While debating whether to respond to an e-mail with “Do you really think I am an idiot?” or “Are you f— kidding me?” I realize that the correct answer is “Time to stop answering email and spend the rest of the evening doing art!”

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19 November 2019

While answering email, I came across one from a student who advanced a totally implausible rationale when requesting an extension. I felt tempted to respond, “Do you really think I am an idiot?”

It would be inappropriate for me to provide further details concerning this student’s request because my intent is not to make fun of a misguided student. Instead, it is to reflect on the need for us to take care of ourselves. But first, a little background.

In the middle of the afternoon after I finish teaching my last class of the day and before I begin other tasks in my office, I have a little ritual. I make myself a small decaffeinated espresso which I drink out of an antique demitasse cup while enjoying an imported biscuit covered in dark chocolate. Some might refer to this as a guilty pleasure. To me, it is a pleasure with no guilt attached as well as a necessary component to preserve my mental health.

My afternoon ritual—or lack of it—played into my desire to ask the student if they really thought I was an idiot. 

It was only Tuesday and it had already been a long week. I was feeling overwhelmed.  I needed to leave campus earlier than usual to take care of some personal business which meant that I was completing afternoon tasks while answering email in the evening.  But the single most important inaction that contributed to my mood was that I had skipped my espresso and biscuit.

To take only five minutes for quiet time during the middle of the day does not seem like much. But when I don’t do the little things to take care of myself, I begin to quickly lose equanimity.  Fortunately, I had enough sense to stop working and to do art. 

The next day, I wrote a professional response to the student. The time I had “lost” by not working into the evening was made up with increased productivity on Wednesday. And, on Wednesday, I made sure to take the time for espresso and a biscuit and did more art in the evening.

When I tell students about my afternoon break, I rhetorically ask them what their equivalent is to my espresso and biscuit. I then advise them that if they don’t have an answer, they need to find one. We all need a little self care in our chaotic worlds.

–Steven L. Berg, PhD

Image Credit: Enjoying a Hot Beverage, from my forthcoming book Promoting Student Transformation at the Community College. HASTAC, 2020.

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