I keep forgetting to breathe.  I keep forgetting to move, to roll my shoulders, to stretch my neck.  I got a Fitbit, and I finally got it working today.  Awareness really is halfway to success.  I haven’t been so aware of my movement (or lack thereof) since my personal training sessions ran out in spring.  As a results, it’s a little easier to remember to move, to breathe.

Several different friends have said just this week that it’s time to take a day, to practice radical self-care.  I agree.

Today I carried around Friday-night-level exhaustion.  All I really got done was the Powerpoint notes I needed for my online class discussion and then the running of said discussion.  Really.  That’s all.

But somehow it’s okay.  Or maybe it just is what it is.

I’m finding that, as the seasons are shifting between summer and fall–today it was 80 degrees, but tonight it will probably dip just below 60–so, too, do I appear to be in a seasonal shift.  My job is shifting, the conditions at my school are shifting, my family reality is shifting with the death of my last grandmother, my certainties and securities are shifting, my plans and dreams are shifting, the future is uncertain–it always was; I just didn’t realize it.  (Haven’t I learned this lesson before?  I am a slow learner.  Like my students, I need repetition.)

And tonight, with the warmth of the Peat Monster filling my throat and chest, the cooling air flowing from the window through the fan, creative foment stirring in my gut despite the exhaustion, I am grateful–grateful for…

• the Peat Monster,
• the story brewing,
• the friend who skyped with me tonight,
• sitting virtually in the same room, working quietly and companionably with someone,
• cereal for dinner (Rice Chex and Honeycomb, if you want to know–from childhood),
• friends who checked up on me to see if I’m doing well and to ask after my day,
• the birthday gift card with which my Fitbit was purchased,
• the prospect of chaperoning a field trip to the Ocean Institute next week (I get to go on the boat!),
• a minimum day tomorrow, with time for planning for AP,
• Gillian Flynn’s Sharp Objects on audio in the car, for a gripping drive,
• Sarah’s reminder that I’ve got a light that always guides me, that I speak of hope and change as something good, that I live my truth and know I’m not alone.

 

(Photo source uncertain; found on challengingnormal.blogspot.com)