A Last look at Summer

Being a college professor, summer is a time to recharge and learn new things. It’s actually when I made my plans for the whole year with the coming school year as a basis for the activities and goals I want to achieve.

One of the “perks” of being a teacher is having a two-month summer vacation no pay off course but at least you can do anything in that two months and go back to your job by June.

I usually plan my summer activities at the start of the year, giving me ample time to save for it. This year I get to go to the beach! Puerto Galera. I am not a beach person, hate the salty water, the hassle just to get there, and swimming pool is just fine for me.  But this year our faculty department planned the outing as a form of professional development-team building activity and with minimal fees. I decided to join since I’ve never been to Puerto Galera and to show support for my department.

I brought my son too, since he have never been to a beach before and he wants to go to Boracay(too expensive) and play on white sand. But before that I enrolled Lorenzo in swimming lessons, we have been planning it for three years now and somehow plans did not push through for one reason or another. As a parent one of the gifts you can give your child is teaching him survival skills and swimming is one of them.

The lessons were a success that I decided to continue the lessons every year. He learned the basics on the water with special focus on water safety and survival skills. Important skills since we are going to another island via a small motorized boat from the Batangas Port to Oriental Mindoro. I was planning of giving Lorenzo several summer classes to attend this year, but he enjoyed the swimming lessons so much that he refused the other lessons like singing or dancing lessons or karate. So we end up letting him play at Playwise, a playground at the mall twice a week the rest of the summer.

Puerto Galera

My co-teachers and I stayed at Puerto Galera for three days, renting a house we cooked our meals, island hopped and basically eat, swim and sleep the days away it was so relaxing that we can’t help but exclaim that we should do this more often. We realized that after a year of hectic schedules, test papers to check and grades to compute we really have to recharge and de-stress.

I also came to the conclusion that having a relaxing vacation even once a year is good for you. My husband and I are workaholics and it’s been years since we took a proper vacation / an out of town one at that.  I promised myself that I would plan something like the Puerto Galera vacation I had for my family before the year ends.

The other things this Summer?

This summer was crucial for me I have an important decision to make, my husband is asking me to give up some teaching job because it takes me away from my family and just concentrate on my business, after all he is a good provider, but there were also offers for me to really work full time in teaching, administrative/managerial positions. I was in a struggle, at one hand I get to fulfil a dream – a full time wife and mother take care of my boys; on the other I am at the height of my academic career, being offered jobs that I could only dream about. I spent some time with my friends and family asking for their opinion and using the time to bond with them as well.

It was a very difficult choice: family or career, summer was nearly over when fate intervened and I was forced to choose but I'll tell that story another time.