My teaching schedule was weird today because of our State of the College address this morning. This gave me a little free time because my morning classes were cancelled. I went to my office with the intention of writing a blog post about… When I was a kid, I was taught to respect adults – my parents, my friends’ parents, teachers, any adult with whom I came into contact. Respect is a big thing when you are the child of…
One thing that I think most of us have learned by the time we reach “a certain age” is that there are no guarantees in this life. Thus, we should take nothing for granted, not the big things and not the small things. Our lives can be turned upside down in an instant. Over the weekend, I was out-of-town visiting a friend and participating in a bowling fundraiser. Despite cold, sleet, ice, and snow, it was a great weekend. This…
I realized that when I started this series about making my way from age fifty-six to age sixty, I never explained why I chose the name that I did. Names are important. I always tell my music composition students that they must give their work meaningful names. This lets me know that they have taken ownership of their creation. So, why am I calling these posts Sailing Toward Sixty? One of the reasons that I started writing about my journey toward…
And I’m already a week behind with these posts, sort of, but I can explain! I had a great post working in my head last Thursday afternoon as I sat down to write. After I typed about three words, I realized that I ddn’t feel well. I sat for a moment and decided that I did not feel good at all. I abandoned the keyboard and went to rest on the couch for a few minutes. That few minutes turned…
Today is my 55th birthday. Exactly ten years ago, on a whim, I decided to start writing a blog. At that point I had no idea why and was fairly sure that no one really wanted to read what I was writing. But, I did it. The title perfectly summed up what I wrote about, all the things that happened in my day. I was faithful to the process for quite awhile. And then I became unfaithful. And then faithful…
Yesterday was my 54th birthday. In the last week we have celebrated both of my daughters’ birthdays and Christmas. It goes without saying that this is a busy time in our family! Interestingly, all of the men in our family–husband, ex-husband, daughter’s boyfriend–all have summer birthdays, an they are months apart rather than days. Despite being packed in around Christmas, I have always made a point to keep my girls’ birthdays separate from Christmas and separate from each other. Everyone…
My day began early and with the following two posts on Facebook:1. “The time needs to change. Getting to school in the dark is just not right.”2. Note to self: Beginning a 7:30 ear training class with harmonic dictation in the minor mode is not a good way to start the day.And so went my day. It had an early and rough start, but by my 9:00 class, things were moving along fairly well. Five classes later, I was done teaching…
Yesterday marked the year anniversary of my dad’s death. In many ways it feels like just last week rather than last year, making me painfully aware of just how quickly time flies. When I look back at my posts here as well as my own journaling, I realize that time really is the overarching theme in my life right now, with the majority of my thoughts being about how I spend what time I have. I am definitely one of…
Today is my four-legged boy’s seventh birthday. “The Birthday Boy” “The Birthday Boy almost 7 years ago” If you subscribe to the belief that a dog year is roughly seven human years, then Adidas is forty-nine. That means that for the next fifty six days he and I are the same age. I thought it might be interesting to see how much age 49 in a dog and age 49 in a human actually have in common. We are both…