The turning of the year is usually used for looking forward to whatever we'll all get up to fixing about ourselves, our environment, our society, or whatever. But I find myself this year with a half-stunned feeling. Like when all the smoke alarms go off first thing in the morning and you spend the rest of the day wandering around saying, 'WHAT? NO. I'M NOT YELLING. WHAT MAKES YOU THINK I'M YELLING? COULD YOU SPEAK UP PLEASE?'. And then I started thinking back to this time last year, and I realized that is a perfectly sensible reaction.
Roughly 365 short days ago, we were living in the old house, at the top of the hill, next to the University, with 2 dogs, 6 chickens, and 2 horses that lived elsewhere and were someone else's responsibility for 22 hours of the day, 4 days per week, and 24 hours on the other three days.
My job consisted of 'physics professor' and 'planetarium director'. It filled all available work time, and then some.
I had just lost a book contract, because the other authors couldn't come to an agreement with each other about royalties. I breathed a sigh of relief to not be working with them. I was contemplating finishing the second draft of my novel.
We had just started thinking of a five-year plan, to find a place where we could move the horses home. This was inspired by a number of separate lines coming together, of which the most important was probably the owner of our boarding stable telling us he had five years left in him.
It was starting to seem likely that there would be layoffs in the college, and my work responsibilities would change. But the legislature had not met yet, so it was all still uncertain.
Today, we sit on our own little mini-farm, a boarding stable in our own right, with responsibility for not only our own two horses, but two boarders, and all the facilities. When the gate falls off the hinges, that's us. We renovated a barn, installed more than 1200 feet of fence, had an arena built, and learned to care for it. And we are learning how to deal with the eccentricities of a new house, built by someone our fantastic neighbor refers to as 'Squirrely'. I've also started giving lessons again, and find that I dearly love it. It's so much fun to have students who genuinely care AND do their homework!
We killed a cow.
We have two dogs and ten chickens, with more birds on the way in the spring.
I have written a first draft, and more than half of a second, on an Introductory Astronomy text. What was originally to be a straight-forward update developed into a project so different that the name has changed. 'Understanding Our Universe' is now more than halfway through second draft, dealing with reviewer comments, which are nearly as unforgiving and autistic as referee remarks. I'm simultaneously dealing with copy-edits on earlier chapters (third drafts, in a sense), as well as a few new items which are more or less in first draft. It's very confusing, and somehow, I still have to figure out how to explain to the art studio why the woman pushing the refrigerator should NOT be wearing high heels and a skirt.
My work responsibilities have changed. I am now all of the following people, some only interim, (which is almost harder, because I feel constrained in the changes I can enact)
Physics professor
Director, Ott Planetarium
Director, museum of Natural Science
Director, Center for Science and Mathematics Education
Director, Science Olympiad of Utah
Assistant Director, Ritchey Science and Engineering Fair of Utah
I am in charge of a staff of two full-time employees, hordes of hourly students and volunteers, and a constantly changing rota of smaller projects.
So many things have changed that I think my resolution for the new year should be to be a little more forgiving of myself, if the trough boxes aren't built yet, and I keep getting in trouble with accounting for various heinous offenses like putting the wrong six-digit code (which was told to me by the scholarship office...TWICE!) on my PARs. Maybe I have a lot going on right now, and it will all seem easier once I've actually successfully hosted 1400 sixth through twelfth graders all on the same day, without having them set fire to campus.
My mom always says it takes a year to get used to a new home. That's also true for jobs, I think. And vocations. And farms. Especially when a perfect storm of opportunities and challenges show up all at once---every one of them worthy of your best efforts.
