JulieAloha

March 28, 2017

A day of extremes. Very productive morning: started planning for the summer program at the Lab, brainstormed and researched ideas for tech related projects and activities, designed a survey for the kids, put some thought into the hiring of a Summer Program staffer; had a good meeting with director and grant writer re: a new tech grant, the wants and needs for the Lab and the reasons behind them; began drafting Lab calendars for the next few months, again looking to summer, communicated with home office to coordinate youth programming; worked on newly upgraded computer unit to work out bugs and customize to our needs, designed a background screen to serve as image for each unit when we update next week. All accomplished by 1:00pm. And then I sat for the next five hours, very few participants came in for the afternoon shift and only two kids for Kids’ Club. I spent an hour cleaning up my email, I put Welcome packets together, though we already had a good supply, and I half watched/listened to NCIS on NetFlix as I puttered about trying to find something more productive to do. It’s a small office and, other than the beginning of the month when there are month-end reports to do, it doesn’t require too much tending or housekeeping, but there still has to be someone there on site to keep the Lab open. It gave me too much time to think – it was a bit of a sad anniversary and I’d tried avoiding thinking about it, to not remember and grieve last year’s loss, but perhaps it is needful to acknowledge the past in moments such as this and allow yourself to view it through the lens of time and distance. Painful, sad, but how can you heal and move forward if you don’t observe and acknowledge the hard times, to learn from them and find solace. So I suppose I’m grateful to have these moments of inactivity for reflection, for accountability and healing.