I've decided to write again as a breather to the end of my day. So I begin with the first day of school.
The purpose is to chronicle my day. It may not be eventful for you, but it's a rhythm I'm trying to develop to remember what in the world went on during my day.
My plate is way too full and I have no idea how things will work out the next few semesters, but hopefully this flame will not die. So here we go.
Tuesday, September 8th, 2009 [001]
I woke up 15 minutes before the alarm at 6:30am, and immediately jumped out of bed. I feel pretty exhausted, given I've been hibernating all weekend studying Greek. It's my own fault. I didn't touch the stuff until a week ago. My procrastination here will probably get the best of me. We were warned several times to spend all summer doing it, and now I'm fairly certain I will be the class dunce in our Greek class. I'm hoping to study enough to not feel TOO stupid. I know when tomorrow's class rolls around I'll feel really dumb.
Grace's alarm goes off at 6:30am (which we just got her yesterday), and she is very excited to get off to her first day of school. In fact, I'm also excited she's going to school. This is the first day of establishing a rhythm that we can predict and depend on for the next four months. Grace also starts an after-school program, Team21, which doesn't dismiss until 6pm Monday-Thursday. While this is very convenient to our schedules, it doesn't give Grace much time to be at home. We're going to give it a month to see how we like it.
Thankfully Julia has packed lunch and picked up clothes the day before, but has woken up with a huge migraine headache (which would last until the late evening). I spent most of morning wondering if she was going to be able to take Grace to school. I know if I did I would be late to my first class, Hebrew. I was willing, but somehow Julia willed herself to get her to school so I could leave by 7:30am.
I arrive at the seminary with 5 minutes to spare, and fly up for a quick coffee from our Starbucks machine. I call it the "holy shrine" of the seminary. It is the Mecca for our building, and that machine is used often (and I'm pretty sure much prayer is going on while students wait for their coffee to be brewed).
This machine grinds the coffee and brews a hot cup on the spot. You hit 3 buttons and voila, there is fresh, hot, Starbucks coffee. I used the spill proof mug today because I'm sure my half-conscious body would knock it over during Hebrew class.
I get into Hebrew class and realize that I will work harder learning this language than Greek. Knowing that I'm already feeling like a dunce in Greek, combining it with Hebrew makes me wonder how I'm even going to function this semester. Many have said this is the hardest semester for MDiv students at the seminary, coming back to our first Greek exegesis class while starting Hebrew.
If I just had those two classes and no job, I think I would still have a hard time getting on top of these. Add a residency, a job, and another class, and...oh yea, a FAMILY, it's hard for me to see how this works out.
The only way I can look at it is...this is only a short time. It's still an entire school year. One thing for sure, it has forced me to regiment my schedule. If I had to cut anything it would be my dart league on Tuesday night, but I feel it's going to be one of my few outlets.
Once class was done, it was off to Mars Hill for my bi-weekly meeting with Jim Kast-Keat, Fifty6 Director and friend to talk about upcoming Sundays and pairing LifeGroup leaders (adult volunteers who lead our 5th and 6th grade small groups). After a quick assigning, reviewing, and discussion of the schedule that awaits me, I'm back to the seminary to work the bookstore until the evening.
Today is New Student Orientation, which means the bookstore was very busy. Thankfully two of us were working today. There was a steady flow of students along with the several tasks and projects I had to get done today. I had learned I must stay past my original 4pm time, and ended up staying until 5:50pm. I immediately headed straight to the school to pick Grace up, and called Julia on the way to see if she was feeling better.
Tonight was also our first week of the dart league. I had grabbed food from the seminary cookout, picked up Grace, and got all of my stuff together for darts and was out the door in 20 minutes.
Darts went okay tonight. Didn't shoot like I had hoped but had some great moments here and there. There is a big tournament in town this weekend and my brother-in-law is coming back up from Ohio to shoot with me.
I've got stuff to do for Mars that was supposed to be done tonight, Greek vocab and paradigms to review and memorize, and Hebrew to practice. After this is done, I'm going right to bed. I have nothing left. I'm setting the alarm at 6am tomorrow to hopefully tackle the Mars stuff before I head off to the bookstore at 7:30am.
It's only one day and I already know that even with a severely discipline schedule this is going to be a trying time for all of us.
Favorite moment of the day: Watching Grace jump happily getting ready for her first day of 3rd grade.
Worst moment of the day: Being home for 20 minutes today and not able to help Julia with her migraine and Grace.
End of day [001]
Mike
Comments