First Week of Summer Break

In some ways, this week has been the first week of summer.  Last week, I turned in my last short paper for Environmental History of Christianity class and went to the quilt show and waited to feel like I was on break.

I rarely feel like I'm on break, and I'm never on any kind of break for very long.  Even when I was "unemployed," I wasn't really unemployed.  I didn't have a traditional full-time job for awhile, but I still had my adjunct job, teaching college Composition classes online.

In the past, I've had summer classes to teach that started just a few days after the grades for Spring term were due.  This year, I have two classes to teach, but they don't start until the end of June.  There have been a few days this week when I've said to myself, "Oh, so this is what it's like to have a summer break!"

I've always envied public school teachers their summer vacations, even as I didn't want to do the public school teaching to get that break.  In South Florida, the cost of living was so high that I couldn't conceive of a way to ever have much of a break.

I am so grateful not to live in South Florida these days, even though I have friends there whom I miss.  As we move into hurricane season, as the days heat up in record smashing ways, I am so happy to be in the mountains.

Last night, we watched The Birdcage.  I have wanted to see it again, but I worried that it might make us miss South Florida, since it is set in South Beach, Florida.  Perhaps the week just before hurricane season is the best time to see it.  I'm happy to be here where the nights cool off, and we don't always have to keep anxious eyes to the east and south, on the lookout for swirls in the atmosphere and thunderstorms that move off the coast of Africa.