Annual April Angst

Well, here we are in the middle of April. Like every year, the angst is fully in place. It comes like a tornado that you can see moving in your direction — you can take shelter, but you cannot truly avoid it, and you just hold out hope that there isn’t too much destruction once you come up for air in the wake of its path. I know this month is coming, I try to gear myself up for it, I try to mentally prepare our whole family for it. But nothing seems to help the absolute overwhelming nature of my life (and thus, my family’s life) in April. It is the end of what is — for me individually, and for all 5 of us J-Ms — a long year. We give the whole of ourselves. And now, living on campus, that is muti-faceted and multi-dimensional, and multi-insanity-producing in so many, many ways — not just for me, but for all 5 of us. By now, I am done. By now, we are done. But the cram and push (while running on fumes) to finish out the year is a major production. It is like the last leg of an Iron Man Triathlon. The kids still have 2 months of school, but I have only 2 weeks of classes left, and the academic year is imploding like a volcano in the weeks that are our April. Right now it feels like a pressure cooker. Wrapping up classes is the least of my concerns. The up-till-midnight-working, burning-the-candle-at-both-ends, 18-hour-work-days, eating-on-the-run, catch-as-catch-can, no-room-to-breath-let-alone-sit-down-for-5-minutes…. all of that right now is the result of things like committee work wrapping up, council reports deadlines looming, numerous events to attend, other events to plan/implement/host, meetings (so many meetings) requiring full attention, lots and lots of people to attend to, academic reviews to be done, work to be completed, a huge stack of grading, etc., etc., etc. Oh, yeah, and there’s the kids’ birthday parties to plan. And Little League; swimming lessons; violin lessons. I sit in a meeting for an hour, and exit the room to see that I’ve received 34 new email in the 1 hour away from the screen. I dread checking it when I wake up in the morning (a ridiculous portion of my emails from students arrive while I’m sleeping). I’m drowning in email. My calendar is packed back-to-back (sometimes, scarily enough, double – or even triple – booked). The To Do lists are long. The days are long. The sleep is short. The chances to get to the grocery store are few (related: I’ve eaten eggs for dinner, after the kids have gone to bed, for the past 3 nights in a row). The blog is always the first thing to go. And thus, …my absence here. I’m not complaining about any of this… just being real. I think it is important to chronicle the joy and the angst. I’m dreaming of the beach, evenings drinking wine, and days in the sun watching my bambinos collect sand dollars and float on their backs and play in the waves with their mom looking on with nothing pressing to do but to watch them.