Feeling Very Vintage This Week

I feel my age this week.

This is not a usual situation for me. I usually either feel younger than my age or older than my age - not exactly my age. This week, though, I feel my age.

I have been figuring out that there are some things that I used to do without a thought that I can no longer do easily. I used to spend most of my Fridays engaged in running games. Not anymore. Same with sitting on the floor and hopping up when I needed to get going.

Rather than dwell on what I can no longer do the way I used to do things, I am trying to think about the things that I can do now that I was unable to do then. With age comes wisdom, right? Right??

I think I have gained lots of knowledge and practice experience in my 31 years of professional work, including learning about what type of therapist I do not want to be. This has been a good thing to learn - I know what I do not want, but knowing what I want is still a bit elusive. I think that is a good state to be in.

So, what is it that I want out of the rest of my professional life?

My sister keeps asking me what my plans are for after I retire from the job I have right now, and to be honest, I have no clue. I don't really have plans at the moment. I still have 21 months before I will be retiring, and I do plan to know what I will do next when we get there, but we aren't there right now. I know that I want to continue to do music therapy things, but I am not sure how those music therapy things will play out. Will I morph into contracting? Who knows. I am not quite ready to figure out my next, next steps.

My body doesn't feel older than it should today, which is nice. My spine is in pretty good shape. My knees are feeling the way they feel after being walked on. We are doing low impact things in the music therapy room this week because I am saving my energy for a medical procedure coming up on Friday. I am freaking out about the procedure, even though I know better than to let my emotions take over. The problem is that I cannot seem to relax. I could either take time off now (which I consider every morning) and stress clean and make my phone calls and arrange things, or I can go to work and be distracted by my students' responses to what I offer to them. Today, I will opt to go to work. Tomorrow?? Who knows? I have Thursday off to prepare and then Friday is the procedure, so I'll have both days to fret at home and pace and get anxious about things working or not working - as the case may be.

Right now, the biggest stressor in my life is that I do not have all the information that I need for this procedure. We switched insurance this month, so I am waiting to find out if I have been authorized for the procedure. I am waiting for a call back to see if I can arrange a ride home from the hospital after the procedure. I need to arrange a ride to the hospital early in the morning - that should be easier than arranging the ride home - I can get there any way. I can't get home except with transportation from specific places and companies. So, I am trying to coordinate everything while at work which is not easy.

Phone calls exhaust me more than anything, and I have many of them to go through in the next three days.

It is time to drag my vintage music therapy body up the stairs to take my shower, get into the car, warm things up a bit (we are finally hovering around freezing), and then drive to work where we are learning a bit about music notation, playing rhythm instruments, and doing some singing. When I get finished with the day, I will come back home and try to make my phone calls. I have not been successful with getting people on the phone for the last five business days, but it hasn't been for lack of trying...

See you soon.