Category Archives: Random thoughts

Random thoughts

Summer Vacation

My early morning job is done for the school year! It ended after a Monday, which is weird, and some of my colleagues seemed to not notice that us part-timers were done for the year and didn’t even say goodbye, but whatever, I’m on summer vacation! I celebrated by falling asleep before 11 pm and waking up at 6:30 am. Since then I’ve updated my website, paid bills, and enjoyed two cups of coffee.

My summer is really starting to fill up with teaching. I’d be happy to have a few more concerts or gigs, but my teaching schedule is looking great. I’m probably averaging 18-20 hours, which is plenty. I said goodbye to a high school senior last night at her lesson, as well as goodbye to an elementary school age student who is leaving lessons. I got to have lunch with a former college student yesterday, which was wonderful. It was great to hear how she is doing in grad school and in life, and I was touched that she contacted me to meet up during her short visit with friends.

I have been struggling with feeling like I’m missing out—I haven’t been playing as much lately, which is a somewhat conscious choice, but I still get twinges of jealously seeing what concerts others are up to. I remind myself we get one life and we can’t fit everything in! I would love to do it all, but I can’t have a busy teaching schedule, travel with Louie to his conferences, and play all the gigs. I just can’t. And I have played things lately, and it’s been fun, and there is more on the docket ahead, but it’s also okay to not play everything…I mean, you can’t play everything, not even a fraction of it!

I would like to do more high level playing, either a more serious chamber music concert (I miss our quartet playing regularly) or perhaps a solo recital that I can sink my teeth into. I was stressed over my new music concert in March, but it was nice to have something to dig in and really work on. I enjoy sightreading tremendously, but it doesn’t give that musical satisfaction in the same way. I have tossed a program around in my head, and I suppose I should really just get something on the books at Wash U…but then I also really enjoy reading in my spare time. I can’t decide if I’m tired, burnt out, or just need something ahead to inspire me. It may be all 3!

In any case, I’m thrilled to be on “summer break” from my school job (okay, except I still have to get grades in) and my college job (truly done!) and just have my private students and gigs to deal with for a few months. Since our weather finally got hot last week, it does indeed feel like summer.

Random thoughts, Travel

What a time to be alive

It’s been a minute since I blogged! I’ve been busy, tired, and burnt out, so I haven’t had much to say. Cats, teaching, worrying, planning for summer travel.

We had our big spring concert at my school last night. It was fun to see everybody all together! It was interesting to see how many people are absolutely okay being in a room, maskless, with hundreds of people…including other teachers. I wear a mask teaching, and have all year long. One of the schools that the kids go to is mask required due to the high number of cases, but those kids don’t have to wear masks other than at their own school, because…that makes sense.

Nonetheless, I have not been that worried about it lately. I have enough other things to worry about, and I just keep my mask on for work related things, because I decided awhile back if I was going to get COVID it would be NOT at work, but from doing something fun, and I’m sticking with that. I also wear masks at concerts and that sort of thing, because we are sitting there for 1-2 hours, side by side.

I digress a bit though. I didn’t plan to go on about COVID in this “post-COVID” world we are in, but it happens. I’ve been working hard collecting information about summer schedules for students, and tomorrow is the day I make the schedule, and I’m thrilled. I’ve been a little worried about it, but worst case not everybody will get a lesson every week they wanted it. I’ve taken on some extra summer students, and some of them have a lot of flexibility and it’ll work well, but others it turned out have less time and wanted two lessons a week during a 4 hour time period, and…we’ll see how that goes. I have decided not to blame people for trying, and I have learned a few more things about this year.

Okay, so I paused there for two days…in the meantime I got my summer schedule figured out and published to the online portal I use, woo hoo! Miraculously it mostly worked out and there were only a few days where I couldn’t fit everyone in, but mostly those students didn’t want a lesson every week anyway. I am coming up on the last regular week of teaching, then a 4 days “makeup week” for lessons missed during the semester (some were mine) and then, OFF TO NORWAY!

