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The Retirement Newsletter: Welcome to 2022! Happy New Year!
Welcome
Welcome to 2022 and newsletter -107 (yes, I am still counting down the number of weeks until I retire).
I hope you had a pleasant break over the festive period — mine was strange.
I teach at a university, and the first term of this year felt like one of the longest terms I have ever taught. Having a week of pre-term teaching to help students who, thanks to COVID-19, had missed parts of the previous year did not help. To the early start, the university also added an extra week at the end of term. Plus, we seem to be going back a week earlier after the break. In fairness, Christmas and New Year at the weekend has caused the early start to term 2.
The early start to term 1, the late end to term 1, and what feels like an early start to term 2 means the break has not been very long. I came into the break exhausted, and I am leaving the break exhausted. Add in that I know I am going back to a lot of marking and teaching preparation that I should have finished before the break, then it feels like a strange festive period. And yesterday, I came across a word that describes the break and the feeling I have, stresslaxing — “ verb, being stressed that relaxing makes…
