The end is near...but not near enough!

As much as I love my job, lately I find myself prefacing a lot of statements with "As much as I love my job...."

As much as I love teaching, I'm tired of saying the same things over and over on student drafts. I'm tired of trying to explain the difference between a colon and a semicolon. I'm tired of repeating the Quotation Mantra (Integrate, Punctuate, Cite) and I don't want to devote any more class time to showing students how to use hanging indent. You know that little Help menu on your word-processing program? It's called Help for a reason.

As much as I love reading, I'm tired of snatching brief moments of time between classes and meetings to read bits and snippets of stuff related to faculty governance and pedagogy and assessment. I look forward to spending long uninterrupted hours reading real literature, digging deeply into current scholarship, mulling over what I read at my leisure. It's hard to relish living the life of the mind when the mind is too rushed and crowded to function properly.

As much as I love writing, I'm tired of writing agendas and bits of institutional prose to insert into documents and e-mails explaining why and when and how certain things are happening. My mind is abuzz with ideas for essays and articles, but they get shoved aside to make room for reports and requests and recriminations. It's hard to write freely when it feels as if the entire campus is looking over my shoulder every time I sit at the keyboard. I refuse to take them all home with me this summer and they're certainly not going along on my sabbatical next year.

As much as I love my job, I'm just tired. This semester has worn me down and I'm the first to admit that I took on too many projects, said Yes to too many requests for help. Now, though, it's all winding down. In a few weeks I'll close the books on this semester, open a big fat novel, and sit down on my back deck for a refreshing rest.