I’ve got a lovely trip planned for Norway. We fly into Oslo, spend one night there, then we take the train to Bergen. It’s supposed to be a really scenic train ride. We spend 3 nights in Bergen and then take a ferry to Balestrand as part of the “Sognefjord in a Nutshell” tour. We spend two nights in Balestrand, and will take an afternoon ferry trip to Fjaerland and the Glacier Museum, then finish our Nutshell tour with a ferry to Flam, a scenic train through the mountains to Myrdal, and then a train back to Oslo. We spend over a week in Oslo for Louie’s conference, and have a few activities planned there as well: a bike tour together (just regular bikes, not ebikes), and then I have two solo day trips planned while he is in the conference: a round trip ferry to Drobak and Oscarsburg, south of Oslo, and a bus trip that goes to Hadeland Glassworks and Kistefos Museum in Jevnaker. We are also planning to attend a few concerts in Bergen since we are there during the Bergen International Festival and we have tickets for Swan Lake at the Oslo Ballet. We may need a vacation from our vacation, (tripadvisor seems to think this is a bad thing, but I don’t, if it’s a sightseeing vation rather than a beach vacation) but I am so excited!

COVID gives us some worries of course, and we have to present a negative test to return home, which I think is ludicrous, but nonetheless still currently the policy. Why do I think it’s ludicrous? Because we aren’t required to follow any other COVID guidelines in the US,(such as masking on planes) and it seems completely outrageous that our own country could keep us from entering based on having a virus that…plenty of people here already have. So hopefully we won’t get COVID while we are there, because that would be a huge pain(especially as we are headed to another conference one week later) but I can’t worry about everything all the time! Norway has no entrance testing or requirements so that’s not a concern going there.

So that’s what I’ve been up to: teaching, finishing the semester, trip planning, scheduling, etc. Last weekend I finally got out in the backyard to do some weeding. I’m not sure my gardening plans this year: I keep thinking I’ll plant some things, but it’s looking less likely for this summer. We have enough travel going on that it will make it challenging to stay on top of things, though I still like the idea of fresh beans and maybe zucchini. I suppose I should decide and if so, plant in the next week!

How are you doing?

Random thoughts, Teaching

Crunch Time

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This is officially known as “crunch time” in our household. Louie got an email from his job about how “crunch time” was a small but natural part of the year and listed all sorts of ideas on how to maximize your time. In any case, we keep yelling “crunch time” at one another here and there…the issue is perhaps that crunch time seems to run from September to May, but particularly from after Spring Break (late March) to May.

My students: got their festival videos submitted. It was a slog this year, I felt. I’m not sure what I could have done to help more, but I felt like I had to remind people too many times. Oh well! And now there’s a recital in one week, which is great timing for those that just finished their recordings because they really know their stuff and should simply have fun, but for others seems fast after Spring Break.

I’m trying a new system for summer lesson signups, where they fill out a questionnaire with their summer availability and then I fill in the schedule afterwards. In theory this is a great idea, because I’m tired of teaching everyday in the summer all day with weird 30 to 60 minute gaps throughout the day, never enough time to actually do something useful, but enough teaching to feel like I worked all day for the equivalent of 3 to 4 hours pay. So I have a new plan, and hopefully it works out decently.

I worked through the weekend: two services on Good Friday, a lovely Passover dinner afterwards at Louie’s Mom’s house, teaching during the day on Saturday, attending a student recital at Wash U, and then a Saturday Night Easter Vigil (which was lovely, but very long), followed by an early morning wakeup call for three Easter services. I got home around 12:30 and spent the rest of the day wiped out. I even took a nap, which is unusual for me.

This week is stressful because I’ve got a thing on Wednesday for a medical procedure…I won’t go into details, but it’s nothing serious, just that you should make sure you get your annual exams so if there is anything wrong it can get fixed before it’s too late. I’m taking off work a bit, all of Wednesday, part of Thursday or all, Friday morning as well. I feel like it’ll somehow be a vacation which perhaps tells you how exhausted I am. It’s poor timing with the recital this weekend, but I don’t get to choose these things. I’m teaching a little extra today and tomorrow to make up for it, but also just missing some lessons. I built a makeup week into the schedule for the semester for reasons such as this.

