apples and oranges in the air

There was a time when I could burn the candle at both ends so easily. I remember in early/mid-20s when I was working almost full time, in school full time (then teaching full time though I was a "part-timer"), doing yoga full time, engaging in activist work, and going out with my friends. I just kept going and going somehow, juggling all of these responsibilities and inhabiting vastly different worlds simultaneously. One semester, I taught seven (!) classes, was in a new and demanding relationship, was working with SWAT to organize a living wage campaign, and working at a restaurant. This was around the time that the Iraq war started so I meagerly organized a walkout at Anne Arundel Community College for the five students who weren't in the military and gave a shit (these were different times in the US with a different brand of jingoism). Understandably, I burned out fast and hard.

I was also starving myself in order to gain some semblance of control over my life and freaking out about EVERYthing existentially. When I was in the thick of it, I didn't have my period for three years I was eating so little. The most disturbing thing is that I was proud of myself for having that much self control. I recall staring out my bedroom window and sobbing about how clock time was fucking up my life; a pressing weight that meant I couldn't ever do enough and could never relax because the next day would always come. And who were we to measure time in that way anyhow? How oppressive. (EP Thompson eventually confirmed my suspicions but way after the fact)

When it became clear that I would perish in Baltimore, fade away, I moved to San Francisco and went a little more crazy, but then got a lot more sane. Going out of my mind was a function of cumulative events to be sure - the death of my grandparents (anyone who knew me then knows why), the disintegration of my relationship, ending my MA, working and going to/teaching school since I was 15, a profound disillusionment with the political culture coupled with newly radical understandings of the world around me. All of these factors resulted in a loneliness so absolute it consumed me. This was coupled with an ethic that if I just stayed busy enough, I could outrun the pain. In SF, I let the pain catch me. And as a result, the pain and I could confront one another.

Yoga and cycling played a central role in saving me. I had to eat enough to at least exert myself that much. These activities got me out of my head and for those moments, I could be. In so many parts of my life I felt so alien. In the post-9/11, pro-George W. Bush frenzy that engulfed the collective consciousness at the time, everything I saw around me felt like a breach to my values and physical activity was the thing that I could rely on to escape all the vitriol that flowed through my body and poisoned my mind. I was also surrounded by lovely people in SF. One person sticks out in my mind most acutely and though she and I speak only sporadically, her presence in my heart fills me with warmth whenever I think of her. I loved my life in San Francisco. Yoga in the morning, tea in the afternoon, reading and writing, serving ice cream and burgers at night. But I wanted to teach and eventually found myself back in Baltimore to pursue my passion.

Something changed in me when I got back. I completely eschewed the busy ethic. I thought it destructive and a path to burnout. I didn't want that. So the pendulum swung to the other end. I became protective of my time and I held onto it stingily. I became rigid. As a result, I disengaged under the pretense that I needed time as though I could place it in a savings account and draw upon it later. That didn't work either. All that I accomplished was a flakiness and a kind of hedonism where I did what I could when I thought my energies would allow it.

I am now trying to strike a balance between busy and manageable, but I don't know where that balance is. I was careful when I first started school to not take on too many responsibilities. I was feeling so overwhelmed by starting again and I wasn't sure what kinds of time commitments were necessary to make it through. Feeling out those commitments wasn't easy the first year because of the strike. This year, I have a better sense of how to organize my time and I am now trying to be a little more giving with it. So I gave myself over. Now, and it only took three weeks, I am completely overwhelmed. The demands of organizing are fairly steep and there don't seem to be intermediary roles. You either are or you aren't doing it.

Upon a cursory reading of "activist burnout," I read a bit of what I already knew. The expectations of activist involvement are often all-consuming. There's the sense that "people are dying" and a partial participation is a sign of your privilege to opt out. In a workshop at Left Forum called "Organizing in a Culture of Isolation," one of the panelists noted the way in which activists often discuss how busy they are as a measure of commitment and how this is a reflection of the the busy ethic in the US. I do it, for sure. I don't think it's a conscious thing but it does happen. One of the common questions that people ask around this is how activist culture rewards "devotion that leads to personal sacrifice." The Protestant Work Ethic still suffuses our hearts and minds. Here I am, in it. With eight meetings pending, a paper to write, and perhaps more coursework this coming week, I immediately feel swamped knowing that I will not be able to meet all of the tasks with all of the attention they deserve. This level of commitment takes me back to the time when I had the energy to engage thoroughly. Better stated, what kind of time in my life I am reminded of when I did engage in such a consuming fashion. Can I make this sustainable?