A Good Tired

I took a nap on the couch this evening after working at the pool. I didn't really want to sleep too much because I worried it would keep me from sleeping tonight, but off I dozed into the ethereal kind of sleep that feels refreshing and drugged all at the same time.

I love taking naps, but I've tried to avoid them lately because then I have trouble sleeping at night. But today, I needed it -- even if the nap only lasted 30 minutes -- I needed it.

Six months ago I never would have imagined myself living the life I'm currently living. Not all that much has changed -- I still live in the same house, with the same woman, the same dog, the same friends who come over to visit, my same family all still alive and well -- but in many ways, everything has changed. Part of it has been difficult. Having been a teacher for so many years, my summers have been mine to craft as I saw fit -- naps were routine and each day I made myself lie down on the couch and feel the glorious dreamy glow fall over me. No papers to grade, no parents to confront, no staff meetings to attend -- yes, glorious.

Now I'm self-employed as a dog walker as well as holding down another part-time job at the pool working to help dogs rehabilitate from surgeries, maintain their mobility, or just strengthen old bones and muscles so that they remain relatively fit in their old age. I work six days a week now and though my days aren't the traditional 8 hours a day, I work hard and the work is physical.

The difficult part is not the jobs, it's not the physical nature of the work or the one day off a week. The difficult part is that Ann, also a teacher, is used to spending her summers with me and the leisure pace of our days were a strong part of our marriage. I know it's hard on her now that I'm gone for long stretches of the day and even harder when the weekends are short and I'm off to work. She doesn't say anything, but I know she misses the "old times" when we were not tied down by anything except our playful plans to swim at the lake or visit friends or see a movie.

She's adjusting, as am I, and while I'm trying not to feel as if I've put a strain on our time together, I fear I have. Yet I'm torn because the work I'm doing now feels so right, so exactly perfect that it's hard to feel any need to change. Ann has never asked that of me nor would she. Instead, she's taken on this amazing role of doing things for me -- things I normally did for her like making me meals or cleaning the house -- and I am immensely grateful for her support.

I suppose this is what makes our marriage strong and steady -- we adapt to what is needed and though it means we must change in ways we are unaccustomed to, we are making the transition relatively well. I've thanked her repeatedly for her support in this move from full time teacher to...to what? Business owner? Massage therapist? Dog walker? I still struggle to define exactly what I am these days and often find myself saying, "I was a teacher" avoiding the thing I am now.

The thing I am now is a good tired. My work is rewarding and exhausting. My work has got me on a steep learning curve and yet each day I feel a little bit more sure of myself, a little bit more accustomed to not being a teacher. It's made time all the more precious. Working with dogs -- on walks or in the pool -- has provided me with so many lessons already, but if there is one that really sticks out it's that living in the now, in the moment is much more fulfilling than the pauses in between the teaching.


I have to remind myself that most people live like this -- working without long vacations, doing a job and then leaving it behind when they head home in the evening. I have to remind myself that living a teacher's life is very different than the vast majority of the working world and while I appreciated the gift of those summer vacations, there's something more powerful living inside of me right now.


The other day I sent my blood pressure numbers to my doctor. We're keeping track as I continue on with the medication she prescribed. My numbers are lower than they've been in years and I jokingly told her it's either the medication or retiring from teaching -- I'm not sure which. She smiled and said that whatever I was doing I should keep it up because it was working.


I think what's working is me. I think what's right is that I'm on a path that feels true. Not that teaching didn't feel true in many ways -- especially after 23 years of it -- but this true feels deeper on some levels. As a teacher, I always doubted myself and while the doubt raised my blood pressure and gave me sleepless nights, it also drove me to be better, to give more, to overcome my insecurities by striving to be the best teacher I could possibly be.


Now I still have doubts -- especially with the dog massage -- but instead of the doubt defining me or driving me forward like it did in teaching, this doubt feels more like an opening up of sorts -- an allowing, as it were, to live at a different pace and see that not knowing is as important as knowing, that the angle of the learning hill is all the sweeter when I'm not so worried about getting to the top but more focused on this moment's step.


I know, I know. It sounds Oprah. It sounds like a self-help book filled with gibberish and impossibilities that only the wealthy have time to afford, but when I come home from six days of hard physical work where I've exercised dogs either on long walks or at the pool and I feel this good kind of tired, I know I've found something I've been looking for all of my life. Not only is it in the work I do, but it's in this house, in this marriage, with these friends, with my extended family. It all feels like a circle that's finally connected and I just want to hold it for awhile.


Enough of this sap, eh? I'm off to bed.