It has been—
[Looking at calendar]
—3 weeks since I last write here on JALC.
[Allow me to pause one more moment to turn said calendar over to February.]
Now there’s a few main reasons for my radio silence. First and most prominently, I was on deadline for a stretch. An inevitable part of life for the non-profit grants professional. Especially one as prone to procrastination and over-scheduling as I can sometimes be.
Continue reading “Time passes”
In other news, I’m wondering about going back to school.
Now, I’ve been in the education NPO business for a long darn time, so you could totally say that I don’t need more coursework or another degree to be successful.
And yet, I’ve been feeling more of a pull towards getting an Ed.D. during these last few months. As the policy piece of my work portfolio and my direct involvement in research & TA projects have all increased, I’ve been wondering about whether there’s benefit to me in having a stronger—or at least more organized—level of background knowledge about the education field.
There would certainly be some benefit to me, job-wise. And I wouldn’t have worked in this field so long if I didn’t care about it as much as I do. And I legitimately enjoy learning new things.
But still I wonder: what’s the gain for me here? What are my motivations? Can I trust myself?
Continue reading “Going back to go forward”
Today it finally happened. Today, 50 days into my personal lockdown timeline, after 7 weeks of “pandemic nesting,”* it finally happened.
Today’s the day I gave in and worked in my PJs.
(I think the plaid on plaid is what really makes the look, don’t you?)
Yes, it seems like every post title I come up with has some connection back to my music collection and/or the music of my generation.
So here, enjoy some Kenny Loggins. And a dancing gopher:
So Sherri, how did that 2019 blogging experiment of yours end up?
I daresay the fact that my last post was almost-literally six months ago answers that question.
Its not that surprising. Shortly after that last post went up, I joined the RED Sisterhood team, helping support my wonderful teacher and mentor, Kristin Sweeting Morelli, in sharing her genius for women’s empowerment and women stepping into their feminine power.
Since I’m an integrous person and my primary professional responsibility is to my “9-to-5” job, I’ve only been helping Kristin out on evenings and weekends. But, when you add those evening and weekend hours on top of my 9-to-5 schedule and on top of the evening and weekend hours I sometimes(1) have to give to my non-profit job — well, it’s unsurprising I haven’t had a lot of recreational writing time.
So why am I back here?
Call it a New Year’s thing.
Well, it turns out I didn’t go to yoga last night. But it wasn’t because I was feeling self-critical or anything like that.
Instead, late afternoon/early evening yesterday found me a really good work groove, making progress on the several hundred tasks that need doing in order to meet the half-dozen-or-so important deadlines I have between now and next Wednesday. And that momentum was momentum worth keeping up.
It’s funny how these deadline seasons at work make me act more like a college student than I ever did when I was actually in college.
I’ve been seeing lots of friends posting about World Theatre Day today, which makes it a little extra fitting that I “played hooky” from work stuff this evening to watch some friends perform in Mamma Mia.(1) It’s a show I was almost in—-for one hot second—-so I very much wanted to make sure I came out to support everybody.
I’ll admit I was a little worried that I’d have some wistful sad feelings about it all. Sorry for what I’d missed out on, desiring to be up on stage again. After the bows and the drive home, I’m glad to say that wasn’t an issue for me.
QUICK HIT: Approaching all-nighter territory, so it’s a super quick post and then a brief nap before I dive into the to-do list.
I don’t know if I’ve talked about it here on JALC, but there was a stretch of time during my Philly years that I became a low-grade devotee of short-form improv. All of which is a somewhat pretentious way to say I took a few classes, did a few student shows, and attended the occasional improv “playdate” with other amateurs who just wanted to keep to fun of the practice going.
But one of the reasons I’m drawn towards the more pretentious phrasing around being a “devotee” is the way in which studying improv during those few years was absolutely transformational for my life, my career, and my psychological health. This is not hyperbole: legit transformed.
This is another “bonus book” that I decided to swap into a category. When I was planning my lists, I chose Freakonomics for a PopSugar category about “inserting a phrase into the common lexicon,* a choice that will also allow me to scratch off one of the squares on my “Bucket List” poster. And, because Freakonomics was written by an economist, I slid it into the “business book” category—even though I knew I was reaching with that. After all, for all I know, Freakonomics is going to be less of a business book and more from a behavioral economics perspective.**
In the meantime, a coworker of mine recommended this book, so I put it on my “hold” list in Libby. A copy was released to me a couple weeks ago, so I set aside my other challenge titles to read this. (Yet another reason why I’m a bit behind schedule for February’s challenge categories.)
Turns out I needn’t have thrown of my schedule this way to accommodate the library timeline, because I liked this book enough to purchase it for my home library.
Self-Love: It's Just Another Lifestyle Change 