Live to tell.

I've been saying for the last several weeks or maybe for the last several decades that I can't think about the thing that's happening in, like two weeks, because I can only think about the three things that are in my face (when I say this, I like to hold my own hand one inch in front of my face, with my fingers spread out like an immoveable wall) right now, and when those three things are out of my face, then the next three things can take their place. It's sort of shocking to me (a) how much I like retelling this little demonstration of my state of mind/life, complete with hand gesture, and (b) how entirely apt it is.

So the three things that are in my face right now:

(a) grading
(b) contracts for visiting writers next year, and all that that implies (and believe me: it implies a lot)
(c) there are actually several things vying for the (c) spot on my list of three things (hand in front of my own face) currently in my face right now, I can't quite decide which one is in-my-face-iest. Which may be a little problem, come to think of it.

Well, the good thing is that teaching is finished for the semester and the academic year. I do have a few students who don't quite seem to realize this, which is probably my own damn fault because I have let a few of them have a little bit of extra time, which one or two of them seem to think means I am still teaching the class. Which I am not. I am not teaching anymore, even if I'm letting people turn things in one, two, three days late. Still: teaching, as an activity that involves me actively instructing people, is over. OVER, students.

And the other good thing is: today I could actually feel myself unwind. I read the paper without the strong feeling that I needed to be done with it already so I could move on to tasks. No. Today my tasks included:

• talk to my daughter in Scotland
• go down to Orem with my daughter and grandkids to visit my folks
• buy excellent cheese at Trader Joe's and also ranunculus and stocks and sweet William, which are currently making my house smell beautiful
• plant a heliotrope
• take Bruiser for two walks with the historian
• watch the penultimate episode of The Good Wife, which, no matter how it has let me down, and in fairly significant ways, I am still finding riveting

So that's my Sunday. If you were keeping track, I wrote 26 poems for National Poetry Month (some of which I did not post, but I did write them). Perhaps I will write four more poems, belatedly, in much the same spirit as my students, who are still turning in late activities and assignments and heaven knows what all. But at least I will not email and ask you to teach me how to write them.

In conclusion: