December 10-11: Nothingth, Tenth Circle of Hell, Love and Hope

A hole had just appeared in the Galaxy.  It was exactly a nothingth of a second long, a nothingth of an inch wide, and quite a lot of millions of light years from end to end.

The Galaxy opens up and rescues of Ford and Arthur, despite astronomical odds against it.  Improbability simply steps in and saves the day.  It does this many times throughout the book.

I am not going to apologize tonight for my absence yesterday.  I am in currently in the Tenth Circle of Hell, the one that Dante never got to visit.  In this circle, sinners are punished by sitting in hard-backed chair, staring at their laptops, and grading final exams for eternity.  Every once in a while, a bell rings, and the sinners may get up, stretch, go to the bathroom, but they have to carry their computers with them wherever they go, answering e-mails from worried students.  And it goes on and on and on and on and on . . .

This evening, I am meeting with my evening film class for evaluations, and then I am jumping in my car and speeding to my son's school for his Christmas band concert.  (Actually, I think it's called the "Winter" band concert, in which they play "Jolly Old Saint Nicholas" and "Good King Wenceslas.")  My son has been practicing like crazy on his trombone, so much that I think I could play his part in the program tonight, and I've never even picked up a trombone.

After the concert, it's back to grading and writing and grading some more.  I type these things expecting no sympathy.  This is what I signed up for.  I know that.  That understanding doesn't make the end of the semester any easier.  Please keep in mind, also, that, while full-time professors are in their comfortable, quiet offices finishing up their grading, I am cobbling together my grading time in between working a full-time job and parenting and working another part-time job.

If you can't tell, I'm a little overwhelmed at the moment.  Not because it's Christmas time.  Not because it's the end of the semester.  Not because I juggle four different jobs.  It's all of that, combined with some personal drama, that is capsizing my little canoe right now.  I will get through it all, as I always do.

On Christmas Eve, I will go to church, sing "Silent Night" in a candlelit church, and try to absorb some of that peace on Earth.  On Christmas morning, my son will drag us all out of bed before sunrise, and he will lose his mind over the big present coming his way.  And then, I will go play the pipe organ for Christmas morning Mass.  The rest of the day will be spent at my mother's house, opening more presents and eating and watching A Christmas Story and Miracle on 34th Street and It's a Wonderful Life.

I still believe that it's the most wonderful time of the year.  But it is also a time, as Charles Dickens put it, where want is keenly felt and abundance rejoices.  That want can be physical, financial, emotional, or spiritual.  In the words of another writer--this time Henry David Thoreau--"the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation."  That's where I am right now.  Quiet desperation.   And it has little to do with all the grading I have left, and a lot to do with the feeling that I'm losing something that is supremely important to me as this year draws to a close.

I am looking for something brighter and happier as I enter the third decade of the 21st century.  Sometimes, however, finding happiness means enduring sorrow.  Because you can't have day without night.  Good without bad.  Fulfillment without hunger.  The cost of love is grief, because, eventually you will lose what you love, through illness or addiction or death or divorce or Donald Trump (yes, you can blame that man for just about any bad thing in the world today).

But love is worth the grief, because, without love, life would be a pretty lonely place.  I will never give up on love.  That would be like giving up on world peace or ending world hunger.  The best things in life require work.  A lot of it.  Writing a book.  Losing weight.  Exercising.  Being married.  Impeaching the President of the United States.

I will hold on to love and hope this Christmas season (and a little improbability).  I will get my grading done.  Finish writing my Christmas essay.  Buy Christmas presents.  Bake cookies.  Work at being a good father and husband.   Because that's what it's all about--doing your best in everything, despite your flaws and failings.

Saint Marty has plenty of flaws and failings to go around.  He also has plenty of love, as well.