20141029.0713

A year ago, I was musing on the weather at Sherwood Cottage. It seems appropriate to return to the subject now, for it is far more fall-like today than it was then. Then, it was in the 60s and rainy; now, it is in the upper 30s and clear. It may make it into the mid 70s--and it probably will--but that is a far cry from even a couple of days ago, when the temperature was far higher; it seemed that summer relinquished its hold upon this place where cowboys came home to defeat only reluctantly this time around. (If it has indeed let go; it may yet reach out again.) But today seems another day to stay inside and write.

I will not be so fortunate as to focus upon doing so today. Work continues, as it ever does, and the work that pays the bills preempts The Work that does as much as anything short of Ms. 8 to fulfill me; I have my classes to teach today. I already know what lessons I mean to offer, and I know that there will be others presented which I do not intend, for there always are. Still, I would rather plug away at the projects I have taken on than upon marking papers for return (of which I have sets from last week and from this, with another coming in today; I shall at least not want for things to occupy my time). Yet I cannot, not in good conscience. The bills must be paid.

With the end of this month and the beginning of the next approaching, I am considering upcoming events. I have every intention of voting on Tuesday, and I made sure my voter registration was in place so that I can do so. (The card is sitting on my desk even now.) I will not repeat last year's adventure, though; that is not going to happen, as I noted. And I will almost certainly not be doing National Novel Writing Month...again. There are too many other things going on for me to take on another project at the moment, even if it is one in which I am interested. (Someday, dammit.) But I will be working on other things...somehow.

For now, though, those "other things" are the work I do on behalf of my classes and my students. Many are ungrateful, looking askance on my efforts even though they have asked me to conduct them (college is voluntary, and in this part of the world, better-paying work is available than most of what college prepares students to face--if at the potential cost of having arms ripped off by juggernauts of machines). But there are a few who appear to give a damn, who seem actually to have some understanding of what goes into putting things together for them; I have to believe that they are worth the time and energy expended on their behalf. The alternative, of course, is not to be borne.