Leaving my ducks in the dust

So I'm sitting on the sofa in my pajamas, drinking a leisurely cup of tea and reading the morning news, when my husband says, "It's almost 7. Don't you need to be on the road?"

"No problem," I say. "I can go in a little later this morning because I'm staying late this afternoon and my first meeting isn't until 10."

Then, just to be sure, I check the calendar on my phone. Friends, my first meeting of the day was at 8. 

This morning I proved that if I put my mind to it, I can get from pajamas-on-the-sofa to fully-clothed-in-the-classroom in under an hour, as long as no one looks at me too closely. No makeup, no earrings, no frost to scrape off my windshield, no slow-moving school buses stopping to pick up students every 30 feet--made it in the nick of time, but one tiny delay would have been a disaster.

As it is, I feel as if I've been running to catch up with myself all morning long, cramming in my caffeine quota while rushing into meetings clutching handouts still warm from the printer. This is not the way I prefer to operate. I'm a planner, the first one to show up for a meeting with all my ducks in a row. This morning all my ducks are scattered in my wake in a chaotic cluster of panic.

Now my morning meetings are over so I can relax a bit. I have some papers to grade, emails to send, classes to prep, and two more meetings this afternoon, but for the first time since 7 a.m., I can sit and breathe for a few minutes and wait for the ducks to catch up.