I’m totally stuck on this week’s web assignment.  There are several (as in more than two) parts that I can’t get to work and worse, haven’t a clue how it works anyway.  So lab tomorrow night is going to be rough.  I think there will also be more people than usual attending the lab as apparently this one was more difficult for most people. 

Meanwhile I spent three hours this morning and early afternoon working at one of the library branches, renumbering children’s fairy tales.  This branch has only a tiny work space, so I did my thing sitting out on the refrence desk, which of course meant I got a few reference questions along with the mindless renumbering project.  The second half of my time there I was sharing a desk with a Youth Librarian.  She handled all the questions, and as she was working with an elderly woman who had several books she wanted to find, I marveled at how well she did with the sometimes crotchety, sometimes preachy patron.  Then I realized that the calm good humor she used with children worked equally well with older people.  A good lesson to learn. 

Having spent the entire day today working on homework I can truly say that I am rethinking this school thing totally.  OK, not totally, but really, I’m so tired of working on this stuff. 

This morning I concentrated on the 9 page paper that I wrote yesterday that is supposed to be 6 pages.  Editing is so much harder than writing!  And frankly, reading it on a new day, I had to admit it was pretty  much garbage.  But I’ve cleaned it up, after many hours, so now I only have to get rid of one more page.

Then I worked on stuff for my group project.  I am supposed to write 5 or 6 pages about Cleveland’s environment, history, etc that will go into our big final paper.  Well I can only find about 3 pages for that.  I mean, how much is there to say about Cleveland!

So I gave up on that and went back to work on the web homework that stumped me yesterday.  After several hours I managed to get all the stuff input, but of course most of it doesn’t work.  I did get one piece to work, and that was exciting.  I have an email out to the class now about my biggest problem, and hopefully still tonight I can fix that problem.

At the end of a jam packed day I haven’t really completed anything that is due this week.  And oddly, I’m wishing I could just turn in 2/3 of each assignment and call it good.  Guess it doesn’t work that way.    If I didn’t have the web final exams ahead of me I’d be less stressed, but I think in that class I have learned just about all I can hold in my head, and these couple of weeks, with new topics, are going to be rough.

Just hanging on now…

I love weekends. Even weekends that are filled with all sorts of stuff I have to do. But maybe the wonderment of a weekend will fade once I’m done with school and the job ends. And I am no longer a college co-ed but merely a middle aged slightly overweight unemployed woman. <smile> I am actually looking forward to being just a middle aged slightly overweight unemployed woman.

Today I’m sitting at my local library which is Katie (the dog) free, writing my last individual paper of my college career. I really don’t want it to be a piece of garbage, I really want it to be meaningful, insightful, perhaps even brilliant. However, I have left it too late for that. It’s due Thursday and I won’t have time beyond this weekend to work on it. So. I will settle for not horribly stupid, with no spelling or grammatical errors, and only an occasional mistake in the footnotes. I’ve been here now for three and a half hours and I need a break. I’m pretty sure that there is no flow to what I have done so far. But I am hoping with a bit of cutting and pasting (which I didn’t even know how to do prior to going to school in 2006!!) I can make something a bit coherent out of it. Or maybe the magic writing elf will appear overnight and spin it into gold.  Or something. You never know.

Enough of this. I need to finish, and the library is only open two and a half more hours. Then I’m stuck at home with Katie unless I want to write the rest of this paper sitting in my car in the driveway. Now there’s a picture for you! Tonight I need to start work on the group project which is due the week after next, and do my weekly homework for the web class. That alone will completely engulf me for the rest of the weekend.

That’s OK though..because it’s only twenty more days and I will be finishing my last ever final exam. But I’m not counting..yet.

The forsythia race has results! About 10 days after I cut the bare branches from my bush I have beautiful yellow blossoms inside.

Yellow flowers inside is a good thing, given we had snow outside again today. And of course today’s snow is for sure the last snow of the season, right?

Sitting in lecture this afternoon, with only two more weeks of classes left this semester, I suddenly realized that the professor was giving her “end of class wrapup” lecture because we’re doing presentations the last two weeks.  This made the end of my college days seem very real, instead of the hypothetical end that I’ve been thinking about.   And it also made me even more nostolgic, because she’s one of my favorite professors and I’ll miss her once I’m gone. 

So instead of listening to the lecture I started thinking about all the classes I’ve had,  professors I’ve met, people I’ve learned with.  And how fast it’s all gone by.  Which is why this song seems pretty appropriate.  Partial Trace Adkins lyrics below:

You’re gonna miss this
You’re gonna want this back
You’re gonna wish these days hadn’t gone by so fast
These are some good times
So take a good look around
You may not know it now
But you’re gonna miss this

I think I already do.

For a long time now I’ve been uncomfortable out in the yard after dark.  Even with the porch lights on I am antsy and eager to get back inside to light and safety.  I’ve been thinking maybe it’s just that I’m nervous about Katie being so young, that if she slips her leash she’ll be off into the dark, but as I think back on it, I was nervous taking old Bonnie, the previous sheltie, out at night too, and she wasn’t on a leash and wasn’t likely to run off anywhere.  

