It occurred to me that I should reconfigure where things sit on my desk to reflect the summer mode.
Somewhere earlier this year a small batch of pens and a highlighter took up residence just to the left of this computer. (I am right-handed.) I say “this computer” because there is another sitting to the right of this one. (I am super-talented.) But I doubt I’ll be dabbling too much in the joy of manual, hand-held edits this summer. (That is not an unpleasant experience, and I catch much more that way, as readers of this site can attest.) I took the pens and put them back into their place in a small hand-turned bowl that someone got me. It was a tourist souvenir; it is beautiful. It still has the price on the bottom, $14, and it was probably not too much to the purchaser. Probably it was too much to me at the time, when I first noticed it, because it is unnecessary to spend money on me, but it seems like the best deal ever now. I don’t know what you’re supposed to put in that bowl, but I see it every day and some days I think about it like this and it’s priceless. It sits behind my elevated monitor. (Sometimes my desk has four screens. (I am super-distracted.) The bowl is within easy reach, but not immediate reach. Opposite that is a little ceramic tourist gift that someone else purchased me. A former colleague had asked me to water their office plants while they were gone, and I got this silly little Dutch shoe trinket. I don’t know what you’re supposed to put in that shoe, either, but it holds highlighters perfectly.
Moving those pens from my left completes a series of tasks I hadn’t realized was necessary. But they’re now tucked away. And the little notepads and things have all been tidily arranged. Previously there were also class notes sitting to the left of this computer. They got filed several days back. Then there were months of calendar pages there, but they were discarded last week. There were also some itemized To Do lists, but they’ve been re-positioned to their next staging area. In the back left corner of the desk, which may as well be on the other side of your neighbor’s house, sat some library books I’m going to read for the fall term. I moved them down to the front edge of the desk, next to my forearm as I type. I am not going to read them next, so, I’ll put some other books on top of them.
Hang on.
Two history books, right on top. I’ll be reading them soon. I bought both online. Perhaps one was a gift. I hate, hate, hate that I’m not clear on that. Please don’t spend your money on me, but if you do, know that I will see it as the honor of a lifetime that you have decided to give me this thing, because you thought it might be meaningful to me, because you thought it might make my day better. It will. It does. Unless I can’t remember if this was a gift. I hate that. Also, I stacked a book that I picked up from one of those “Please take this away from my shelves” that characterizes university life. No, not theft from a library. Occasionally some colleague will need space for new materials, retire, die over this very book, whatever. And out into a common area the old ones go. There will be a sign, sometimes an email. I have many books like this. Most of them I remember picking up. This one, on folklore, could prove very useful for next fall. I remember from whence it came, but not the day. That’d be absurd. I’ve had it for a decade or more. Besides, I probably picked it up in the evening or at night, anyway. So, all these books are moved right down the corner.
I am eager to get all this reading underway. I can’t explain that without making it sound even nerdier.
Fine, there’s nothing better than slipping into someone else’s world and seeing their best work.
Just behind the books I have placed a big stack of CDs. This summer I will return to the Re-Listening Project. Longtime readers will not be surprised: we are behind.
Behind the CDs on the desk … you know what … nothing. There’s nothing back there. I took the rest of the stuff and put it below the desk. My old pallet desk (I built it in the pure rebellion of 2017) sits on fancy birch IKEA sawhorses. There’s a shelf on the bottom of each sawhorse. Those shelves need to be cleaned up. I look around my office … all of it needs to get cleaned up. But it’s the kind of cleaning you don’t mind doing? The kind you play loud happy music and do it and wonder why all cleaning doesn’t feel like this? The kind of cleaning that signals progress.
I’m not starting that at 1:19 a.m., as I write this. I must simply bottle this feeling for a more appropriate time. A more appropriate time for progress.
Anyway.
I agree, 869 words is an awful lot of throat clearing, but remember: you came here for this.
We are setting off on a trip. The little graphic above is from airport signage at Dulles. It’s a silly sign for a very standard airport store. The “Oh, shoot, I forgot a book and need an overpriced drink and some earplugs would be nice, and hey, is this neck thing better than my other neck thing? That’s Stellar News!”
We will be gone for several weeks, and you’ll have to figure out where we are. I give you until Wednesday, maybe Thursday at the latest, to get it right.
Here’s your first hint. It’s a long overnight flight. And I’m watching a lot of British media on the seat screen. The UK is not our destination, but we are flying BA and, for some reason, it seems like I should be watching something the flight crew would appreciate as being of their own.
The King’s Speech it is! And probably also some BBC dramas. And maybe some sleep. Tomorrow, when I wake up, we’ll be somewhere else. Or on the way to to somewhere else. It’s a long flight, but I am terrible on planes.
