So we’re going from the lovely 60s and rain to the 90s and Santa Ana winds again. Cue headache. Today is the mid day…it’s in the 80s and not windy yet…that’s tomorrow. I don’t think I thought about the weather this much when I was a kid. I would just look out the window in the morning and make a guess. I wouldn’t track radar (well, you would have had to watch the news for that). I did watch the news in my 20s, honestly, mostly for the weather. Is it going to rain? It’s San Diego; probably not. But how hot it was going to be (or cold) would dictate what you wore to work…sometimes. Today I’m wearing all black because our bargaining committee is meeting with the district over their less than COLA offer. Health insurance is going up. EVERYTHING is going up. And offering us less than COLA AGAIN means a cut in pay. So yes, I was at another school board meeting last night wearing red. Black today. They are just exhausting. Meanwhile, my school asked me to do a half-day release on literacy, something I support, but they’re not giving me enough notice. And only an hour to work with my co-teacher of the three they want to take. And I’m out the next day. So no. Thank you but no. I tossed and turned last night, irritated by many things (the bottom sheet won’t stay on the mattress and I couldn’t fix it because the Man and two cats were already in bed asleep…see below)…
Also irritated by people. Not surprisingly. People assuming stuff, people overreacting like middle schoolers when they are grown-ass adults, so little communication. I seriously just want to do my job as well as I can without being out of the classroom excessively. I want to be able to come home and NOT work sometimes. I had this plan at the board meeting last night that I would grade stuff, but I didn’t have the brainpower.
Today is another day.
In really good news, I am finishing this quilt two weeks early and I don’t know how I pulled it off. Wait. I do know. I did not come home and work as much as I usually do. I am behind in grading, yes, but I finished quilting last night…
I started Saturday…and did 9 1/2 hours since then. Glorious. I had about 45 minutes before bedtime last night, so I trimmed it…
And then stayed up late cutting the binding and sleeves so I would be ready to put it all together tonight and start sewing the binding on.
This morning, I texted the photographer, and it needs to be done Saturday for delivery. Check out the three different backing fabrics. I’m using up stuff! Like a boss. Don’t worry; I bought more last Saturday when I bought the binding.
I’m feeling excited about what I’ll be working on next, which is finishing a few of the smaller dye paintings from the summer for an upcoming show they might actually get into. Hopefully. When I’m having a hard time falling asleep, when I realize I’m having conversations in my head that haven’t actually happened and probably never will, you know how they tell you to count sheep or some equivalent? I had one doc tell me to imagine the colors of the rainbow, and you start in a cloud-filled, soft room of all red things, and then you move into the orange room, etc, and eventually you will relax enough to fall asleep. I do meditate every night and then sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn’t. So I do the art quilter version. I imagine where I am in the quilt that I’m on, and I visualize the next step. Last night, I imagined sewing the binding strips together, ironing them, trimming the excess, then sewing them on, then sewing the sleeves together, finishing the edges, then sewing them on. Then zigzagging the edges and folding the binding over and pinning it. Yes. All that. It’s meditative for me anyway. It didn’t help. I had to get up, pee, take pain meds (head), pull on the bottom sheet until the Man got up so I could fix it, then deep breathe, flip over, do that again, move the pillow, get up again and type in the idea for the next big quilt, then look up an embroidery kit company from the 80s, then try to sleep again. Plus have all those conversations in my head again. It was not helpful.
But I did have this guy on the couch next to me.
I was trying to finish my book. I did not finish it. I’m so close it’s annoying. Sigh.
This…
Though I don’t remember the parachute as a kid…only with my own kids. And I don’t think we did phonics when I was a kid either. But we did do book fairs. I remember those. And we did nuclear bomb drills where we hid under our wood and metal desks. Fun times.
OK. Today we are starting force and motion. Not a hard day, I think. I still have two teachers out. Yesterday, it was all three. Kids kept asking me why I was there. Rude. Union meeting after school. Maybe some of the conversations I had in my head will happen (more gently) in real time. You never know. Then putting binding on. I’ve already done it in my head. Should be easy to do it for real.
