Productivity Report

When I started this blog, I said I had decided to be more productive in my life. I hadn't really thought out what that meant, but I knew I couldn't stand the idea of just "being". I suppose somewhere in the back of my head it is that cliche notion that every day is a gift and I want to get something out of each and every day. It goes without saying that every day of my life I get joy from seeing my wife and my child, but like I said before, I needed things to keep me from falling into the hole that is now in the middle of my life.

I'm pretty open about the fact that, to a certain degree, it is all distraction, but any achievement, big or small, is a little reminder that our lives do keep going. The slope towards that hole isn't quite as steep anymore, which is nice. Now I can walk up and take a look without feeling like I'm going to fall in (or just wanting to jump in). I can...examine it, appreciate it, memorialize it. I can overextend a metaphor to talk about my son. The bottom line is that, distractions or not, I think things with both myself and my wife are a lot healthier as of late thanks to all of our 'productivity'.

So what exactly have we been doing? Well, if you follow her blog you already know a good majority of it: home improvements! Home organization and beautification via a few new furnishings (entertainment credenza, office cabinet, pretty basket-box-thing, hanging pot rack for the kitchen), some purely aesthetic improvements (finished painting kitchen, wall decor for dining room, large pot w/ artificial plants, chair cover that I constantly mess up with my huge ass). Plus my wife, basically all on her own, sanded and re-finished our stairs AND is working on our downstairs bathroom! She enjoys putting me to shame.

I poured some concrete outside (two slabs/steps to connect side and back "patio", simple drainage ditch beside driveway) and worked on cleaning up our formerly-an-excavation-site backyard. I've also been trying to be more active online, which is lame in a way, but it keeps my brain working since I'm always trying to be witty, and of course there is this blog thing which has been good for my brain too (not to mention me heart).

I've also gone a little 'fanboy crazy' since my birthday. I already posted Jules' first visit to a comic shop: that was to spend some of my birthday money. The rest had been spent on a new video game: Fallout 3 -- It isn't an entirely brainless occupation of time and at the very least it lets me get out those feelings I have that otherwise expressed would involve property damage or personal injury. (Its a real bummer to be so angry with no one to be angry at.) Beyond that, I've been comic shopping online, finally updating the Culver Amazing Spider-Man collection (we are now completely up-to-date). I say 'we' because my personal goal is to have every issue that has been released since I was born and I am doing the same for my children. They don't need to grow up to be as big of nerds as me, but I hope they enjoy them as kids and get something out of it. It is perhaps a little meaningless, and perhaps not the most productive thing I've done, but it means something to me.

Work : I haven't done much of anything in regard to preparing for the upcoming school year. I've given some thought to a couple of things and as it gets closer and closer my mind is getting better adjusted to the idea of going back, but honestly? The idea of it is a little hard for me still. I guess it is where so much of my time at the end of last school year revolved around Joel: all my free time was dedicated to getting plans ready for my sub while I was off for paternity leave, students asked about him and my wife almost every class period, co-workers asking, you know, all the excitement and attention when a baby is coming. I've been back to the school once since then, to drop off my keys and pick up some things from my room and while it was nice to see some kind and familiar faces, I also felt really anxious being in my classroom. Maybe it was just the time (just a day or two after the memorial) and not being ready to think about all the pressures of getting that room ready again. I don't know, but I am glad to work with such a great group of people and to have the summer off. I think I would have had a total meltdown if we'd lost Joel been mid-school year and I had to go back.

But thanks to my commitment to being productive, I'm getting myself mentally prepared to go back AND I'm getting set up to start grad school. I took the GRE, scored kinda low (scored a 1080: 560 verbal, 520 quantitative/math) my excuse is that I took the test completely cold: no studying, no prep at all. Oddly, looking at average scores, my math was pretty low, but my verbal was pretty high. Looking at different programs and occupations, my score suggests that I am already doing the only thing I'm cut out for (except for counseling). So it looks like I'm going to get a Reading certification, maybe take an extra class here or there. Either way, I have to take two courses this fall in order to keep my teaching certification, so I figure I'll make them productive ones and do the Reading thing.

Oh, and I'm getting my wisdom teeth cut out next week...and a cavity lasered.

Of course, there is also The Quest (part 2 ). There is a LOT to update there because the ball, she is a rolllin'. But I will save that for its own update, which won't be long from now.

If someone told me, when Joel had first died, that we should plan on working on our house, I'd have punched them. But I think that sense of accomplishment, and the cooperation between my wife and I, has been a real boost to our healing. We still have a rough road ahead, and it still hurts a lot, but at least now I feel like I have the heart to get through it all.