So Here's the Thing...

Goodness, it has been awhile since my last post. Almost a week! What is wrong with me?

I'll tell you:

I am working.

A lot.

At strange hours.

And I've been thinking about that lately. You see, I love my job. Not just in a "yeah, it's kinda fun and pays the bills" kind of way, but it an "I feel called to work with college students" kind of way. Nothing gives me greater joy than watching the lightbulb pop on over a students head when they finally "get it," than listening to them negotiate rather grown-up topics in the context of a seemingly surface event like Homecoming or Recruitment, than having a student leave my office after a really great conversation and just smiling to myself because I know they left a bit different than they came in. I am a teacher. The meetings are my classroom. The programs are our lessons. Their experiences both their exams and my evaluation. And I love it.

But these days, when I am on campus at 10 p.m., when I am working on the weekends, when I have only one night per week that has not been claimed by this fraternity or that service organization, I'm not feeling so warm and fuzzy. And this past weekend I think I pinpointed why.

I love my job.

But I love lots of other things too.

And when my job does not allow for me to do those other things, I get a bit sad. A bit grumpy.

When I don't have time to cook. When my house is a mess. When the weather is nice and I finally have a yard and I really want to plant some stuff in it. When I would love to go to Hobby Lobby but it is 30 minutes across town and there is no way to get there and back in the little one-hour slot between meetings. Oh, for more hours in the day!

I try to make time for these things as much as I can. A little here. A little there. Because ultimately I believe that we choose to make time for what is valuable to us. So that is what I will do. And in a few weeks, Greek Week and Greek Grammys and the Hunger Banquet and Service on Saturday and all these things will be over. And it will be summer. And I will miss them.

But tonight I will cook dinner. And I might do a load of laundry. And I will take note from the little self-observation I have made: in order for me to be happy, I must make room for all my loves. For my yard. For my kitchen. For the outdoors. For books. For this blog. Because when that balance is in place, everything I do is better for it.