December 10: Ineffable Heavens, Full of Dread, Best Intentions

With finger pointed and eye levelled at the Pequod, the beggar-like stranger stood a moment, as if in a troubled reverie; then starting a little, turned and said:- "Ye've shipped, have ye? Names down on the papers? Well, well, what's signed, is signed; and what's to be, will be; and then again, perhaps it won't be, after all. Any how, it's all fixed and arranged already; and some sailors or other must go with him, I suppose; as well these as any other men, God pity 'em! Morning to ye, shipmates, morning; the ineffable heavens bless ye; I'm sorry I stopped ye."

The old sailor, Elijah.  Ishmael encounters him before shipping out on the Pequod with Ahab, and Elijah fills Ishmael with a certain amount of foreboding.

I am mind-weary right now.  I've been working, researching, and writing all day long.  It feels as though I got a little ahead with my medical office duties.  And, finally, after about twenty pages of false starts and rabbit holes, I think I have the beginning of my Christmas essay.  (Thanks to Maggie Nelson and her book Bluets.  I found some inspiration and direction from them.)  Now, I have a couple blog posts to write, and then I dive into some grading before I head out to a basketball game to hear my daughter play in the pep band.

Like Ishmael, I find myself full of foreboding and dread this evening.  I have a lot more writing to do, and I'm drowning in papers to grade.  This time of year, I find it difficult balancing all the parts of my life--work and teaching and family.  There are Christmas concerts and poetry readings and final exams.  Christmas shopping and Christmas rehearsals.  I am reaching a state of panic just listing all of these things.

Now, before you start saying aloud as you read this, "You're missing the entire point of Christmas!"--I'm NOT.  I know that it's not about presents or cookies or cards.  However, I am a church musician and the father of an 18-year-old girl and ten-year-old boy.  I can't simply tell the pastors at the churches where I play, "I'm not going to practice this Christmas.  I'm focusing on the TRUE meaning this year."  I also can't tell my kids, "Santa's not coming this year.  Instead, we're going to spend Christmas day playing board games and reading the Gospel of Luke."  Life doesn't work that way.

That's why I'm filled with dread right now.  Too much shit to do, not enough time to do it in.

Keep in mind, this situation is nothing new.  Every December, I experience the same thing, and I always survive somehow.  Right now, I'm at base camp on Mount Everest, thinking about the climb that's ahead of me.  And I forgot the bottled oxygen.

Every year, I tell myself I will not allow it to happen, this accumulation of work.  Tell myself I will work ahead, grade ahead, write ahead.  I go into the time between Thanksgiving and Christmas with the best intentions.  However, it never pans out.  Ever.  It's my fault.

So, you'll forgive me if this post is a little shallow.  I only have time to skip along the surface right now.  In a week, I promise that I will blog something that will be Pulitzer or Nobel worthy.

Until then, Saint Marty is on survival mode.