In the Queue

My summer goes by slowly.

Ever since the semester ended at the university, I haven’t had much work-for-pay. One job I hold there is writing consultant, meaning I assist students with their writing assignments (if they ask for help). The other job I hold is administrative assistant to one of the department heads, meaning I do anything he needs me to do in order to assist him with his duties.

The first job has mostly evaporated (temporarily) due to there being few students taking classes over the summer. The second job is hit or miss lately, with me working only when my boss has tasks for me to complete. I’m squeaking by in the pay aspect, with just enough work to keep bills paid until the fall semester will start. This is one aspect of scholastic work that I don’t particularly enjoy, at least at this university: the lack of a consistent paycheck all year ‘round.

However, with unexpected, though unpredictable, time on my hands, I have a few projects that I could work on when I don’t have much else to do.

Scanning

My mother is a shutterbug, and something of a photo collector. In the age before this one, when photography was analog, she amassed quite of lot of photographs. Now that we are living in a digital world, she would like these photos available to her on the iPad and in the cloud. That means scanning. She has procured a scanner (albeit a finicky one) that works well enough and quickly enough to scan in many photos in a session. I have already scanned a few albums worth, but have many more to scan. I think this will end up being more than a summer project, but it is in the queue.

Poetry

It is now two and a half years since I completed my first compendium of poetry, a book that has sold about four copies worldwide. And while I have barely written any poetry since, I am thinking about what my next poetic project could be, and I have an idea: a chapbook. My book of poems comprises several sections, and I thought it might be cool to create chapbooks of each section, and sell them individually as art projects containing both word and visual. I have saved in a wishlist online some appropriate paper, and a heavy-duty stapler that could aid me in creating these chapbooks, and all it takes is putting some together. My wife maintains an area on consignment in a local craft shop, and perhaps I could add a few of these chapbooks to that area and see if they sell. I don’t know that they would, but it is an idea in the queue.

Reading

I start to sound like a broken record in this regard, but I find it difficult to read these days. I wish I could read, but every time I think about opening a book, it seems an insurmountable task. But, I have a book that I bought a while back, Patrick Stewart’s Making It So. I would like to read that book this summer. It used to be I could read twelve books every couple of weeks, but maybe I can manage one book by September. I don’t know if that is achievable, but that book is in the queue.

Photography

Lately I acquired some scenery material: driftwood, sand, rocks, etc. and I aspire to use this to craft photo worthy scenes. While I’ve yet to use it as such, the ideas are percolating in my head of photos I could take. I have a few difficulties to iron out, such as a lack of room, not wanting to build permanent dioramas for the photos, and what to do with the scenery media when I am done with it, but I can’t shake the images I see when I close my eyes and dream of what could be. The pictures shimmer in the queue.

Organization

My wife and I moved into this house just after Christmas Day in 2024, which means we’ve been here almost six months now. The house is just now starting to feel like a home, and as such, it needs a few things internally, that thankfully aren’t plumbing or maintenance related. No, I am speaking of decorating and organizing. I have made great strides in the craft room (what was supposed to be the master bedroom) in terms of both decor and optimizing storage, layout, and usability. But the living room, the kitchen, and even perhaps the bedroom could use some help.

The kitchen in particular has very little decor, and still bears the marks of being moved into hastily, with little organization, optimization, and isn’t terribly user friendly. It does the job, but it needs TLC. The bedroom we are only in for sleep and whatnot, so that is low on the priority list, but the living room is the third most used common area (after kitchen and craft room). It, too, needs a little thought and love. Decorating and organizing thoughts drift through the queue.

Clearly, I have plenty to do. It has helped to streamline my priorities just in writing them down. Before I had vague ideas, but now I have action points and even some hazy plans. Yeesh, that sounded too much like a few of the committees I was on for work this past year. Shudder. If I could accomplish even half of these queued tasks, though, I would feel like I had a great summer, and my environment would benefit, as would my creative expression which needs, um, expressing.

And also in the queue? R&R. I can report that I have been already availing myself of some of that, and with a trip to Boston planned for the end of July, I can even take some time to see another part of the world. Won’t that be fun?