Get Dressed

So... I recently came into a lot of time on my hands.  There are things to do, no doubt, but there is A LOT of time to do it in, so therefore, not a lot gets done 'round here.  Its like my momma used to say (usually in reference to getting ready for the day, but also applicable to life in general) "It takes as much time as you have."  Innit true?

Right before I started the lovely internship of all internships which now feels like a blur that never really happened which makes me a little sad (oh, maybe that's what I want to talk about?) one of the intern "coaches"  talked a lot about "just get dressed!"  She had this analogy, like if you have an hour to get ready, what would you do?  Shower, get dressed, eat, make-up, do your hair nice, etc.  If you have a half hour you might skip breakfast and throw your hair up, but you can get to the rest.  Now what if you only have five minutes.

You "just get dressed".

At the time, this was all related to just getting my classroom put together passably, and preparing myself and my lessons for the first week.  I held on to that analogy.  I kept repeating it.  It had so little time and so much to do.    After a while, it was supposed to get easier, they told me.  I was supposed to learn how to "get dressed" a lot faster.  I was supposed to come up with systems where I could "pick my clothes" (do the basic planning and preparation) quickly.  I was supposed to have time to start putting on make-up and doing my hair (you know, actually becoming a good teacher).

But just getting dressed, and not doing that great a job at it, was taking ALL the time I had.

There were factors there that made it really hard for me to get dressed.  I was like a new mom, who ends up wearing yoga pants everyday because she is too busy being sleep deprived and living in crisis mode to really get dressed.  Maybe I'm taking this analogy too far.

The madness of it all came to an abrupt halt, and now I find myself in nearly the opposite situation.  I have little to do, and lots of time to do it.  Somehow doing laundry becomes an all-day event (Symbolic?).  But mostly I spend my time dreaming up ways to spend my time.

I wonder if I had had some of this time then, would I have used it?  Or would "just getting dressed" still take all the time I had?  I worry that even in a new situation, I won't be able to be a "fully showered, breakfasted, made-up and ready for the day" teacher.  Will I still use up all my time to just "get dressed"?  What about this time I have right now?  What can I do to make sure that the scary bad unsuccessful teacher Mikell is gone forever, and the amazing, fabulous, confident, prepared teacher Mikell can emerge?  I'm asking too many questions.  I just wish that I could spread out all the time, and use it wisely and always be my best self.

I like to think we all feel this way.  That time management is one of the important things we're supposed to learn in life.  For now, I think I'd better just go get dressed.