Festival of Frida: A Week of Highs and Lows

All this week at work we've been having a Festival of Frida.  Back in February, I noticed that a wide variety of us were interested in the upcoming Frida Kahlo exhibit that was coming to the Museum of Art Ft. Lauderdale.  I suggested a Festival of Frida that would happen in late April or early May--enough time for us to get events together, and early enough that students could still go see the exhibit.  We decided to hook into the Cinco de Mayo activities of the week of May 5.

The library put together some wonderful exhibits.  The Graphic Design students created some boards of her lesser known works.  The Fashion students created garments and had a Frida inspired fashion show.  We had one of our Art History experts give a talk about Frida Kahlo, and some of our Culinary people made Mexican refreshments for that.

I kept expecting that one of the events might flop.  I didn't do much organizing, after all.  I just floated the original idea and let people chart their own course.  Periodically I sent out an e-mail.

I am not a micromanager.  Along the way, I got the idea that some people might have preferred me to micromanage a bit more.  And that made me a smidge anxious.

But in the end, like I said, it all came together.  It's been a wonderful week, in terms of helping me appreciate my colleagues and students.  And Frida Kahlo herself is such an inspiration:  such a broken body that contained such determination to persevere.  I really should never complain about a thing.

In terms of the larger (across the nation) network of schools affiliated with my school that gives me my full-time job, yesterday was a day of bad news. We found out that 15 schools will be teaching out programs and eventually closing.  My school, one of the larger ones, will not be closing.  I woke up at 2 a.m. nonetheless.

As usual, when I wake up in a hyper-alert state, I got a lot of work done.  I wrote a page of the short story that's been in my head.  I wrote a new poem based on this blog post from the last time the school had bad news.  I looked at old poems.  I haven't typed any poems into the computer since February of 2014.  One of my summer goals will be to get some poems typed and ready to send out in the Fall.

And then, I felt tired again, around 5:30.  So I turned out the lights and went back to bed where I slept for another hour and a half.

I feel oddly well-rested for someone who has been up and down.  If I had complete control of my schedule, I'd likely work for a few hours, rest for a few hours, work for a few hours, and onward through the 24 hour cycle.

But that's not my life right now.  And so I will go and take care of a variety of duties--while basking in the happiness of a successful Festival of Frida week.