I will say that changing up my teaching schedule to a monthly set fee has worked out well, but also been exhausting: I think I have ended up teaching more than ever! I do plan to continue, but in the fall I’m making each semester 1 week shorter, for my mental health. I’ve been feeling pretty run down lately: I am really looking forward to summer and taking some time for myself.

I haven’t even been taking any cat pictures lately! They are enjoying the catio (on the back porch, there’s a screened in place to hang out that they can access from inside, and not actually go outside, but be on a little cat porch) when the weather isn’t too cold, and they love when it’s nice enough to open the window entirely (I’ll try to get a picture of that next time it happens, maybe this week?).

The weather has been blah, overcast, chilly, rainy…I’m ready for warmer weather. I think that the weather is contributing to my general malaise, but it’s also just burnout and feeling underappreciated. Anyway! How is your week?

Random thoughts

Stormy weather

It seems like we’ve been having rain, wind, and storms more often than not. But today we are supposed to have severe storms, and I guess weather forecasting has gotten better than it used to, but it’s still the midwest.

Many things are happening all at once this week: Holy Week, which means extra work services (back at it!), Festival (recordings due Thursday night), along with regular preparing for the end of the year. Louie shared with me an email he got from work about “crunch time” and how the school year follows a certain ebb and flow, and crunch time is the normal part of things…it was all both true and also felt very much “don’t worry about working 80 hours a week this is all fine.”

This Is Fine creator explains the timelessness of his meme - The Verge
Dog in burning restaurant says “THIS IS FINE.”

Nonetheless, I haven’t been too crazy busy. I’m more annoyed by my constant allergies and some personal health matters which I’m not discussing here. I’ll be happy when April 24 is behind me though, as that is the end of a lot of stresses in my personal life as well as the day of the Spring Recital for my private students. And then it’ll be nice when school ends, but I don’t want to wish my life away!

I feel like each semester goes by faster than the last, which I assume means that the next semester will be even faster and soon I’ll be retired. The downside is that I constantly feel like it’s the “end of the semester” and that we are constantly preparing for performances, when I want some time to just relax and work on technical issues my students are having. I suppose I could do less performances, but I don’t think twice a year is too many.

I keep researching parts of my upcoming trips when I have some downtime, as well as reading: I’ve started some Jo Nesbo (reading Bat) as well as waiting for the next Inspector Gamache I need from the library. I did decide to go to Austin as well: I figure I should take full advantage of opportunities and since Louie is going to be there and there’s a hotel room, I should do it. I’m just going part of the week he is gone, but it should be fun (and hot.) I wish the Norway trip were later in the summer honestly, as the summer will feel a bit of a letdown afterwards, but that’s out of my control!

I enjoyed performing on a concert on Sunday afternoon at Washington University. I only played on the first piece and then stayed for the rest of the concert with a colleague. She worried she had guilted me into staying but I said I was happy to do it, that I wanted to be the sort of person who stays when they can.

I recently saw a post online that someone made about networking and attending concerts being work and all of that, and who knows, maybe that is a thing, but I want to the be the sort of person that attends concerts for fun (I already do this) and also to support my fellow musicians, not just for networking reasons. I want people to attend my concerts, so I should do the same, and I feel like statistically if I go , then somebody else will too. That’s all. And did I mention I like music?

I’m rambling now. I blame the sneezing 🙂

Basically I came here to blog and I have little to say. Life is rather repetitious really, each day the same schedule as the week before, waking up early and working late. It’s a rather tough schedule, and I keep trying to decide how long I want to continue it, and what the tradeoffs are.

How’s your April going? Eaten any good recipes lately?

Random thoughts

My Blog, My life

I got a comment on my blog yesterday that I moderated, because I can: I pay for the blog. Someone I didn’t know accused me of being “afraid of Trump signs.” Yes, I mentioned that there were political signs in the area and that led us to not want to spend more money.

I didn’t say what the signs were. You can assume, but you might be missing some: some signs were Trump/Pence. One was a former Trump/Pence sign with the Pence torn off (traitor to the party, right?). There were many confederate flags, and some Let’s Go Brandon signs.

