Well, it's easy to find parking...

This is going to be an odd semester. Students are all over the map in terms of how badly their lives have been affected by the storm and how ready they are to get back to school work. I haven't heard from a lot of them, which means either that they're not checking e-mail--or that they can't. Since I didn't have ready access to e-mail until Saturday night, I understand. And I count myself very fortunate: one student told me that her family is in a shelter, and I'm sure there are others in that position--or worse.

I am feeling profoundly addled at the moment. I know I have a lot of things to organize so I can move forward, but I'm having a difficult time figuring out the triage. I've told the students we're going to try to stay as much on schedule as possible, but I'm letting go of attendance policies, late paper/late homework policies--at least for now. Seven students managed to make it to the Short Story class today, and I heard from at least another five who couldn't make it. I'm getting a mixed bag of responses from 102 students; most are silent, a few are on top of things, a few are revising the papers that were due last Tuesday--which puts them way the hell behind the curve. All in all, herding cats would probably be significantly easier than trying to get my students in the same general area in terms of assignments.

The students in the Short Story class were a bit dazed and non-responsive, but as the class went on, they warmed up. I could get snarky with those who don't have logs and mini-papers today--because those should have been done before the storm hit (they were due last Monday). But I know that most of them hadn't done the work on Sunday, heard that classes would be canceled--and took the opportunity to coast. I can't much fault them, actually, as I did somewhat the same thing. The main thing is to get enough work collected that I can give them a reasonable grade--and heaven only knows how that will happen as they straggle back to campus over the next week or so.

I have gotten some very sweet e-mails--especially one from the Poor Dear Thing (or whatever I've been calling her)--thanking me for being concerned, for keeping them posted, for lightening the load. We're all going through a mental and emotional regrouping, and I've told them--and Paul, and myself--that school should be the least of our worries for a while. Take care of life first. The rest we'll figure out as we go along.

And just to add some excitement, the forecast is for rain and wind on Wednesday into Thursday. It's just a garden-variety autumnal storm, but imagine what this means for people who are without power, living with flooded basements, and so on. It's getting cold, too. Somehow I can't be too worried about assignments in the face of all this.

And yet, of course, I am. Not "too" worried, but concerned, certainly. It seems the cosmos wants to test my ability to stay in the present, not to try project into an unforeseeable future. I have no idea what to expect, and I have to accept that and simply roll with whatever comes.

I don't even know if I'll have enough gas to get to work on Wednesday. I'm OK for tomorrow, but I'm not sure beyond that (I'm keeping a close eye on that fuel gauge).

Breathing, breathing.

I'm going to return to my desk for a bit and try again to figure out the triage. The "fall back" to standard time means it feels later than the clocks say it is (my body is still on daylight savings), but I am scheduled to be here for another hour in my duties as evening supervisor, so I might as well put that time to some kind of use.