Sundays

Today has actually been a pretty nice day, for a Sunday. For a long time, as long as I can remember, I've really disliked Sundays. When I was a kid, Sunday was always the day my mother would (undoubtedly tired of having us around and perhaps dreading her own work week) start yelling at us about cleaning our rooms etc. It was also a day when everything was closed: in a small town in the Midwest, the mall was closed on Sundays -- up until I was maybe 14 or so, when most of the mall (and Target, which was nearby) started being open, although the department store was still closed because of religiosity. Not that we went to the mall that often, but it was the idea that everything was closed and that there was no escape from the fact that it was Sunday that bothered me. Plus, of course, I dreaded Monday's return to the tedium of school.

Now, I still loathe Sundays. There's always the pressure of the weekend's house/life tasks still undone, plus the academic workload -- the reading for the week's classes, the papers to grade. Which, combined with the fact that neighbors and people out and about are doing things like going to brunch and shopping and relaxing, often makes me grumpy. (I know, it's not rational, especially since I should be grateful I don't have their get up at 5 a.m. kind of schedule during the week.)

I try to have one day each week that is totally off from work (writing and teaching and department stuff). In past years it's generally been Friday or Saturday: Friday when I've had an exhausting long Thursday schedule, Saturday years ago when I was dating and had a fairly exciting social life. But my day off has never been Sunday. Maybe I should try that. But that would require working a lot on Fri and Sat.

At least this semester I'm on a Tues-Thurs teaching schedule, which I prefer to MW or MWF. But my grad seminar is on Tuesdays this term, which will put a lot of pressure on the weekends. (Of course, I could start prepping the next week's class on, say, Wed or Thurs of the week before, but that would not only require nearly superhuman will and organization, but also a review on Sun or Mon, since I do my best teaching after a fairly fresh rereading of the texts.)

Since I worked on putting together my new course syllabus yesterday, I wound up taking today off (although that wasn't exactly a conscious decision). Though it's hard for me to say exactly where the day went. Some time in the yard with the dogs, some computer time. Cooked a nice lunch. Cleaned the kitchen. Lots of laundry. Weeded out part of my closet, although I didn't really follow through on the whole job. But I've been pretty relaxed about it all today. I'm going to go to the park with the dogs soon, and then we're having dinner with my gf's father. If I can just keep the nervous Sunday grumpiness at bay, it will have been a good day.