I’m not afraid. But I did not start this fight. I am not the one leaving up divisive political signs or adding to them, long after an election is over. I am not the one who put politics in the middle of a pandemic of a deadly virus that killed AT LEAST 1 million Americans.

So, it boils down to, do I trust eating in a restaurant in an area with people who support an autocratic ex-president who still supports Vladimir Putin, who is currently bombing civilians, (including maternity hospitals) in a sovereign state?

No.

No I do not.

Of course it goes much further as well. I have so many friends and family members who are in the LGBTQ+ community. I know that those signs stand for taking away their rights to simply live as who they are. I know that those friends and family members would not be welcome in these areas. And I want to go places where they are welcome.

Am I afraid? No.

But I have dollars to spend, and one life to live, and what I have, at least, what I still have for now, is choice. I chose to visit an Airbnb in a rural area. I chose to visit some state run natural resources, which I support highly. I chose not to spend any additional money in the neighboring communities, for a variety of reasons, one of which was that we had such a lovely view from our room and had brought food to cook.

Are there lovely people in these places, just as there are lovely people everywhere? I am certain. There are lovely and not lovely people who live everywhere.

You may not know this about me, but I grew up in a small town in South Carolina. I grew up surrounded by confederate flags and Reagan supporters. Don’t assume you know me because I live in a city now.

But, as a traveler, as a human, I have choices. I’m debating visiting Austin with Louie in the summer (he has another conference there), and I think, hmm, do I want to go to Texas? All the guns, all the anti-trans legislature, etc. Plus the heat (my god, the heat!) in June will be annoying. But there are some really interesting looking things there, and I know Austin (and Texas) are full of wonderful people trying to do wonderful things for the world. And Louie has a place to stay because of the conference, so it’s just the cost of the plane ticket and any missed work (which, it’s summer, if I can’t be more flexible in the summer when can I be?)

All this to say: I welcome comments from all readers, but I reserve the right to moderate in any way I see fit, especially for personal attacks.

Random thoughts

Super Tuesday

So many 2’s in today’s date, right?

Anyway, just a quick pop in to tell you how my week is going so far.

Honestly, last week was a really difficult week. My job was difficult, I was failing at everything, my students were doing poorly and it was all my fault, my class was the worse in the group rehearsals, mine had the worst posture, etc, etc. I had some days where I just broke down. I was tired and fantasized about quitting my early morning job at the end of the school year…or just never going back again even.

But I made it to the end of the week somehow, and had a nice weekend! And Monday was a holiday so I got tickets to a play on Sunday night.

I got the tickets from the St Louis Repertory Theater. I’d played a show with them a few years back, and we went to see A Christmas Carol in December, so when they sent an email offering a good deal on the latest play, I thought why not. I bought two tickets, had them held at Will Call since it was close to the date, and didn’t really pay attention beyond that.

We went to the theater at the appointed time and realized…oh so they don’t always have their shows at the same place. It was locked, no one was parking, nothing going on! I checked my email and realized, oh my gosh it’s at a different place about 14 minutes away.

Somehow we made it! We were a few minutes late, but it hadn’t started yet, and we got our tickets and got seated just in the nick of time!

The show was called Stick Fly and we really enjoyed it. It was both entertaining and thought provoking, which is the best way to be I think. I’m so glad we didn’t give up and go home, which is what we were very tempted to do after failing. The production runs through March 6 and I highly recommend it–just be sure to notice the address of the theater.

So I guess the morale is, keep on keeping on. It’ll get better. Or something.

And then this morning, I had my school job and it was fine, my students are doing a bit better, and I just need to keep at them and not let things slide, and then I went to Trader Joe’s. I got some orange sodas which I thought would be a nice weeknight treat.

As I was unloading I had the horrible thought that I had left them on the bottom of the cart. I didn’t see them anywhere, and I had almost done something like that in the past and thankfully somebody had noticed before I drove away. I thought, wow, this week is turning out just like last week, isn’t it.

But as I unpacked my bags I saw that the sodas were just in one of the bags. I hadn’t forgotten them at all!

I will take this as a sign that this week is going to be okay.