another quarter begins

tomorrow is the first day of the new quarter for me.

i feel like winter quarter just ended. and it did! job talks and meetings up until the last day of finals week. final grades due the tuesday of spring break.

and here i am, a week later, contemplating whether or not i should do a bit more work on my syllabus before i go to sleep. no, i have not finished the syllabus. yes, i did say that the first day of class is tomorrow. surely there are other professor procrastinators out there.

part of it is procrastination, but part of it is just that i feel like i'm being trampled underneath the quarter system: ten weeks of fall quarter, two weeks of vacation. ten weeks of winter, one of week of vacation. ten weeks of spring. then, mercifully, summer. for research and writing and all the other things i should be doing all year along to maintain my professional standing.

there is so much more time within a semester system. fifteen full weeks of a semester. four weeks of vacation. fifteen more weeks of spring semester interrupted by a week for spring break and then a full summer. i miss that (seemingly luxurious) rhythm.

oh i know that all the 8AM to 5PM workers hold no sympathy. it's a flexible job and i do have a lot of time "off." but, as an academic, do you ever feel like you're "off." i feel like i'm always thinking about what i should be doing, even if i'm not actually doing it. case in point, i obediently brought several books with me to bakersfield over spring break. i only cracked a few open, but they were just sitting in my room, making me feel guilty about what i could/should be doing.

like tonight. blogging but knowing that i could/should be working on the syllabus. and when i dream tonight, it will surely be about immigration and the history of chicano/as. *sigh*

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'tis the season

it always amazes me that just as thanksgiving weekend slips by, christmas suddenly appears.

though winter is somewhat of a fiction in southern california, i returned to find christmas lights and trees and wreaths decking every corner. it's nice that christmas is finally settling in to town. the past few weeks as the sun sets earlier and earlier, and the day hours become darker, i've felt considerably less productive. i've just wanted to come straight home from the office, put on my sweats, make a hot dinner, and cozy up on the couch to talk to joseph or watch primetime (he knows which shows not to interrupt!).

nevertheless, though i had imagined the quarter coming to a quiet winter end, it seems to be becoming more frantic. the last two weeks of the quarter are, apparently, when committees convene for one last meeting and all the departments and centers decide to host holiday potlucks (why doesn't anybody cater?). my schedule is more full now than it has been during most of the quarter.

but it's just a matter of getting through all of the last minute frenzy. soon the quarter will be over, and the students will depart. i will submit my grades and make my own northern departure. i'll have some work to do--planning next quarter's class, working on an article revision--but i hope to spend a lot of time with my family and friends. much more than festive decorations, meetings, or potlucks, that time is what makes christmas matter for me.

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