If February was busy, then March 2003 was a five-ringed circus. I didn’t sleep through the night even when I was taking nighttime cold medicine. I spent much of the month recovering from a cold. It was snowy and cold and winter got its last licks in during its final month. “I think my body is falling apart,” I wrote.
My daughter had orthodontist and pediatrician appointments, x-rays of her adenoids and wrists, violin lessons, and a performance of the baby scene from Free to Be You and Me for a school gifted program event. She planned her birthday party and, when I questioned one name on her invitation list, I told myself to, “back off.” She brought home a hat she made at school that said her new year’s resolution was to stop yelling at her brother. She yelled at her brother? When?
We celebrated my son’s fifth birthday with a play party at the park district. Since he was getting ready to go to kindergarten, he had a marathon of inoculations at his yearly March physical and it felt like a reward (or punishment) for recovering from all his illnesses of the prior month.
I kept track of all my appointments on my Palm Pilot, needed to replace the phones that were installed in our cars, and watched shows recorded on VHS tape on our VCR when I worked out in the morning.
“I am the human pinball.” Often my schedule wedged my home, school, and parenting responsibilities into a small space. I wrote about finishing class at 12:15 and rushing to volunteer at the book fair at the elementary school and then returning to the high school for an afterschool meeting, coming home and cooking dinner before leaving for Shabbat services in the evening. On the weekend, we attended the school’s musical, attended a community workshop, took my Sunday school students on a field trip, and had families over for pizza and play.
I wrote that, “School is the simple part of my life.” Yet, the more I read, the less simple school seemed. I met with the Peer Helpers in the morning, taught two or three classes a day, was assigned a new teaching partner to co-teach an integrated social studies-English class for the next year, drafted on to a “think tank” to work on the new daily schedule, and moved toward performance of our creative writing event, called Stage Write. School had a lockdown drill I said I was, “overstuffed to the max.”
As part of our congregation’s steering committee, I attended interviews and other events to hire a rabbi. We met the man who would become our rabbi this month. He did a Shabbat service and I drove him around the area. My wife felt that we should move quickly to hire him or another congregation would snap him up! I noted that I was the youngest member of the Steering Committee. Now, I am one of the oldest and most senior!
In the middle of the month, we declared war on Iraq because President Bush believed Saddam Husain had weapons of mass destruction. My father and I saw this very differently and had some passionate discussions about it.
I was planning trips for spring break and the summer. My wife’s mother was struggling and required a great deal of care and attention. She had an infection, then an allergic response to the medicine for it, and the doctor struggled to locate an alternative treatment. My folks returned from a vacation, were home for a week or so and then left on another one. Once again, I watered plants, fetched mail, and got groceries for their return.
“Running, running, running. Lots to do and little time.” I went to my professional development class, SEED several nights throughout March, tried to figure out how to grade student journals without commenting on everything; we had clogged toilets, trips to the train station (to just watch the trains go by), and several dinners at Sweet Tomatoes.
Yet, when things slowed down occasionally, I wrote, “I love lazy and slow mornings when we can get them.” Spring break was a chance to do just that, although I reminded myself to “use it well.”
“Spring is here and summer is quickly being planned. Zoom, zoom, zoom.”
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