In Place

It's been a rough weekend for me thus far. Well, mostly, anyway. Once again I feel swamped and overburdened with things to do, and my fatigue levels just want me to sleep and do absolutely nothing -- to roll over and cover my head. I always feel so overwhelmed, even at times when I'm actually not. There's always something else to do, someone else to try to please, something else to pack, clean, or organize. I know this time is only going to last for another month or so, but still. Ugh.

Last night, shortly before midnight, I went to meet up with two friends from the department at a late-night donut shop here in town for some much-needed decompression time. I saw they were in town and could've said nothing, could've ignored it and continued to sit here in my room and dick around on the computer, but I didn't -- instead I told them I'd be there in five minutes (said donut shop is across the street from the newspaper where I used to work, and is thus only about two or three miles from my house at the most), put on a pair of shorts and threw on a shirt, and left.

As I drove the Monte Carlo through the silent, empty residential streets and neighborhoods between here and the donut shop, I thought to myself, I need this. I really do. I hadn't been over there since I worked at the paper, and there are so few opportunities to see my friends outside the department. One of those said friends is going to be at the wedding as well as the "bachelor party," but I so rarely see anyone anymore aside from the cats, my students, and the late-night cashiers at Walmart. Tuesday is the only day I have any real social interaction with anyone on campus, and most of the time I'm holed up in my office or in the office of one or two friends, and I still don't really see much of anyone aside from those friends.

The conversation (over a caramel/chocolate nut roll and a big cup of fountain-drink Mountain Dew) was concerned primarily with my wedding and moving plans. I didn't dominate the conversation or anything -- generally I try not to -- but that was the overall big discussion topic: the whos, wheres, and whens of everything, and about what it has been like to live up here in Newton for the past five years. It's so rare that anyone I know comes up here that it was slightly bizarre.

As for the donut shop itself, the place is the hangout in this town for anyone between the ages of 16 and 80, basically, as the town has no other night life whatsoever, and they're an overnight donut shop, so at midnight the place was jam-packed with locals both young and old, high schoolers as well as middle-aged and senior-citizen night owls. I don't know how long the other guys were there before I got there, but we were all there for about an hour or so before the place quieted down and went dead; when we left around 1 or so, there were a few small tables with older folks gathered around them drinking coffee and talking quietly, but no one else left.

It was...shall we say...cathartic for me to just sit there with some friends and relax, pushing the rest of the world aside for a brief hour. It feels different to do it in a public place, outside of our offices. It's like we're different people, even though we're not. I'm the same person everywhere I go and in everything I do, no matter what situation I'm in. I know other professors and GTAs who have a "classroom persona" that at times even extends to the office, a persona that is a mask they wear to be professional and/or make themselves sound and act more important than they actually are. I've never bothered with such a facade. I'm the same person in front of my classes as I am around my friends and colleagues, the same person I am around my family or around Daisy.

I actually almost called Daisy by the name "Daisy" in conversation last night (obviously, that's not her real name), which I found internally hilarious. I don't think either of those friends read my blog, but I'm sure they know it exists. I'm actually fairly certain that most of the department (excluding the higher-ups like the chair and the Directors) know it exists, and it's never really bothered me that much. There's nothing, ahem, incriminating on it, and while I do talk about being a professor, I have always taken great pains not to call the university by name. Also, with about three weeks left to work there anyway, my ability to care about who reads it or knows about it is rapidly diminishing. I know many friends read it or at least check it once in a while, because I always have a ton of hits from Wichita.

On the drive home, I waited on a train, and the low oil light in my car came on. That's a sign that I need to do my monthly/bi-monthly maintenance on said car again, as I know the car's not been dripping oil as of late, but just slowly burning it off since it's old. Because of the storms expected today and tonight (nothing yet, though) I pulled the car into the garage once I got home. I'll do said maintenance in the morning when I take it back out, or tonight if nothing happens and I'm awake enough to go to Walmart to check for some more boxes in about twelve hours or so. I haven't decided yet, and totally don't know how alert and/or awake I'll be then. Whenever I do go, of course, I should probably get more oil. Duh.

As for everything else going on? Well, I packed three more boxes this afternoon and the pile of disarray in the spare room is slowly being reduced. I still have a lot more to do over the course of the next several days; posting my mock-up yard sale ad on Facebook got several friends interested in some of the stuff I have, so tomorrow one of those friends is coming to get some stuff, and on Monday another is coming up to get other stuff. I still have to do all my grading (that's tonight's plans, more than anything else) and I do, at some point, have to get at least a marginally-acceptable amount of sleep over the next few days to be able to continue to function.

Of course, my time is limited; I could be completely done for the semester already (I'm not, obviously) and I'd still feel swamped and overwhelmed. Most of what I'm doing in regards to cleaning/packing/trashing things should've been done months ago, if not a year or so ago -- I was just never motivated enough to do it. Fear, apprehension, and the pressure of being on a time frame is a great motivator, apparently. With my 30 days' notice letter being mailed along with my rent check today, the clock is officially ticking now. Adding insult to injury is that I got my electric bill today, and despite the fact that I've been barely doing anything that requires a large amount of electricity -- like running the furnace -- it's still almost $100. WTF. I mean, do I have to turn the house's breakers completely off when I'm not here, or something, to get an electric bill that's $40 again? I don't get it.

The storms aren't popping up yet, though I do expect them to start firing up all over the area at basically any given time. It's 86 degrees outside and it's after 6PM. It's April. It's windy. This is prime severe storm/tornado weather. If we don't get anything? Good! If we do? It'll be nasty and will more than likely hit under the cover of darkness -- which is, of course, the worst time for that shit to happen.

I can't let it concern me either way, really; I have too much other stuff to deal with and/or worry about right now, starting with my grading. Speaking of which...