Coffee.
That’s it.
Coffee.
Tag: dailyprompt
I Don’t Do ‘Nothing’ Well.
Daily writing prompt
How do you know when it’s time to unplug? What do you do to make it happen?
I’m not the sort of person who rests well. I don’t sit and read much or watch television or videos often. I write in my spare time. I’m already working on my new classes for the fall semester (and I have two months before the fall semester starts).
Sometimes, however, I run out of steam. It usually happens when I have worries and work, and I don’t have enough energy for both. How do I know it’s happening?
- I have nightmares: I’m not showing up to my classes because everything is detaining me and I’m half-naked and I can’t find the classroom and my mother wants something from me and … And then there’s the one I had last night: I was in a driveway and a garbage truck plowed into me and bounced my car onto my parents’ roof and somehow it was all my fault because I stopped. (My dreams are breathless, run-on sentences.)
- I worry more, sometimes even about things that happened forty years ago.
- I have trouble sleeping because of the first two points.
- I get weepy, especially over one more thing to do.
Taking a break from the overload is imperative for my health because too much stress could put me into hypomania/depression. It’s hard to stop myself from forward motion until my body just puts the brakes on without consulting me. I’ve just had enough.
There has to be a better way to do this!
What jobs have I had? Fun!
What jobs have you had?
My first paying gig was as an elf for the Marseilles, IL school district my junior year of high school. I don’t put that on my resume.
My first real job was the summer before my freshman year of college, where I was a fast-food worker. My co-workers once locked me in the walk-in freezer.
Jobs during my undergraduate years: kitchen help at Papa Del’s Pizza; storeroom supervisor for Bevier Hall Cafeteria, all at University of Illinois.
Jobs during my graduate years: Teaching/Research/Administrative Assistant, Family and Consumer Economics Department, University of Illinois (various years); 2nd cook, Y Eatery (Thai/Italian eatery); typist for a Psychology computer lab.
Professional career post-grad: Assistant Professor, Consumer Economics, SUNY Oneonta; Assistant/Associate Professor, Human Services, Northwest Missouri State University.
And I suppose I can count “writer”, even though I’ve made very little money on that so far.
Diversity Enriches Life
In my writing, in my teaching, and in my everyday life, I espouse the message that diversity in people enriches life.
People have always considered me “different”. Some of this may be because of my lifetime of bipolar disorder, but much of it isn’t. I am not autistic, so it isn’t that. Maybe I’m just “weird”, being creative, not interested in fashion, awkward, a little loud, and as much at home in my round body as my clumsiness will let me be. I dance in the grocery store when nobody is listening, I find humor in absurdity, and I have an almost encyclopedic knowledge of edible weeds. Oh, and I write, and writers are weird enough on their own.
I believe the world needs diversity. People need to have different philosophies, different bodies, different colors, different customs, different viewpoints, different orientations, different likes, different loves. If they don’t hurt others, their differences are vital for our human ecosystem. Evolution counts on difference; so does personal growth. We grow by coming into contact with people’s differences, if we’re willing to grow at all.
It’s hard to be different, because people fear differences. I think they most fear being found “wrong” or “inadequate” themselves — “If this other person is okay, does this detract from me?” That’s not how difference works. You be you, and I’ll be me, and the world will be richer.
Neither a Leader nor a Follower
Are you a leader or a follower?
I think there’s a third choice not mentioned here. I am neither a leader nor a follower, but a — what would you call it in one word — a loner?
That’s not the right word, evoking as it does gunmen in warehouses. What I mean to say is that I go in my own direction, work independently whenever possible. I tend to be an impatient person, and want to get right to business. I used to be in a department where the first 15 minutes of any meeting was spent with conversations that went like:
“I saw (name of former student) the other day. Remember her?” “Wasn’t she related to (this other person)?” “She married that farmer out in (name of town) last year.” That drove me up a wall, especially as a new person who didn’t know who (name of former student) was. But most of all, it bothered me because it was not on the agenda.
I have been the leader (of a committee in my department) and a follower (most other times I’ve been in groups). As a leader, I tend to feel impotent because I can’t get the group to make a decision. And as a follower, I get impatient. I find myself pretty predictable, on the other hand, and I can brainstorm and chug along to solve problems.
So I’m an independent, happiest solving problems and making plans by myself. How does this work out in marriage? My husband and I have an egalitarian marriage, so we’re neither leaders or followers, and that’s the way I like it.
What gives me direction in life?
Motivation needs direction, or else people waste their energy. There are several things that give me direction in life, honestly. Some are lofty; some mundane. I need to talk about both.
