Tuesdays are always a late night for me this spring, because one of my interns, a junior at a college in the Central Time Zone, has a class this term that occupies her daytime hours four days a week. To let her stay on with us, I’ve arranged to let her work evening hours thrice a week, and we meet Tuesday evenings after her class lets out to discuss priorities for the week and to check in on how she’s doing.

One of the things that has come out of the confluence of a shift to remote workplace and some colleague departures is that I ended up supervising our interns. We have four, two undergrads and two grad students, and I’m the main point of contact with our organization for them.

Add in the colleagues that I supervise/have supervised, and I’ve been a mentor to six young adults in the first half of their 20s in the past year.

Even when I’ve been failing/flailing at other parts of my job, I’ve taken this role seriously. I meet with each of them weekly to check in on their lives during the pandemic, ask about classes and extracurriculars, and try to provide career/workplace advice, even as I’m handing out assignments and supervising projects. I’d like to think I’m pretty good at it, and our interns have been very kind with their comments about what a surprisingly positive experience this has been for them.

We are currently in the process of doubling the size of our department and included in that is the realigning of certain job responsibilities. Supervising interns is going to be one of those roles that shifts away from me, and selfishly it’s the one that I’m having the hardest time recognizing is the right thing for the department, despite knowing it’s a necessary change.

I have to recognize this doesn’t mean that I can’t still provide mentorship, but it does mean that I’ll need to give more thought to what that looks like moving forward and do a better job of being proactive in my approach.

It will look different, but different doesn’t have to be bad.

I could have been more productive this weekend, but it’s not like I completely shirked off:

The apartment is still a mess, but I made some more progress in the garden, dislodging more of the bunching onions and violets. (The violets grow tall and wide, meaning that plants that were in a fine spot a couple weeks ago are now overshadowing the plants I put into the garden. The onions have just been allowed to linger in a metaphor for all the things that were once a good idea in my life but that have been allowed to root deep without consideration to how much they’re still wanted.) I salvaged all the violets off the plants that came up without dirt, picked a bagful of salad greens (tomorrow’s lunch!), and strung up some ladders for my peas to climb.

I didn’t get to any bookshops, although I did make it to two grocery stores.

I picked up enough quarters to do a load of laundry, but have yet to take it out of the washing machine.

I finished an audiobook, but not the pair of socks that’s sitting on my table.

And I finally determined that it wasn’t that you all suddenly hated my posts, but that adding a new security certificate to the site is eating all your comments. I just haven’t figured out a fix yet, but I’m working on it (tomorrow’s task!).

This weekend is supposed to be a mixed bag weatherwise, with sun, clouds, and rain all expected. The key will lie in getting outside earlier on Saturday to catch the sun, but if I miss it then, I hope to see it late Sunday afternoon.

Here’s what I’m thinking:

• Stringing up some latticework for my peas and picking more violets from the garden.
• Visiting one of our local bookshops for Independent Bookstore Day.
• Reading as part of Dewey’s 24-Hour Readathon (but not as an all-nighter).
• Taking in a YallWest author session or two.
• Buying asparagus at the farmers market for the first time this spring.
• Doing some baking.
• Tracking down quarters. (None of the local branches of Rudi’s bank had them this week, so now I need to be creative at the couple spots that take cash so we can do laundry.)
• Listening to baseball.
• Cleaning the bathroom. (Not fun, but necessary.)
• Finishing the toe of a long-lingering sock (and maybe doing a photo shoot).

What’s on your aspirational to-do list for this final weekend in April?

Things I’m looking forward to after my immunity fully kicks in post-vaccine four weeks from today:

• Visiting my parents
• Hugging my friends
• Browsing the stacks at the library
• Going to museums (one opened in my city dedicated to the written word and I haven’t felt comfortable going yet)
• Eating outside at restaurants (I jumped the gun on this once and won’t do it again until next month)
• Traveling
• Browsing in big box stores
• Seeing my coworkers not through a screen
• Swimming at the pool (and lounging on the deck with a book)
• Attending concerts inside (definitely not immediately)

How about you? What are you looking forward to after you’re fully vaccinated?

It’s been a while since I’ve done one of these posts, but here’s what’s going on around here right now:

Hearing: Cars driving by, including one playing goth music and another with its bass boosted way up. Birds, with their own unique nighttime music.

Seeing: A lot of mess that I need to invent time to deal with.

Feeling: The warmth of a cat curled up next to me asleep.

Tasting: The last mouthful of hot cocoa I recently finished.

Smelling: Not a whole lot because I should take an allergy pill to clear my head and go to sleep.

What’s it like where you are?

My invitation for a COVID shot just came through, so I’m booked for late Monday afternoon. I am very excited (and a little trepidatious, because I still hate doctors).

I don’t know that I can reward myself with another trip to the beach just yet, but I’m definitely going to get an ice cream cone (and maybe bring my own festive bandaid).