Anniversary of this blog... sixteen years. A few days ago, really, on Saturday, but this is close enough.
No, the blog doesn't feel dead to me, I'm still here for it, and it for me.
I retired from the university in February; moved the books of my office to storage; and now keep talking about moving to Barcelona. I'm not getting there quickly, but am not terribly worried... of course it might fall to become a thing that doesn't happen, but I think it probably will happen.
Life is quieter after retirement. I'm pleased they'll keep me as a retired 'guest' – so some minor perks, software, connections. A few postgraduates to work with for a while; if other links arise I don't mind – as long as they don't involve meetings, or list emails, or (horrors) marking.
Of course I continue as a psychoanalyst. I worried a bit in the past few months when appointments decreased... and then they increased. None of these things are major concerns – the income is fine, and I've hardly ever had more than 12-14 patients in a given week – and that can feel like a lot, bit it's manageable. 8-10 is more usual, I mostly enjoy doing that. My landlord rebuilt the trellis behind the deck in back of my flat, so I can see people there, on folding deck chairs that N. found for me – I'm still being COVID-cautious (I never have tested positive, which is fine with me), but I may start letting the vaccinated into my home next month....
And, though this is another project that has drifted through the years – I want to put this blog on a website of my own. (I'm not terribly interested in whether blogs are still current... I'm fine referring my thoughts and patterns to a now-aging form. It's still more modern than Montaigne's tower, and anyway I have heating and running water, which he didn't.)
As for travel... I won't go to Buenos Aires for the August conference, it seems like a terrible plan to get into a plane that goes that far for that long, with people crossing through several continents... a shame to not get to my sixth continent, but that's a goal I can let slide.
I will risk teaching in Zürich in July, though, and just wear masks throughout the flight. Teaching... these days it's seminars for adults, with no marking (yay!) – the Zürich seminars will be among the first where I'm doing 4-6 hours on a topic, so there will be time to dig deeper; and I think next year I'll ask for even more hours. What do you think of, say, eight hours over two or three days on archetypes and opera, focusing on productions at the fabulous Zürich opera house?
Another online seminar for San Francisco in December, and maybe Los Angeles (also online – seeing cities I once loved would be wonderful, but given the triple whammy of COVID, long flights, and costly travel for a pensioner, I think I'll wait before doing any more long trips).
•••
There's a department farewell in three days: I already know what to say – it's been in the back of my head for years. It won't have the same impact for them (it hasn't been in the backs of their heads for years), but I think they'll get that I know I was lucky to land here. Though, yes, I also love being done with the job... it's interesting how colleagues from around the world have identified with what I'm doing: but I feel as though I'm doing something a bit different from a lot of retirees. After all, in some ways, I actually expect more now rather than less – working, and living, feel even more interesting than they have for a long time (perhaps than they ever have?) – though they are defined in ways I wouldn't have foreseen a decade ago.
And the book! – or books! – I am indeed proud of what I've written so far, and annoyed that I haven't done more. (About 21,000 words of a book that's supposed to be under 50,000 – but the draft feels forged, intense – I find my own writing about AIDS both good and also a little scary, which is okay with me.) T. and D. and A. and others nag me to keep going... I hope I'll get there. And the other book. And who knows, maybe the third.
Other writing... that Barcelona (and Sitges and Vienna) blog post, which is about five pages in draft... I really do want to post it some day. It may end up a bit fragmented, but... I'll do what I can to keep it as coherent as its original intentions.
•••
Last night, dinner with D. in a beautiful small restaurant, one I'd never seen. Long conversations: a sense of moving forward, of getting somewhere... cross-linked experiences of talking to another psychologist about things that intensely matter, of making exciting plans for a different future, of moving somewhere in a way that feels important. And similar conversations online with A....
But even these relationships, the power of talking to someone who can push you to go further, are powerful largely because of the general space of who I am at the moment (and this is the important part, the part that made me want to write this post, though I suspect I can't make it clear):
because even fragments of aging and fragility, of not-doing and pleasure or sadness, of world difficulties and personal victories, are framed by a continuing, even accelerating, sense of changes in my own awareness, in dreams and thoughts: of time, self, memory... for months, even more than previous times in my life, I keep having a wider sense of all the things I've been, all the things I've seen and people I've known, as well as all the things that could have been: as though they are all available, as though awareness and imagination have, for me these days, so many interesting facets, that...
well, at one trivial level: that complaining about almost anything would be merely silly. It would be beside the point of existing, actually.
Even a wasted morning doesn't feel wasted these days....
Happy blogiversary.