Another day in what's going on in my life. You can follow the Chronicles tag on the sidebar for other installments. I don't expect you to. This is more so I can have record of what happened in this season of my life.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
I woke up before my alarm went off this morning again. Maybe my body is preparing itself for the crazy day that's ahead.
I know right away that my plate is full today. I'm going to be driving all over the place, running to meetings, and working the bookstore at various hours throughout the day.
Once Grace got up, I knew immediately that it was very likely I was taking Grace to school this morning. This is the first time this week I've had to do this, and I got worried quickly. My morning routine did not include getting Grace to leave earlier than she was used to. Julia was unable to even get out of bed, so it was up to me to get her dressed, make breakfast and lunch for her, and try to make her hair look presentable, while packing her backpack.
This didn't include the fact that I had to pack my stuff too. I decided that I was going to go out to eat today. Making lunch will take another 5 minutes I didn't have.
I finally got everything ready (Grace included) and we were out the door by 7:35am, 5 minutes past what I usually do. I dropped Grace off quickly, and was off to try to make my Hebrew class by 8:00am. Traffic was nuts, but I made it to class with 2 minutes to spare, giving me time to run upstairs and grab some coffee from the holy shrine (see Chronicle [001] for an explanation).
Hebrew was overwhelming. Not only did I feel like I don't have the alphabet mastered, but also the transliteration of that alphabet. Dr. Lawlor just moved on to combining these letters together, introducing us to more forms, and giving us a monster assignment over the weekend. I really wouldn't fret over this except my weekend is entirely booked. I have to study tonight to get ahead and not feel the brunt Sunday night when I sit down to tackle it some more.
About 5 minutes before class ended, Julia called me to let me know Grace was in the nurse's office. Great. I don't need 2 sick girls! I was worried about how this will impact the upcoming weekend, knowing that I'm booked through the whole thing. Julia was still unable to get out of bed, so I had to book out of there, go home and grab some medicine, and head over to the school to give it to her and see how she was doing. Oh yea, and I have a 10:30 meeting, a very important one at Mars.
I knew I was going to be late. I called Jim, and he made a impromptu decision to meet at the Biggby near the school. Great call! I fly home, get the medicine, go to the school, see that Grace is fine, give her the medicine, and head off to Biggby.
The meeting lasted an hour-and-a-half. We planned the specifics of the arc that I will be co-teaching with Mike Edwardson in October and November. The meeting was important because we would presenting this before the Formation team, which meets at 1pm.
I called Julia on the way to let her know Grace was okay, and see how she was doing. Not any better. I'm starting to get worried now. I told her I will pick up the farm food (we are part of Trillum Haven Farm's Co-op) and bring it home before I had to work at the bookstore.
I grab a quick bite to eat to go, fly over to Mars with 10 minutes to spare, get my bearings, and go through another meeting until 2:30pm. After a quick follow-up with Josh I headed off to the farm.
I get to the farm, grab all of the food, and fly home. I drop off the food, sit with Julia for 5-10 minutes (pretty much just holding her as she sobs...I feel awful for her), and then head back to the seminary to work my bookstore shift.
Bette (my co-worker) was surprised and relieved to see me. She thought she had to work until 7 (she started at 10am and was in my Hebrew class at 8am). I informed her that she's scheduled till 5pm, to which she called me "her hero" and gladly got me some Qdoba for dinner. :)
The bookstore was busy as expected, but I had enough time to separate my Hebrew vocab cards for the next two lessons so I didn't have to rummage through them. I decided to but a pre-made set of them because I was afraid of my Hebrew writing skills. I figured I'll already be writing enough of it so it'll be nice to have a good set of vocab cards.
I closed up shop and got out of the bookstore at 7:20pm. I get home, told Grace to get ready for bed, and immediately headed outside to mow the lawn. Once I did that, I chopped up the vegetables (we share them with another couple in our house church) and got Grace into bed.
Thankfully, Asher (she is living with us and part of the FIfty6 Formation team) was doing the massive pile of dishes on the counter that I hadn't touched in 2-3 days. That was my next task after getting Grace to bed, so I was extremely grateful to her for diminishing the pile.
Julia was still feeling bad, and asked for a neck massage. This meant I sat on the couch, gave her a massage, and watched the US Open and the NFL game. At first, it was nice to actually sit down and relax. At the same time it was awful because I suddenly remembered that I only had two-and-a-half hours of sleep, and this was the first time I slowed down.
Wouldn't ya' know, I fell asleep and woke up at 11:45, which blew away all of my intended study time. There was no way I was going to start now, and figured for the sake of the weekend I better go to bed now to get some semblance of sleep.
Worst part of the day: Feeling like a human ping-pong ball, going back and forth between class, meetings, and work, and missing my study time at night I desperately needed.
Best part of the day: Being called a "hero," and Jim adjusting to my unplanned opportunities.
And thus ends day [003].
Comments