The Week Where A Clone of Myself Would Be Nice

This week is one of those weeks where I had more than one of me.  I'm looking forward to teaching the autumn themed writing module I've designed; yesterday I stopped at my favorite apple orchard to get a bushel of Pink Lady apples.  But the Southeastern Synod of the ELCA is having their continuing ed event here at Lutheridge.  I'll be doing a bit with that group; in a half hour, I'll head up the hill to camp to lead a morning walk.  I wish I had more time.

Even as I wish I had more time, I know that only some of the continuing ed would be relevant to me at this moment in my professional life.  The ELCA isn't geared to those of us who are bi-vocational.  Much of the support that the ELCA gives to clergy assumes a traditional clergy member who serves one congregation and doesn't hold down multiple jobs to make ends meet.  Or worse, it assumes that the clergy member is managing a staff of people at a church that has plenty of money.

And even though I know these things, when I see pictures of continuing ed events with lots of clergy folk having inspiring times, I want to be with them.  And similarly, when I see writers at events that look inspiring, I want to be there.  And when I read about successful teaching, I want to be creating modules that will do the same.

And so I try to do it all, sort of.  I could say that I do none of it well, but that's not true.  Could I do it better if I only had one thing to focus on?  Maybe.  Or maybe I would be bored and stop trying.

I also wonder what it's like to only want to do one thing, to focus on that one thing, to have no alternate lives tugging at the hem of one's garment.  I've gotten better at not obsessing over decisions already made, roads not taken.  But I'm not as good at settling down into my current life.  There's some part of me always creating alternate plans.

By now I realize that those plans will be useless.  Far better is my skill at pivoting when things need to be different or when something falls apart.  Perhaps that pivoting skill comes from my lifetime of alternate life Kristins tugging at me.

Well, let me get ready for my walk.  I've got only one self to be all the places where I want to be.  Let me enjoy it.