don't even (currently) have any extra money to help her out on it, either. Every month is me covering basic necessities and paying bills just to survive here and not up there yet.

My classes today will both be long, and neither of them will be that much fun. I'm covering two readings and collecting workshop copies in my 102 class (as well as giving back journals) and in my 011 class tonight, I'm covering another reading and a chapter in the textbook. I only expect about half of the 011 class to show up, to be honest with you.

Yesterday I made out the lesson plans for the final assignments in the 102 course as we wrap up the rest of the semester. They'll be doing a Proposal and Annotated Bibliography, and then they'll be meeting with me for conferences and spending the rest of their semester writing their big, long research argument papers. Their final exam is set for Thursday, May 1 -- as I can set and schedule my own times for exams for classes that meet on the West campus (and I do). I've already told the West campus staff about this as well, so that nothing will be scheduled in that room at my exam time (well, nothing is anyway, nothing but my own class). Tomorrow in my 210 class, my students are bringing in drafts of their own project proposals and we're going through them in peer review -- and I'm also covering the other half of their final project in the workbook and in the student example. Thursday in my 102 class is workshop day. So, I have a decently busy week ahead of me.

Last night I switched out my bag for the remainder of the semester; I have always carried a sling bag, a messenger bag, to keep all of my student stuff in -- I believe it was one of my longtime ex's bags that she left behind when we broke up and she moved out -- and it's easily ten years old. Daisy's parents got her a new messenger bag (as she uses one for her purse anyway) but it wasn't big enough for her and wasn't her style, or something like that, so she gave it to me. It's tan and old-school, hipsterish, with faux-leather straps/snaps and buckles. It's a little smaller than my old bag, but I like it. A lot. So that's what I'm going to use for the rest of the semester.

It's cold this morning -- barely above freezing -- and it's only supposed to reach 50 or so by the end of the day. It's supposed to get progressively warmer for the rest of the week, but rain off and on and be windy. I guess this means we are, finally, getting a bit of springlike weather here in Kansas, as spring does tend to have a few "rainy weeks" in the 50s and 60s before it gets warm again. Oh well -- at least it's not snow. My mother told me yesterday that it's snowing (again) back home, and it flurried a little bit here yesterday afternoon. It was dark and dreary here all day yesterday, a trend that looks to continue today.

On that note, I shall gather my things to leave the house this morning, knowing full well that it will be at least twelve hours before I return. I do have something to look forward to, however -- my tuxedo t-shirt for the wedding should arrive today while I'm gone, and that will be fun to unbox this evening when I get home. I'll probably take pictures of it as well.