Day Diary Feb. 20, 2020
At
4:30 I wake, go to the bathroom, and lay back in bed. My sleep has been iffy lately—I’ve been waking around this time and having some difficulty getting back to sleep. Now I start to think and almost start stewing about work things; then I stop myself and play the word game I use to fall back to sleep. I think of a four-letter noun, then a noun that starts with the final letter of the last word, and so forth, e.g. “Part…Trip…Pool…Lamp.” It’s never failed to put me back to sleep, though sometimes (incl. tonight) I have to stay at it for a while. Tonight, after a while it starts to get hard to remember the first letter I’m looking for, then I start to get dreamy. I’m back asleep in maybe 15 minutes, but the sleep is thin, populated by vaporous dreams that vanish as soon as the alarm goes off, at
6:30. Classical music is playing on the clock radio—sprightly orchestral music, which ends, and the DJ says it’s CE Bach. I hit the snooze and wake to something ponderous, stormy and modern. I get up and brush my teeth, looking at myself in the mirror. My beard is white and is getting long-ish. A thin stream of toothpaste stains the green Henley I wore to bed.
When I finish, C. is still sleeping, the room dark, so it looks like I’m on coffee duty. I perform the sacred ritual (I like it actually, the easy precision of measuring and grinding beans, measuring water, etc.). I go into my office and sit crosslegged on the couch and meditate for 12 minutes. My meditations have been for shit lately—thinkity-think-think; I get perhaps 90 seconds of quiet mind between bouncing around among: the little party we’re having on Saturday; will I got to Scotland in August? (waiting to hear about a grant); maybe I can see B; she’ll be in London then? …today’s going to be a long day…..think think think.
When I come out of the office there’s already a faint but distinct smell of coffee: mmmm nice. I shower and take medicine. Now the smell of coffee is powerful and alluring, and I think of that Paul Muldoon haiku: “The smell, like a skunk/Of coffee about to perk./Thelonious Monk,” which makes me think, “Paul Muldoon has probably smoked some pot in his day.”
I go into the bedroom, turning on the light. C. is awake, and we exchange affectionate words while I dress: black slacks, checked shirt, black cardigan. From the kitchen, I ask her would she like a boiled egg. “I would love a boiled egg,” she says. “How long do you cook your boiled eggs?” “I’m going to cook mine a little longer today,” I say. “However long you cook yours, cook mine two minutes more.” I boil water, put a slice of rye in the toaster, and warm Israeli hummus in the microwave.
At about 7:15 the alarm on the stove rings. I crack and peel my egg on a wooden cutting board, put the toast down again, re-warm the hummus, slice an apple, and assemble: apple slices around the edges of a plate, small round bowl of steaming hummus in the middle, medium-hard-cooked egg sliced on top: yummy. I put the coffee pot and mugs on the table and sit down to eat, while C. finishes with her egg.
We’ve been eating likes this—at the table together, no devices—since Dec. 9, when I had eye surgery and began an almost two-month recovery. The first week I had to look at the floor for most of the day—like 50 minutes out of the hour, so she had to bring my food to the table. It happened spontaneously but we like it.
We don’t talk that much this morning, just relax and eat, though we say a bit about our moods and the day’s meetings. I want to get to the car by 8 or not much after because I want to hear what NPR has to say about the debate last night. So I quickly pack my lunch, do the dishes hastily (not in the meditative Thich Nhat Hanh way), bundle up and head out to the garage. At the door, C says, “Have a good day. Don’t use your AK.” I’m in the car by 8:03. Winning!
Sun’s coming up and it’s clear and frosty. On the radio, the news about the debate isn’t especially satisfying, then we’re onto a mass shooting in Germany and the Coronavirus. In my mind I air a frequent complaint: I used to love the news; I was a newspaper reporter for 5 years, spent almost 10 years studying the history of journalism. That pleasure is gone.
It’s going to be a long day, I need to keep my mood and energy up, so at the light at 65th Street I switch to music, spinning the songs on my Amazon Music. The random selection is, randomly, all jazz: songs come up one after another: Wayne Shorter, Duke Ellington, Bud Powell, as I race up I-69 for the 7 jillionth time.
