Recovering and to do list…
It has been 3 weeks since 29 April. Time flies so fast. I have gone through volatile feelings during these three weeks. But things are getting clearer, I guess. Or it certainly seems so.
I have COVID vaccine today, first dose, Pfizer. Not really sure if I will get any bad side effect yet, oh well, at least I’m ok for now. Let’s keep fingers crossed that I won’t be too sick for next few days.
Today the local government has informed us that all the schools will close for the rest of the school year, so my daughter will need to stay home till September (sigh… she will be very upset knowing this). Sigh… she’s getting a bit better with online learning, and the school gets better as well – last year online learning was horrible, her teacher did virtually nothing and we always felt we are lost, i.e. not knowing what to do. But we told ourselves, ok, she’s in grade 2 (she was in grade 2 at that time), so we should not worry too much.
I have recovered after my semester and after that fatal episode with you. Sigh… Yeah, it takes me JUST 3.5 weeks (yeah, just). I really take lots of rest, as I don’t have that level of sustained energy. Lemme talk about that later, maybe in a different entry.
I’ve just sat down and written down what I want to achieve/do during the next 3.5 months (yes, I will need to go back to teaching early September, so I will have 3.5 months to be exact for the summer (after I have spent 3.5 weeks doing almost nothing productive!!! :-). As always I’m very ambitious and I try to blend in so many things on my to-do-list. I may not finish all the things in that list, but if I can get half, or two-thirds, or three quarters of that list done, it’s very good already. And yes, it is on 4 fronts: career (research), family, literature & investment. And yes, as you already know, I’m an excellent planner, even though just only so-so at implementing things because my energy level and my moods are extremely volatile.
Looking ahead, it will take me 1 more year to get to submission of my tenure document. If all things are good and I get confirmed for tenure, then I will need to teach 2 more years till I have my full-year sabbatical leave (i.e. you take just 80% of your salary or so and only doing research in that year). I think I may apply for another one year unpaid leave after that so I can do a two year master degree in literature, and I want to do an online degree, maybe with a few weeks of residency. Currently I’m thinking of UK, or US, either country, I want to travel (let’s hope COVID has disappeared by then and no other virus shows up, touch wood). That may be the only way I will get serious about learning English literature and writing in English. Two years are a very short period, but who knows, maybe. Just need to give it a try. Of course, I can always plan, whether I can do it or can finish it is a different story, but at least, I have a plan. One of my favourite movies is “Inception”, where they say ‘you need to plan a seed of thought into someone’s head, then it will grow into a tree, that’s why ‘inception’ is so important!”.
From now on, what I will keep doing is still trying to write half-an-hour a day in English, here, anything I feel like, a letter, a story, a poem, talking to you, talking to me or talking to anyone else about whatsoever I can think of. Just to get me used to express things in English, and get myself a bit more familiar with this form of writing. I don’t know, I’d like to keep this diary going on, even though that is not a dialogue that we used to have with each other. I don’t even know if you are reading this, but I believe you are. If not everyday, it will be once in a while. I think you should know that you are the ONLY ONE that knows this username and website, I don’t give it to anyone else. I hope somehow it will put you in a calmer state of mind. We can’t be with each other and we can’t talk to each other any more, but maybe I can do this for you. OK, for me, and a bit for you. (I can’t insert a smiley face here – so restrictive here, not sure why). If you want to drop this, stop reading it, I will not know, and then the site will be for me only, but it’s OK for me either way.
As ambitious as I am, I think I need to learn to take good care of myself. The last 5 months were a bit too much volatile for me, even though I’m volatile all the time by nature. We have gone through a very rough time – well, I will say, a very rough year. Or at least, it’s on my side, if it is not applicable on your side. (Your year is tough because of different reasons, partly relating to me, partly relating to the other ‘flower’, sigh… poor you!!! I sincerely hope things will be better for you – and I know I can’t do much to help. Probably keeping this diary is the only way that I can comfort you, to the best of my ability and till I can maintain it).
I’d go home now, I need to maintain a good routine with my family by cooking dinner, having dinner together, going for a short walk after dinner, getting my daughter to have a shower (she hates showers), reading her a bedtime story (currently I’m reading her Harry Potter, we are just still at the first book). Oh well, so many things that need to be done/get done in and around the house. My husband is not in a very good shape now to help with many things so I guess I’d need to bite the bullet though.
Will try to do at least a few productive things every single day and keep my days productive. I hope you feel better, love, and hope you can get on more with your creative work. Please write for me sometimes (yeah, if you feel like you want to write), I always secretly hope that you can write a little bit (*yeah, just a little bit) more for me. There I will be happy – I’m easy to please, aren’t I?
Take care love and take care diary, till tomorrow.
Vivid Memories
PS: I’ve edited this entry – and I find it helpful. Maybe everyday I should try to edit and re-edit my entries a few times, that will help as well.