December 20, 2004

Workation and Darkmonth.

I'm not really getting my work done, but I'm not really on vacation. I'm on workation.

I don't really like this feeling. One ought to go one way or the other. Say you're on vacation and don't touch your work, or plow through that work and stop taking breaks that stretch out but don't feel that good because your inner voice keeps nagging about how this is just supposed to be a break but it's eating up the whole day. If you're going to think "get back to work" at least get some work done.

Agh! I think it has something to do with the light, that is, the lack of light. We are deeply embedded in the time of year I think of as "Darkmonth." Tomorrow is the Winter Solstice, the midpoint of Darkmonth, the darkest 30 days of the year. After tomorrow, there is, at least, the knowledge that each day has a little more light than the day before. Here in the north country, the darkest days are so dismally short. I've gotten used to the cold over the years, but never to the extreme dark. At 2:30 in the afternoon, you already feel the darkness setting in. These days have so little sense of their own existence, it's hard to take them seriously.

3 comments:

Meade said...

2:30 in the afternoon?!!!!! Aagh!!!!! NOW you tell me!

Ann Althouse said...

Thanks for bringing the light and the warmth to get me through the last 8 darkmonths, dear Meade.

How heartening it would have been, on December 20th, 2004, to have known that 5 years later you would be coming.

Meade said...

The pleasure has been mine, my dear friend. Has it really been 8 darkmonths? Time does indeed fly. Even as the planet tilts.