At 9:10 I get to the office, stow lunch, chat with M, my admin assistant, about a university meeting yesterday. I plug in the space heater: this side of the building is cold on cold days. I walk downstairs to get water from the filtered fountain, see E. coming back up and exchange hellos. A few minutes later E. comes to the office to pick up her book, which I’ve been holding onto for safe keeping. She asks about my eye recovery & we chat. This makes me feel supported and cared for.
I tidy my desk a bit—in prep for a meeting in here at 10. I open my computer and work through some emails, recheck my meeting schedule for today, etc.
At 10 I have a short meeting on a complex issue, which required some prep (content prep and emotional prep). After it ends I de-brief with J., a colleague, about the university meeting yesterday; we agree (jokingly, with hyperbole), “People aren’t that great.” We part, laughing vigorously.
I work through emails, pausing around 10:34 to work on this diary a bit. I have a nice office with big windows facing Worthen; it’s nice and light in here. I re-jigger my to-do list, prioritizing for today and tomorrow. Answer, delete, file emails; schedule meetings, check things off my list till
11:52, with jazz playing low from the live stream of WBGO Newark, a great jazz station. It’s a jazz day, unplanned. I’m being effective but JESUS my to-do list! I stand up and stretch and walk downstairs to the soda machine for a Diet Coke. I pass a colleague who asks, “Are you getting your cardio in?” “A little bit,” I say. I grab my lunch (salad of kale, spinach, parsley, peppers, tomatoes; triscuits) & sit at my desk eating it, futzing with this diary and then taking a break for some ego reading: a review of one of my books that came out recently, which I read half of yesterday. (Did I mention that to-do list?)
Halfway through eating my salad I realize I forgot to add the nuts. (Protein!) I finish the review (very gratifying) and open the New York Times and read about last night’s debate. At
12:40 I stir myself, pack my briefcase, put on my coat and gloves and head to a meeting at the Student Center. It’s brisk outside and a .6 mile walk one way (per google maps) so it feels good and my cheeks are rosy by the time I arrive. The sun continues to contend with clouds. The meeting starts at
1 p.m. This is one of the more Kafka-esque committees I’ve ever been on. The task is quite arcane, having to do mainly with record-keeping but important for accreditation. We spent about 10 minutes debating which course of action would be more apt to get hung up in the bureaucracy and therefore take longer. We’re trying to fix a university policy that almost no one is conforming to now. Will people conform to the new policy? No one would bet their life on it. The people on the committee are nice, though, so it’s pleasant, and ends early, at
1:40, at which point I sit down in the Student Center cafeteria with A., an old and close friend (and also a member of the Kafka Committee), and we chat for about 25 minutes, about his high school daughter’s exploits in athletics and the ubiquity of grumpiness on campus at the moment. We head shake and commiserate, then walk out into the air (brighter now, still brisk) and walk north towards Riverside talking about TV shows we like. He likes “American Horror Story”; I’m in the midst of “The Americans.” This bit of the day felt like a stolen pleasure, and some welcome reconnection. From here I go to the library and at about
2:10 I fill my refillable coffee mug and head back to my office, where I squeeze in a few tasks (grade change forms) amidst a visit from J. to consult again about the issue from the morning meeting. She sits at the table while I stand—I’m trying not to sit too much. When she leaves I re-check email, finish grade change forms, and pack up again, to schlep back to the Student Center. (Didn’t make it to the gym today, so the 2.4 mile double-circuit back and forth to the SC is welcome.) Walking through the AJ Building I see three students from my fall class in quick succession. One, A., stops and greets me warmly and asks whether my eye is recovered; I say yes all better thank you and as we’re parting she says, “Thanks for everything last semester.” That felt really nice….
