Lunch on Tuesdays

This semester's Osher Institute for Lifelong Learning concludes this week.  It's been a good experience, one that gave structure to my week, particularly on Tuesdays.  First class starts 9AM, last class ends 3:15PM.  Inbetween there are gaps but none long enough to just go home and return.  So Tuesday's were closer to a workday than the other days of the week.  I found it hard to exercise, even if scheduled that day.  On awakening I would be a little stiff, on returning home a little tired.  I did prepare for a full day, though.  A backpack, or actually a rucksack.  In it I had a tangerine colored nylon loose leaf with writing paper, two pens and a mechanical pencil in the assigned nylon tubes.  Each course had a folder.  The pocket in the loose leaf would include a photocopy of my next Torah reading, faithfully practiced after the morning class.  I brought my laptop until the computer people undermined my internet access, then it became clutter.  While I practiced Torah, I did not make as much progress learning to tie blood knots or nail knots.  The heavy shoelaces with cut soda straws allowed some practice but I never got around to tying with nylon monofilament.  I took a tape recorder, rarely used.  I thought I might do some of my creative writing on the loose leaf paper.  It didn't happen.  If I still had one more essay to read for the creative writing seminar, that got done with my editing pencil in full force.

What went best, or at least most consistently, was a weekly lunch.  I have a number of lunch kits, mostly insulated nylon in the form of a sack or a box.  Pesach gets a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle metallic lunchbox.  I like the sack best, as it has compartments.  A sandwich or two hardboiled eggs as the core.  A fruit for dessert, usually eaten but occasionally taken home.  Some cookies most weeks.  And I have a large insulated coffee tumbler, filled with about three cups worth before I head off, mostly finished before returning home.  And despite it being my longest day, I usually feel good at the end.  It is the only day that I avoid the supine position all day.  My mind is engaged in the courses, my hands in the woodcarving, my nutrition at 11AM, and my spirit from the only conversations I will have with people most of the week.  Worth the price of admission.