20150910.0613

I spent most of yesterday fighting a headache that I think has not gone away--or if it has, it has been replaced with another one. Aspirin did not help, not even with coffee. Drinking more water did not help. Neither heat nor cool helped. Darkness was some small relief, so I have to believe part of the problem was eye strain, but it was not the whole of it. I think my sinuses may be involved; the headache I feel building even now seems to be situated in one of them. I cannot be sure, however; I am the wrong kind of doctor to know that with certainty, and I have not attended to my body as I ought during my time on the wind-swept plains and in Sherwood Cottage.

I do not write the last to heap blame upon this place. There is blame to be found for it, certainly, but that is true of all places and in all times. I am sure that there have been chances for me to act more appropriately than I have, to do more, and I have not taken them. For that, I can only hold myself to account, saying I will try to do better without a clear idea of what trying actually is, soon forgetting that I have said the thing, or else pushing having said so to the back of my mind so that it lingers and annoys me, but not enough to prompt any changes, not enough for me to take any action amid the many things I already do.

It is not as if I am idle, teaching four classes and doing the attendant grading while juggling freelance work, academic work, the search for more of both and for other work besides, and the welcome obligations of family. While I have not formally tracked my hours, I routinely begin my work around this time each day (although I admit that my personal blogging may not count as "work," I get going on the other stuff as soon as this is done), and I am often still at work at seven, eight, or nine o'clock at night. I move around among the tasks, of course, putting the needs of the Mrs. (when she is not at work) and Ms. 8 above the others, as is right, but I am more or less always on the go.

But it is not enough, somehow. It does not have me where I want to be; I am not certain I am heading in a direction that will take me there. Perhaps that is the source of the headache that will not go away, or a source of it (as I note above, I think there are several contributors to the condition), that I have no way to gauge my progress towards the goals I have set for the middle and long terms. (Short-term goals are not problematic; they amount to "get this one task done." They also multiply more quickly than flies or bacteria, and perhaps with the same effects.) Walls rise high around me, or blinders are firmly affixed; in either case, I do not see the scenery passing by.