December 7, 2010
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The Daily News
1 So…Don Meredith walks into a bar…
2 GREAT Dallas Cowboy “back-in-the-day”, and an even better voice on Monday Night Football.
3 Meredith rocked the classic age of Monday Night Football, and would always amuse all of us with his folksy, aw shucks style.
4 His death tome when one team on Monday night was clearly losing was this: “Turn out the lights; the party’s over.” To this day, it remains sheer poetry for anyone or anything that is sure to lose.
5 Such an NFL soldier, and always with a bit of devilish humor. He once said of the Cleveland Brown’s Fair Hooker, “Well, I’ve never met one yet.” He won me over for his historical reference to Richard Nixon as “Tricky Dick.”
6 You will be missed, Dandy Don. You will be missed.
7 Moving on, Part the First: Is anyone else experiencing “life lag”?
8 I’m not sure, but I think that each year right around this time, I get into this sort of holding pattern. It’s a form of the classical death wish, in which we sort of tread water between the holidays.
9 In my earlier days as a teacher, I used to liken a lot of days to a guy caught in the ocean, and swimming senselessly until he reaches an island, and then has time to rest.
10 The swimming was the working world, or the studying world, when we literally kick and spin,chug waves, and fight for our lives until the next day off. Sometimes we do it so naturally that it goes easily, but when we start hitting the holidays, it gets colder, mightier, and more severe.
11 Thanksgiving then, is a tease. We get this nice little island of rest, only to be instantly tempest tossed into a relentless, stormy sea once again, fighting wave after wave, knowing that Christmas break is close, but that we have battle after battle to fight and to survive until then.
12 Some get a day or two off, others get several weeks. Anyone in education gets a wonderfully dry and peaceful island, but getting there is studying, planning, mid-terms, finals, and absolute madness.
13 We start longing to see a familiar face, but each time we almost do, we get tossed and turned and thrown in all directions.
14 Sometimes I wish that in my profession, we could just go straight through a year with no breaks at all, except perhaps weekends. As a teacher, I KNOW that I can never rest until summer, and that includes weekends, vacations, and nights. The work is relentless when it’s on.
15 I know this to be true of students as well, and anyone with school-age children.
16 And the college/post-grad set gets thrown absolute insanity at this time of the year.
17 So we get lured into a false sense of security at Thanksgiving, knowing we have all earned a break, and the second the Monday following surfaces, we get tossed into one of the hugest metaphorical storms of the year. It beats us senseless.
18 Fortunately, I now routinely give up Sundays so that I could battle this madness by working it, and by going in to each week prepared as I could possibly be.
19 I used to be of the attitude that my job would never overtake my life, and that I earned the rest.
20 Yes and no.
21 While we need the rest, we also don’t need the stress that comes with letting the guard down.
22 The tough part is, I find myself exhausted of late, and turning to going to sleep really early so I will be rested and ready for each day.
23 I’m not certain as to whether it is the onslaught of Daylight Saving Time, or of Thanksgiving, but something happens to me each year that makes me want to pull a blanket over my head and sleep forever.
24 I guess I’m winterizing.
25 And all I want is to be left alone, and to look forward to seeing family and friends. It’s this leetle bit of angst that happens each year.
26 And every day seems longer than the previous day, and all of the deadlines loom larger and larger.
27 No wonder I find peace in the coast. I think I sometimes enjoy looking at the madness of ocean waves, and that somewhere therein is myself above the madness, smiling triumphantly, as though I have somehow escaped the madness and intensity.
28 Last night I began working on the DN at around 7:30. The night crept all over me, and I found myself snoozing at the computer for lack of ideas. I would look to emails for comfort, but those were few and far between. Everyone is too beaten around and torn up.
29 I finally went to the living room, threw a blanket over my head, and drifted off.
30 Interestingly, at work I can’t wait to get home, but then I want the days to fly by right now.
31 I still have miles to go before I sleep.
32 I now have ten days left, but ten of the most intense days of the year. We have benchmark tests, lessons, and finals coming up, along with the relentless madness of grading and grading and grading.
33 Plus our last grades just came out, so parents want answers at a time when we are fighting the waves and the insanity.
34 I have to guess that this time of year is pretty intense for everyone, across the board. The days are shorter; we tend to sleep more, but that also brings on bouts of insomnia and of course, it’s twin sister, worry.
35 I have all of those going on right now, and frankly, I want all of it to go away.
36 Right now it won’t. It might for some, but for most of us, the next few weeks can’t go by quick enough.
37 If you feel like I do right now, just count your blessings, dig in, and keep fighting. Life goes through these cyclical times, and will eventually relax its grip.
38 Storms come and go, islands are always out there, and there are friends and family, who sometimes are part of the storm, but who more often than not become islands in a sea of madness.
39 Count blessings. There are those out there much worse off. Give them a thought and a prayer.
40 And love what you have.
41 I miss everybody, especially my daughters. I can’t wait ’til I can see people, and enjoy the good things life brings.
42 Anyway, despite all, live life.
43 Love life; it will ease up.
44 Believe that.
45 Keep fighting.
46 Peace.
~H~
www.bharrington.xanga.com