One thing that gives me direction is love. Love of people becomes an evident focus in my relationships, and it’s the answer people expect when I say “love”. But what loving what I do? That’s at least as strong a guide for direction in my life. I think about two activities I term as “flow” activities in my life, moulage (casualty simulation, otherwise known as making victims for emergency training) and writing. The love of the activity and the stimulation they give me gives me direction.
Another thing is striving to be better. This points me toward improvement activities, such as reading about my writing craft and practice, practice, practice. Related to this is the desire for recognition. Although I don’t like to talk about my need for external validation, it’s there. It’s definitely there.
Sometimes, it’s duty that gives me direction. That I get up in the morning on days when I’m depressed, and go to work even when I am hypomanic, is the power of duty. Duty to myself and to my husband and cats. The need to provide food, clothing, and shelter; safety and security, and emotional support. I also do these things because I love all of them, but the daily things fall under the category of duty.
This list is pretty prosaic, more of an essay answer for my positive psychology class than a creative piece. But these are the places and the reasons I focus my energy.
Christmas* is my favorite holiday. It’s strange writing about Christmas in April, but then again, I have a Christmas tree still up in my parlor, and I turn the lights on now and then. And I just got done writing a Christmas romance. (It’s my sixth). No other holiday comes close to me.
Christmas lasts an entire season, and that’s one thing I love about it. I get to celebrate from post-Thanksgiving to New Year’s Day. It comes when I need it, toward the end of a very busy Fall semester at the college. It livens things up against the leaden skies and frozen ground waiting for snow that doesn’t come till January.
Christmas also has traditions handed down from many cultures (mostly Western) to give it a rich color and flavor. Red and green, silver and gold, touched by Hanukkah blue and white (it is part of the season), ribbons and blown glass ornaments and Della Robbia wreaths (my mother had a particular fondness for them, as do I) and twinkly lights.
We have special Christmas foods from many cultures as well. Pfeffernuse (ginger cookies) and springerle (anise cookies) from Germany, Mexican wedding cakes/Russian tea cakes, sugar cut-out cookies, Christmas goose, plum pudding, KFC (in Japan) …
Christmas remains my favorite holiday, even though I’m too old for Santa. But given I write about a secret society of Santas, am I really too old?
*I am talking about the secular parts of Christmas here. I am of a “spiritual but not religious” bent, best described by “omnist“. Or maybe “panentheist”. I’m not sure. My beliefs are very personal, and I don’t want them hijacked by the “one true religion” crowd.
What I Learned
Describe something you learned in high school.
In high school I learned that sometimes your crush will pay attention to you and that’s enough.
Back then, 44 years ago, I had a crush on Mark. This was painfully (and I mean painfully) obvious to Mark, his girlfriend, and everyone else in high school. He took it well, however. And sometimes he would open up a little sunshine into my life.
Once we were caroling: me, him, his girlfriend, and the rest of the chamber singers. I dropped behind, mostly because the two lovebirds were lovebirding but also because I was cold and tired and depressed. He walked back to find me and ask if everything was okay. He held my unmittened hand briefly and told me it was cold and scolded me for going without mittens.
I wrote a poem for him once. It made fun of him because that was my undying declaration of love. (It ended with the words “you stupid klutz”.) He told me he would keep it in his billfold the rest of his life. I knew he wouldn’t, but the image was enough to make me laugh.
He married his girlfriend and as far as I know they’re still together. I went on to have many more unrequited crushes and eventually married. But I learned the little gifts of moments we receive from people can last in memory forever.
Thunderstorms
What is your favorite type of weather?
I love thunderstorms. I live in the Midwest, which has a fine number of thunderstorms each year. The pounding rain, the flashes of lightning that hit all too close to the house, the ringing thunderclaps are all dear to me.
When I was younger, I had the perception of walking through a bolt of lightning. I did not really walk through lightning because I had no charring or lightning trees on my body. But I found myself completely surrounded by a hot white light, no clap of thunder. I always felt from that point forward that lightning had claimed me.
I like the drama of thunderstorms. I am not dramatic; I have aged into a pretty staid person. But I claim thunderstorms as my alter ego.
What do you wish you could do more every day?
I wish I could write more. That doesn’t mean I never have enough time to write. Sometimes, something else gets in the way.
Sometimes it’s my focus and I find myself taking a detour on the Internet. Sometimes it’s negative self-talk that makes me not want to write. Sometimes it’s too much to think about.
Today it’s my iPad is down to zero and is recharging very slowly. I can’t always do something about it.
Words Like Me 