A late night
So I was up til 1:40 last night, grading a set of papers that I should've had graded a week ago so that I could return them at 8 this morning. I had carved out chunks of time to get the grading done--on Friday, on Sunday, on Monday morning--but nothing happened. It was as if the stack of papers simply didn't exist. Or, even worse, I completely knew that the papers existed, but that fact was of no consequence to how I chose to spend my time. Or, even worse yet, I chose to spend my time in direct opposition to what I had planned to use it for--in direct defiance of myself.
I'm not typically a procrastinator of this sort. Typically I work my way slowly through a project, simultaneously accomplishing pieces of it while managing to remain burdened with an awareness of how much is still left to do. But lately, it's been different. Just putting things off, off, off, until finally I'm forced to cram them into the amount of time left for them.
I've got a job application that I've been thinking about working on for 2 weeks now. I haven't done one damn thing with it yet. Maybe I'll never get to it.
I don't like feeling this way, that I'm just deferring action, avoiding taking control for my future, just responding to the most essential of tasks. Just treading water, trying to keep my head above the waves.
But, on the other hand, maybe a certain amount of anti-planning makes a whole lot of sense right now. When I think about how much has changed lately, maybe it would be more crazy for me to still feel capable of navigating quickly through the wreckage. At times like these my own power is insufficient. As Willie Nelson says, "Fortunately, we are not in control." Or, as Euripides says, "The end men looked for cometh not, / And a path is where no man thought."
I'm not typically a procrastinator of this sort. Typically I work my way slowly through a project, simultaneously accomplishing pieces of it while managing to remain burdened with an awareness of how much is still left to do. But lately, it's been different. Just putting things off, off, off, until finally I'm forced to cram them into the amount of time left for them.
I've got a job application that I've been thinking about working on for 2 weeks now. I haven't done one damn thing with it yet. Maybe I'll never get to it.
I don't like feeling this way, that I'm just deferring action, avoiding taking control for my future, just responding to the most essential of tasks. Just treading water, trying to keep my head above the waves.
But, on the other hand, maybe a certain amount of anti-planning makes a whole lot of sense right now. When I think about how much has changed lately, maybe it would be more crazy for me to still feel capable of navigating quickly through the wreckage. At times like these my own power is insufficient. As Willie Nelson says, "Fortunately, we are not in control." Or, as Euripides says, "The end men looked for cometh not, / And a path is where no man thought."
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