One more day...

I can almost say I survived 2019.

(I know, I know, but this is one of the lessons I take from this decade: don’t count on anything)

Because I am me, I was thinking this evening about “what I’ve learned “ - good and bad.

Good:

I’m pretty tough and I can keep going even in the face of it feeling like everything is collapsing.

I am adaptable: I learned enough about federal law-making and the history of Federal environmental legislation to be able to teach a class in it - and am now doing the same with reviewing advanced biostatistics (material I have not used, some of it, in 20 years)

I can continue to be kind and civil even when I’m angry inside, or worn out, or heartbroken.

I’ve learned to accept that it’s my lot to be alone, romantically, and that I don’t even really take up much space in people’s lives, and to be okay with that.


The not so good:
I have realized the good I can do is so small and so meager in the face of the larger and stronger cruelty of the world- and begun to ask myself “why put yourself out so much if making an extra effort has no real benefit?” I will not be actively cruel, ever, but I am less-inclined to do the “crawl 20 feet over broken glass to benefit someone else” that I once did.

I have also realized - after learning in 2016 that a former student I considered one of our success stories had been imprisoned for fraud on the job - that you can’t really ever assume anything is a win and that you can do your best and it can still all go wrong. That your influence matters less than I once thought.

And that you can do your best and you can still be kneecapped by things you have no control or say in - I am thinking here of the budget cuts of 2016.


I’m on my phone here and unsure of how to embed videos so imagine Peggy Lee singing “Is That All There Is” here.

I don’t know what the 2020s will bring. In my current sadder-and-maybe-wiser mindset I am not terribly optimistic. I wish I could get back some of the wonder and idealism I once had, or at least find some way to parlay the sorrow I still carry into something useful- ideally, something useful mainly TO ME. (Being useful to other people with little direct benefit has burned me out)

One vague thought I had was to consider moving the furniture in my house (and perhaps REmoving some) to make a space by a window for a small writing desk - which I would have to force myself to keep clear and .... I don’t know. I have no time to write other than what I must do for work, and no real ideas. And maybe the desk would be like the illusory promise of buying books I never read or yarn I never knit... but I feel like, I don’t know, I want something new in my life and I don’t quite know what.