The Thoughts of the Week

 As I write this today, it is on a Monday and I am home.  I was feeling a bit under the weather over the weekend and took a sick day from work.  Dealing with the handful of snarky high school juniors I teach in my first class was just not something I was up to today.  I am not sure what happened to me, but starting yesterday morning I was nauseous, lightheaded, and having headaches - I know I don't have a viral infection, as I was not congested, so not sure what is going on with that.  While I am feeling a little better today, I figured it might be a good idea to take it a little easier.  

Also, as I write this I am in the process of upgrading a few things in my home now.  I got a new compact mini-desktop computer and am in the process of hooking that up.  I have to wait for a VGA adapter to be delivered in a short while to get the monitor hooked up, but everything looks like it will be pretty easy to connect.  Technology has come a long way since the days of clunky monitors, large computer operating towers, and floppy discs - in a fraction of the space now, you can have all that same convenience, and I personally think that is a good thing.  And the flash drive - that is a genius invention!  You can save so much on those, and I have a boxful of them with practically all my documents as well as books, videos, music, etc., preserved.  While on a more comprehensive scale I am a bit wary of technology (AI, for instance, is a prequel to transhumanist eugenics, so I don't see much good coming from it), I also understand how integral it is to have technology these days.  The fact it is now more compact makes it even more appealing.  Now, if only all these damned wires could go away - those are the biggest pain.  I spent the better part of a morning detangling a mess of cords, earpieces, and other stuff that I had in a basket under my old computer desk in Hagerstown but now is in a drawer.  There were cords to things I don't think I even have anymore, and in all honesty, I question the wisdom of keeping a lot of them.  But, I keep a few on hand just in case - you never know when something like that may come in handy.  Technology then is a necessary evil - I wish there was less of it, but so much also depends on it now. 

Getting rid of my desktop - after dissassembling it and taking out the hard drive and the disc drive - was a mixed feeling.  On one hand, it does symbolize the end of the old and the emergence of the new, but on the other hand it symbolizes the same thing.  That is both a positive and a negative in other words.  With so much that has happened in the past few months, I am still digesting a lot - it could be why I was having a few physical problems that led to me taking off work today. Losing a lot of stuff at our old house, then having Lily pass away on me, as well as having to rehome my rabbit Zoe and my birds, was a lot.  Thankfully, I was able to salvage a core of my life and it is safe in a storage unit in Martinsburg, including all my most precious items such as memoirs and the core of a music collection I can begin rebuilding upon.  However, I have days where I just feel a bit overwhelmed coping with all this, and it does wear on me at times.  God is in everything right now, and I have seen his hand at work, but it still is a lot to adjust to.  I am slowly getting a number of my books back though, and now have about a shelf of them.  I know I will never get the library I used to have back, but I can get some important volumes that will aid in my research.  Until I get a permanent place and get out of just living in a rented room though, I am being prudent about how much I actually get.  The less complicated an imminent move is, the better.  New beginnings lead to good places in life, but my goodness, they are not always easy.  Any rate, I felt like sharing that today.

There is still much to sort out, and as I do so I am sure that I will start to see the bigger picture.  And, I will continue chronicling those developments here.  Thank you for allowing me to share, and will see you next time.