Toil and Toilets

 I'm writing this knowing full well that I have about a hundred other things to do.  For the past couple weeks, I have been under water with work.  Probably not the best time to start potty training Emmie, but hey - when it rains, it pours.

Emmie's "office"

Except when a certain toddler is sitting on the toilet.  Emmie did great on Saturday, the first day of training.  She tinkled, and it took her by surprise.  We praised her; she beamed.  Ever since, she tells me she has to go potty.  I take her to the bathroom upstairs, pull off her pants, sit her down... and then nothing.  She looks at books and kicks her feet.  We talk.  That's it.

If I could focus solely on potty training, this wouldn't be so frustrating to me.  But I'm totally overwhelmed lately.  I have a rotating stack of papers on my desk that need to be graded.  I have student recommendations I promised to write.  On top of that, I am working on a new online class for the spring.  The 3rd party company my school contracts to run the online program needs all my materials tomorrow.  In the past, I've posted the materials to my courses myself as the weeks went by.  This time, they are being more adamant about doing it for me - way in advance.  I resent the lack of autonomy.

Creating all these documents up front is an incredible amount of work.  Just imagine - anything that I might say to students standing up in front of the classroom, I have to find a way to present to them in a different form.  Mostly it's a lot of writing.  Instead of being able to talk and gesture freely, correcting myself or clarifying when necessary, I need to write out everything.  The writing needs to be precise.  That takes a lot of thought and time.

My "office" in the basement

I could do PowerPoints, but those take even longer to create because you have to think about graphics, transitions, etc.  I could do video presentations, but from where would I record them? My basement?

On top of that, I have been advised to compose objectives (at least 5), have a self-scoring assessment (of at least 10 questions), and post additional suggested materials to correspond to each weekly lesson.  This goes above and beyond what a face-to-face class requires.  What really bothers me is that I don't get paid any extra to do all of this.  I won't get paid until January, when the class starts and I am immersed with grading and providing feedback for all the discussion forum posts and writing assignments.  I will spend six months on this course and get paid for 8 weeks.

All this preparation comes with the job, I know that.  I signed up to teach this course; I accept the responsibility for the work.  I just feel stretched so thin.  Last week, I freaked out to Bruce, and he gently suggested that I get out of the house more to work uninterrupted.  I should.  It's just hard.  I teach one day on the weekend, and two week nights.  He works full time during the weekdays and goes to school one week night.  That leaves us with one weekend day, and two week nights to be together as a family.  The last thing I want to do is leave when Bruce is home.

Bruce arranged for his dad to come over and watch Emmie yesterday afternoon so I could get work done before class.  I went to Starbucks and got a coffee.  I unpacked my laptop, pen, and papers and worked for 2 & 1/2 hours nonstop.  It was amazing.  It solidified for me that I am going to have to embrace new routines.

Working from home just isn't working for me.  The parenting-a-toddler life isn't gelling with the adjunct instructor life.  Even now, as I type this, Emmie's battling for my attention.  I try to work before she wakes up or during her naps, but I barely get emails answered before she's calling for me from her crib again.

All of this makes me want to stress eat, but I don't, because to add to my overly full plate - I'm trying to get fit.  Bruce has been counting his calories for a while and walking on his breaks, and he's lost 20 lbs!  (Damn those men, they just think about losing weight and the pounds fall off).  A few weekends ago we spent time with friends, a married couple who have a six month-old baby.  She's trying to lose the baby weight, and he is focused on health, after a young coworker of his had a heart attack and died suddenly.  They count calories and work out regularly now.  I've been talking about losing the 'baby weight' for two years.  After all this, I decided that there's no time like the present.

So Bruce and I got MyFitnessPal apps on our phones.  We log all our calories and exercises.  That part isn't too hard.  Eating healthier gets easier every day.  We put a battery in our old scale, and I've literally watched my weight go down since.  It's encouraging, but it's work, too.  Some days I feel like there is no aspect of my life that's uninhibited anymore.

I was going to end this post with something inspirational about success and hard work.  Maybe a famous quote.  I was searching for just the right one when Emmie told me she needed to potty.  I rushed her upstairs, but we were too late.

There's no way I'm going to get all my work for that online class done by tomorrow.  I feel pretty dejected right now.  There's a lot of quotes out there about how success is the product of determination in the face of failure.  That's totally true.  But in the moments of failure, personal or professional, success sure seems a long way off.

Is it lunchtime yet?