Maybe I should smuggle a bulldozer into my office

This morning I zipped blithely along a stretch of highway admiring the new wall intended to prevent the kind of landslip that closed the highway two years ago. For two years I've spent a great deal of time watching the heavy equipment move piles of debris out of the way and replace it with that massive wall a quarter mile long, an entertaining and educational process that helped me while away the time until the temporary red light turned green and let me proceed on my commute to campus. Early-morning commutes usually resulted in a short wait, but during peak hours I could wait through two or three lights, with no convenient way to get around the blockage (until amphibious vehicles become readily available). Now the heavy equipment is gone, the barriers are down, and the highway is open in both directions--smooth sailing!

Some other long-term projects have not proceeded quite so smoothly. Lots of Covid-related delays have kept contributors from submitting revisions in a timely manner, but finally it appears that I have everything I need to complete the manuscript for the collection on teaching comedy that I've been working on for two years now. I have some work to do on the organization and the introduction, but if I work diligently for a week or two, I should be able to submit the revised manuscript to the publisher before classes start. That will be another barrier cleared off my road.

But a pothole arose in the path of the pedagogy-inflected essay I've been working on all summer. A few weeks ago I celebrated finishing the draft, and now I've revised it in response to readers' comments--but the journal I'd been aiming for is not currently accepting submissions. I need a Plan B--a publication aimed at non-specialists interested in poetry, history, race, and culture, one that also accepts footnotes. (I can delete the two footnotes if I have to, but it would hurt me.) Finding a venue has always been my least favorite part of academic writing, and it's really disappointing to find that the venue I'd had in mind is unavailable. Where do I go next? I'm stuck.

The other big obstacle keeping me from relaxing for the few remaining weeks of summer is the lack of direction about fall classes. My syllabi are in good shape but I can't put the finishing touches on anything until I know what the College will require regarding Covid precautions. Do I still need to set up a Zoom link for each class? Will I be required to offer class online for students who have to quarantine? Will we have a college-wide mask policy or are we on our own? Until the Powers That Be issue their official pronouncements, my whole preparation process is broken down by the side of the road.

But progress is being made. Today I asked the building services people to let me use the vacuum so I can start getting my office ready for fall. Right now an avalanche of books blocks my work space, but let me get the heavy equipment moving and soon I'll have the whole place set to rights. All summer I've been making incremental changes so small that it rarely looks like I've been working at all, but in the end they'll add up to smooth sailing into whatever lies ahead.