Awake Before the Moon

I have been awake before the moon.  This week, sleep has not come easily to me--I fall asleep easily, but I've been awake between 1 and 2.  I usually get up and get some work done, whether it's online teaching work or writing.  I've had a lot of online assignments coming in this week, and this morning, I'm finally caught up.

There are benefits to being up before the moon.

Of course, the disadvantage comes around 11:00 in the morning, when I start to feel a crushing tiredness.  Yesterday, for a brief moment, I thought about taking half a vacation day just to go home and sleep.

Instead, I placed a lunch order for our campus for next week, and then I took a camera (by way of a Kindle Fire) and wandered around the campus.  Our social media coordinator has requested that we take more video, so I asked students if they'd be willing to be filmed talking about the first week of school.

I asked some basic questions:  "Tell me one interesting thing you learned this week" or "Tell me a highlight of your week."  I was surprised by how my mood perked up as I did this filming project.

As I often do, I thought about the parts of my job that I'm liking most.  It's been a week of issues that seem unsolvable.  These are not the kinds of problems that delight me.   But walking the halls and asking people to describe week 1 was a delight.

I thought about the elements of work that have brought me contentment this week:  serving as a historian of sorts, as I recorded a particular moment in time and setting out the day old baked goods for students to enjoy.

Historian and Hospitality Coordinator (I wrote Hospitalian, a word I made up)--I'm not sure that job title really exists anywhere--perhaps on a cruise ship?

I thought about the Faith 5 techniques that so many people I know practice to some degree.  One of the central tenants is to talk about the highs and lows of each group member's day.  As I walked around campus, I felt like I was crafting a variation of that exercise.