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February 13, 2007
Time Away in My Head
Have you ever just needed time away from yourself?
(For once) I recognized the warning signs yesterday. Long amounts of time staring at the computer, doing nothing, certainly not doing the things I needed to be doing. Lots of yawning. Procrastination. Crankiness. Habitrail brain. All of these signs that I hadn't had any "me" time for a while.
Me time is not alone time. Not solely. I can sit and surf the net and be completely alone, and it won't do me a bit of good. All of the competing thoughts are still crashing around in my brain. I need time outside myself occasionally, especially when I've just exited tech week and am teaching lots and in the process of devising new projects for my students. The brain never shuts off, it flits from one project to the next and never really comes to rest.
Which is why the Arboretum Project was so good for me last year. It forced quiet time, time to just exist, focusing on nothing but the world around me and the things I could capture through the lens. I could allow myself the luxury of letting objects of beauty surprise me into gasping. Now, of course, I don't have time for such an ambitious undertaking. My days are all full full full of stuff to do and build and write and think about and memorize and perform. I haven't had time to step outside myself for a while. And I could feel the demons creeping up.
So this afternoon, I did something irresponsible and necessary. I read a book. An entire book. Straight through. A book that was absolutely perfect for taking me out of myself. It's new (to me, anyway, I'd never read it before), it's honest, and it's beautifully written. And when I finished reading Are You Somebody? by Nuala O'Faolain, I felt like I'd been alternately bathing and drinking in a virgin spring. I felt refreshed and awakened and rested. Ready to tackle the grading and the lesson planning and the research and the memorization and the writing of a midterm exam.
Thank you, Nuala O'Faolain, for giving me exactly what I needed when I needed it. You have no idea what a lifesaver your book was, sitting atop my TBR pile. Thanks to your memoir, my grading may actually get done tonight.
Posted by sally at February 13, 2007 07:28 PM
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