And Now, For Something Different

The daily prompt told me to switch things up (well, it actually said to be the opposite of what I usually do), and seeing as my blog is already a study in contrasts and variety, I didn’t really know where to go with it. I mean, what haven’t I done on here yet? So, I challenged myself to come up with something I have never done on this blog, and I could only think of one thing. That would be to write a blog entry without thinking about editing myself. I haven’t ever done that before. I guess it’s the picky writer in me that is always right there on the surface, striving for the perfect phrase at the perfect time in the perfect order. So, forget about all of that. I’m just going to write my thoughts down and do absolutely no editing on this piece.

That’s scary. Please bear with me.

Well, this week has been a bit strange, to say the least. I’m working two jobs at the same time, something I don’t think I’ve ever really done before. It’s one thing to be teaching and tutoring because it’s in the same vein, and usually the tutoring came right after the teaching day, so it was really just an extension. It’s completely different to work two completely different jobs on opposite ends of the day. Let me show you a snippet of my schedule this past week:

Sunday – worked at Target from 6 to noon
Monday – taught summer school from 8 to one-thirty; worked at Target from 5 until 9
Tuesday – taught summer school from 8 to one; worked at Target from 5 until 9

Following that pattern? Yeah, it’s having that time in the middle of the day that you think would be refreshing — hey, he could take a nap and stuff — but isn’t. And that’s okay because that’s the time I should get to spend with my kids, right? But I didn’t, not this week. Instead, because of how far away I live from both jobs (and how close they are in proximity to each other) I spent my time at various libraries catching up on my reading, my blogging, or inadvertently sleeping (Oops).

It was during one of those “in-between times” when I realized, “dude, you’re not 17 anymore.”

It’s not like I didn’t know it before, but it’s times like these that the notion gets reinforced. And I know it probably wouldn’t be easier to work the two jobs back to back, but by around 5 o’clock when I have to drag myself to the second one, or around nine-thirty when I arrive back home knowing I have to be up and out again early, I think maybe it would be easier. Luckily I’m only doing this crazy schedule for six weeks. Has it been six weeks yet?

And it’s all worthwhile when the paychecks come. Ah yes, paychecks. I can do this. Four more weeks!

Sam