Syllabus #64

Well well well.  Here we are.  I feel like this is the digital equivalent of giving a school presentation in your underwear.  Only this isn't a nightmare, this is real life.  

Maybe I'm blowing this out of proportion, but here I am, nakedly unprepared on this Sunday.  Normally, I collect links and deposit them in a draft post throughout the week so that on Sunday, I just have to edit a bit, add a photo and some commentary up here, like so.  Imagine my surprise when I opened this draft post and found...one link.  It's an interesting one, but it's the only one.  I honestly haven't had time to do more than skim headlines this week.  I am still reading the same three print books I was reading the week before.  I'm slacking on all fronts.  I mean, I'm slacking on the reading and writing and exercising fronts.  Temporarily shifted my efforts elsewhere out of necessity.  

It's fine.  Everything's fine.  Or it will be.  

So here it is.  Here's my meager offering this week:

I learned so much about the au pair system from this article.  I never realized it was a formal program, one that has been deeply impacted by the closing of borders and the cancellation of visas.  This might be the saddest thing I've read in a while:  “I was honestly heartbroken,” said Kristina Kobzeva, 23, from Kazakhstan. “My mom told me that I can’t wait so much time until next year, that I’ll have to quit the program and get married if the borders won’t be reopened this year for au pairs.”

Also, just now I am eating a plateful of roasted eggplant for dinner and watching Obama's eulogy for John Lewis.  It's very good and very sad in every way imaginable.  


Be well and be sure to find a moment to breathe this week.