Outside, it’s considerably warmed up; I remove my gloves and hat on the way. I arrive at the SC as the bells are chiming …
3:30 for my next meeting, an open forum by our dean. Over at the Student Center, a couple other faculty—an older Asian guy and a woman about my age, neither of whom I know—are wandering lost in the hall, unable to find the room. I direct them and we join the group. This meeting is relaxed and cordial and reasonably productive, I think—folks asking questions and raising concerns to the dean and her assistants. The hour goes fast, after which I get up at
4:30 and walk over to Lucina to drop off the grade change forms. Now it’s cooling off again; the sky is very changeable: in one direction, above the Admin building, beautiful mixed blue with white clouds beyond the tall, bare trees; to the north a heavy medium gray. Could change your mood every time you turn your head. As I pass the eastern edge of the art museum I see something I never noticed before—the words “beauty is truth” carved in stone above the door. Is this bowdlerized Keats? Then as I get to Riverside I pass a student who abruptly exclaims, “Damnit! I’m supposed to be going this way. I’m having a low-brain day.” Closer inspection confirms he’s not talking to anyone on Bluetooth. As I walk I resolve that when I get back to the office I’ll eat an orange and write on this diary, which is what I’m doing right now, reader, and it’s
5:24. I spend about 20 minutes on the diary and the next the next approx. 90 minutes flipping from task to task, answering emails, checking things off my list. At 6:15 I heat up my dinner (ham and bean soup from the freezer—I made it about three weeks ago and it is DEELISH), run downstairs for another Diet Coke (a bad habit, and one I’m indulging today because I’m busy, want the caffeine, don’t have time to run to the cafeterias for iced tea). I sit back down and work, work; checking things off and distilling a to-do list for tomorrow and the weekend. It comes out to 13 items, all of them time-sensitive, requiring from 20 minutes to 2 hours each. Arrrrrrgh! “Work done got hard.” I was hoping to take a weekend but it looks like I’m in my usual semester mode: Saturday off, full workday Sunday.
At about 7:10 I begin packing up. This is a careful process because I’m working at home tomorrow and thus have to make sure I have everything I need, since I won’t be back in the office until Monday. Notebooks, books, computer, reading glasses, contact case: Oh, the moving parts! I hustle to wash and dry my dinner dishes, darting (as much as a roundish 55-year-old man can dart) back and forth between the office and the kitchen/work room. At
7:21 I have time to hustle (as much as a roundish 55-year-old man…) to the car and stow my brief case and bag-o-tupperwares; then turn tail and hurry (as much as…you know) to the library for the Faculty Reading Series.
There I settle in, arriving two minutes early and in mid-poem, setting my coat on the back of a chair, next to my admired colleague K. and sit back and listen to the readers, a poet and a fiction writer, both BSU faculty. The poet’s little daughter is next to him by the podium, carrying a little sign that says “I love you Daddy” and murmuring periodically. I’m a little too tired to tune in 100% to the reading but they’re nice and funny and the audience, mostly students, is enthusiastic.
It’s over at about
8:20, at which point I pat the poet on the back, lightly touch the elbow of the fiction writer, and talk for three minutes to an acquaintance from a separate social network who happens to be on hand for the reading, a friend of a friend. He says he’s retired from his job as a school counselor and has been writing a lot but misses the connection to colleagues and students. “It’s a new stage,” I say, thinking to myself “Wow, that’s a vacuous remark.” I zip up my coat and walk five minutes to my car. It’s chilly and clear; there’s a very bright star alone in the western sky—Venus? I wish I knew these things. At the car, I plug in my phone and set up the book I’m listening to on audible (Joy Williams’s grim, steely, and brilliant short stories), and pull out. By I-69 I have to pop out and get gas, and I drive home, listening to an odd, spare little story about a pre-teen girl taking tanning sessions in Florida. The drive passes quickly; I’m very tired and still adjusting to my sharpened distance vision with contact lenses.
At 9:35, I pull into the driveway and call my wife, who opens the garage door remotely for me (we’ve only got one remote). We exchange Displays of Affection and chat briefly about our days as I remove my contacts and put on pajamas, and we retire to the living room, where we sit on the couch and do a New York Times crossword puzzle together on my phone app. This is something we started doing when I couldn’t read: she reads the clues, and we try to beat our times for each day of the week’s puzzles. Of course we’ve never gotten past Thursday—the puzzles get harder as the week goes on. I’m tired, I close my eyes and breathe deeply as I answer clues. 6 letters, “Letter Flourishes” = S-E-R- I-F-S. 6 letters: “Overdue amount” = A-R-R-E-A-R.
When we’re done, it’s about
10:40 and I sit there, eyes closed, and say, “I’m going to bed, and I’m going to be asleep in about 50 seconds.” I strip down to socks and shorts and get into bed, holding C. close. I flip on my right side (a position I couldn’t sleep in for 10 weeks, during eye recovery, and she nuzzles in behind.) “I love this position,” I say. I drift off quickly.