Teaching, recuperation, scrimping

I spent the last two workdays teaching classes. Although I like to teach, those days are pretty hard for me. Standing for roughly seven hours of an eight-hour class hurts my back. Speaking at a higher than normal volume so that my voice projects to those in the back of the class puts a strain on my voice. Add to that the inescapable stress of teaching a class and you can begin to see the strains it puts on me. It takes me two days to recuperate – in a good week. I feel better this morning. Just a bit more stiffness than normal in my lower back, but I took a muscle relaxer last night. I normally will not do that except on weekends.

After teaching all day Wednesday it was a challenge for me to lead the singing at church that evening, but we got through it. Erin Echeveria, who plays the piano for our church, sensed the difficulty I was having with my voice as I softly sang the invitation song and played a little bit louder than she normally would. That was a big help. The class yesterday was a smaller class in a smaller room, so I did not have to speak as loudly but my voice and back were already strained from the class on Wednesday, so I was starting off a bit behind. One night is not generally enough to allow me to recover, but by Saturday evening I should be okay once more. Last night there was a lot I needed to get done at the farm but my back was hurting so miserable that it was painful to walk. So, I rested a bit after getting the dogs and the pups taken care of while I waited for Mama to get home from her doctor’s appointment.

Mama is going to get an MRI done on her left knee. She is at the point that she needs to do something to mitigate the continual pain. She has another six weeks of school this year, so scheduling the scope or any recommended surgery will not be an issue, but it will take the majority of the summer to recuperate from either of those two eventualities. She will probably not be going back to work at the school next year. The amount of standing required has been hard on her. Plus, we are working toward her being able to do our business fulltime from the time she finishes this school year. We are optimistically planning on me being fulltime in our business by the fall of this year. I am, emotionally speaking, too ready for that to happen. But knowing that we have that in the plan makes it a bit easier to continue with things as they are.

Since we have not had any success selling any of our goats, we are trying to stretch our incomes to meet the bills of the home, the business and the farm. We will have a calf to sell by late next month and we have four goats to sell right now – not to mention the seven puppies Victoria is selling. So, we are not far from having the resources we need to keep feeding the animals without it coming out of my paycheck, but financial matters are getting challenging. We will make it. We always do, but it would be nice to have a little extra stashed away once more. Don’t get me wrong. I am not complaining. I mostly wanted to record the situation for future reference.

Mama and I normally would have gone to the office last night to continue our research, but I was worn out to the point that my mind was not functioning clearly, and I took the lazy path of just sitting still and doing things that did not occupy my mind. I let myself unwind for a couple hours. When we finally get internet service at the house, I will be able to work in small intervals on the research at the kitchen table or at my desk, but that has been difficult to arrange. The cost of the two failed attempts to get reliable service at the house have left me extremely hesitant to try again but I will have to get something for Mama to use when she is working our business.

One of the disappointments with the iPhone Cori gave me when she upgraded, is the poor connectivity I am getting. With the Android device I was using, even when signal strength was poor, I was able to get apps to open and use the hot spot for internet service – such as it was. That is not the case with this phone. I get nothing. Because of that, Mama and I have to travel to get connected.

Disappointing, but workable…except when you are too worn out to make the extra effort.