Tired
This has been a very emotionally exhausting morning. Nothing new (in a bad OR good way) has happened. I am just feeling emotionally overwhelmed by most everything. I do not want to do ANYTHING other than sleep, where I can have dreams and memories of good things.
It may be the time of the semester, or it may be the time of the year (March is the month where a sizable majority of deaths of family and friends has occurred over the years..... my Dad, my Mom, several uncles and aunts, pets, at least three friends.). I do not want to work today. I feel spent up and used regarding teaching today. The same, if not more is how I feel about research today.
But, if/when I eventually do retire, who am I then? I do not really know. It frightens me. Will I have any identity? Who am I now, though? Does it matter if I transition from nothing to a retired nothing?
This is about all I can muster up to write today.
PipeTobacco
4 Comments:
Professor,
A couple of my academic friends used their retirement as an opportunity to take up an academic project that was either too obscure/exotic or too impractical to pursue while they had ongoing university responsibilities. Do you have some obscure or fringe research interest that hasn't yet been feasible but that could keep you engaged during retirement?
Alternatively, you could become a tobacconist and open a small shop of your own in your preferred retirement locale.
Or maybe you could throw yourself into volunteer Church work? Even work toward the permanent diaconate if you could be granted an exception to the usual age requirement?
When I've had moments of utter exhaustion and overwhelm, I've sometimes joked that my ideal occupation would be to do quality control in a mattress factory -- plop down on a bed and give it the OK eight hours later. Damn shame that job doesn't actually exist!
I trust you'll power through your current exhaustion and overwhelm, but if it lingers perhaps you may want to find a trusted counselor, maybe a priest or a university resource to whom you can unburden yourself? Good luck with it all, Professor!
You are you. You are not your job.
I like what both Pat and John have to say. Perhaps a part-time teaching gig with less stress and responsibility would be ideal. It would be a transition into retirement. You do sound burned out, my friend.
Listen to your body
And
Rest xx
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home