I seem to have this vague dread that sits right behind my eyes, that something or someone is going to suddenly rush out of the dark and I won’t be able to do anything to save me or the dog.  So this early morning around 4, as Katie and I wandered the yard looking for the perfect place, I thought about this, peering into the dark, listening to the trees blow in the wind, jumping at the occasional oak leaf skidding across the asphalt.  I closed my eyes and tried to think about what exactly I was afraid of.  What did I think was going to come sweeping out of the darkness to overtake Katie and me?

And what I saw, what came instantly into my minds eye, what I’ve been blocking for oh so long now was a vision of something large, so large it blocks out sight, and it comes with a huge roar, bright light that blinds ahead of a large black nothingness.  That’s what I’m afraid is going to come out of the night.  Loud noise, blindingly bright light and then nothing.

So clear, what I am afraid of, and what I must be carrying around inside me.  It is the vision of what it must have felt like, sounded like, that dark December morning when Dad couldn’t save himself.  

This is Katie, posing for the camera. She doesn’t usually do this. More often she looks like this:

Which is why I’m always happy when she looks like this:

But she doesn’t seem to need very much sleep.  That’s OK, I’m learning to get along on less sleep myself!

My husband’s aunt and I didn’t end up going down to Ann Arbor for the garden show.  8 inches of snow in Ann Arbor upended our plans.  Which in the long run was just as well, as I finished the paper that is due Monday.  And you’d think I’d be well on my way into the paper that is due a week from Thursday as well, given I’ve had this whole day to myself.  But no.  I did complete the research and all I really have to do is sit down and sort out the articles I found about my topic and then just write.  You know I like to write.  But I just can’t seem to get going.

I am also anxious about assignment 8 of the complex web design.  I can’t find the assignment.  Really.  Usually the prof posts it to our shared site, but it’s not there, nor have I received an email about it being somewhere else.  I sent a message to the class to see if anyone else knows where it is, and one student responded that he couldn’t find it either, but the prof didn’t respond, even though I eventually sent him a message directly.  So, whenever that shows up I know I have a lot of work to do.  You’d think I’d be getting other stuff done to clear my plate in readiness for the web assignment.  You’d think.

Today turned into a pretty day, sun on the snow, and if it weren’t mid-March I’d have enjoyed it more.  As it is I find all the snow, even if it IS melting pretty fast, slightly irritating.  I’m sure if I had had to drive to Ann Arbor in it yesterday or today I’d have been more frustrated.  

I just really want this month to end so that we can move into April and I can get myself graduated.  I think.  There’s still that pesky problem of finding work after graduation, but I’m ignoring that issue for now.

On to paper writing… 

As I was walking the four blocks from class to job yesterday afternoon I saw the following:

Two, then suddenly three, squirrels chasing each other around in circles, up and down trees and across brown lawns.

A flock of cedar wax-wings, passing through on their yearly migration, tittering in a maple tree whose buds were growing larger.

A guy walking toward me in shorts playing a harmonica.

Daffodil and tulip foliage pushing up from the soil near a church wall.

Does this mean it is spring?

This morning as I settle in to get some homework done I saw the following:

First one, then nine more deer emerging from the woods behind my house, running and prancing, chasing each other around and around my yard. The dog quivered in my arms as we watched till they crossed the road and moved on.

Our neighborhood blue heron, standing beside the frozen pond across the street, neck curled, head tucked into his shoulders, wondering why he left his vacation home so soon to come back to the frozen north.

Goldfinches at my feeder sporting tiny squares of bright gold feathers on their heads and necks.

A red and black ladybug wandering across my floor.

Does this mean it is spring?

Today I heard on the radio:

2 to 8 inches of snow predicted today.

NOW I know it’s spring in Michigan!

I’m spending this morning pulling out more information from an assortment of articles in preparation for the writing of a paper due Monday.  In my mind it’s already written, but I need to clarify positions in the articles to make sure I’m headed in the right direction.

Meanwhile I’ve made plans to take husband’s aunt who is 93 to Ann Arbor on Saturday for lunch with my aunt and uncle, after which we are going to the Matthaei Botanical garden’s spring flower show where I hope we all get uplifted by looking at (and smelling) fresh spring flowers in bloom.  I really can’t afford to give up a weekend day of studying so late in the semester, and I’ve waffled about making these arrangements all week.  But this morning I just decided to do what my heart says is right and figure out how to get everything else done later.

In the end, it’s my belief that doing what feels right will turn out fine.  And even if it means that I don’t get a perfectly wonderful paper written, and instead turn in a somewhat fine paper, well, that’s OK, because in the long run it’s not the paper that is important.  Family is overarchingly important.  A spring afternoon in a beautiful garden is important.  Watching someone you love enjoy themselves is important.  Taking time to smile is very important.