“Take rest; a field that has rested gives a bountiful crop.”

Above quote is from Ovid, a Roman poet from waaaaay back in the day who definitely knew what he was talking about. He wrote a lot of love (and all things encompassing it) and transformation. Ever read The Erotic Poems? There's a man who has a way with words :)




My summer is already half over.

Who can believe that it's only the middle of June but there's already only half of a summer left before I'm forced back into the jaws of an everyday work schedule, one that I know for sure will make me get up before 10am. I'm being a bit dramatic, but it's still a hard pill to swallow that soon I won't be able to wake up, lie in bed reading and chatting with friends on the phone, before finally crawling out to see what it looks like outside and start my day. Soon I'll be fueled by coffee (plenty of sugar with a hit of cream), bagels with cream cheese, and covert text messages with my coworkers across the room. [Uhhh, I mean, sit and pay attention to every little word that's said?]

The amazing thing is that despite all the fun that I've already had, the second half of my summer is actually the best part. Most of the excitement is soon to come and so I shouldn't feel pissed that I haven't been working on my tan as frequently as I'd like because I'm going to have plenty of time (and in the best locales) to do that very soon. I shouldn't think of summer as half over, but rather think that the slow and steady warm-up has now completed and is prepared to yield to the upbeat and fast paced cardio that's yet to come. (I must provide this peptalk to myself, if not to those others out there who might also be experiencing this downtrodden view of life.)

One of the more surprising things about this summer has been my lack of desire to work. While I'm not required to do anything work related I told myself that I'd definitely putter about in my office working on things for next year's staff and getting things ready for training. I was SURE that I would want to be creating things on Microsoft Publisher, reading up on some material, and putting some plans into place for programming. I've probably stepped into my office about 5 times in the last month, each time either dropping off something that found its way to me that I don't need to worry about until July or retrieving something that was left in there that I need (like a favorite pen, or perhaps a picture frame). My travels will take me away from my life here for the next few weeks, proving that I was delusional upon thinking I would be proactive when I was obviously too lazy to way a few feet down the hall to my desk. I guess the idea of relaxation was just too much for the idea of working ahead to handle :)

Tiiiiiiiime is on my side, yes it is.

One of my summer experiments is attempting to swear off my watch. I’m one of those people that is hyper organized and conscious of where I’m supposed to be at what moment of every day. During the school year I am always near my planner and my Outlook calendar, constantly updating both with events from my work and personal lives. I’m trying to relax and enjoy this summer as much as possible and for me this means trying to stay relatively unscheduled and carefree. While I obviously have to plan out all my trips to here and there, the one way that I can really try and do this is by not wearing my watch.

This is not easy. I’m not sure at what age I started wearing a watch every day, but it was long enough ago that I can’t remember not being able to look at my wrist to see the time. I’ve become so dependent on it that I often freak out when I don’t know what time it is and get uneasy in places where there aren’t enough clocks (at least by my standards). I used to have cheap watches because I was so hard on them; constantly banging them against things and such. I spent so much money replacing them every few months that I decided to invest in something a bit more sturdy, and it’s been well worth it. Every few years I get a new one just because I find something very fun that I like – but every one that I own (once its battery has been replaced) still works, including one that had to be revived by a very nice jewelry store man who could see the absolute pain on my face when he couldn’t get it started again.

At first not having the watch was weird. I was constantly looking at my cell phone to see what time it was, searching out clocks in public places, etc. More quickly than I imagined, I started liking the feeling of having nothing on my wrist. I finally had to do a semi-professional event a few weeks ago and put it back on, thinking that if nothing else it might help jumpstart me back into the feeling of working, if only for a day. I was surprised to find that I didn’t like the feeling of it anymore – I didn’t like the grip of it on my wrist, didn’t like feeling its weight on my arm. I was glad to take it off at the end of the day and return to my summer world where time doesn’t matter….much.

Deep down I know that this doesn’t mean I’ll never put one on again. I think it’s sort of like having to wear “real shoes” with socks for the first time when it starts getting cold again – you hate the feeling of it and you feel suffocated at first, but it just feels right after the first few times. My crazy organized self will return when needed, but for now she’s been safely repressed to the deep corners of my brain.