Durate.

As my school year starts up again, I face a few challenges.

I am adjusting to an admittedly beautiful new apartment. I will be cooking my own meals, which means that no matter how tired I am, I am responsible for feeding myself. Not an actual hardship, but one that will take some getting used to. My class schedule is 4 hours of class straight on my least strenuous day, ballooning to 6 straight. On Wednesdays, I'll be observing in a classroom and helping out for the full, 7am-3pm school day with an age group that I will not be teaching in my "real life" (very loose term).

In Greek this semester, we're translating the Gospel of John and some Herodotus. Having forgotten my Greek this summer, this will definitely end in tears and a lot of frustration. I technically have no language requirement so this is sort of optional, and yet I continue.

I'm trying out for one theatre troupe, and maybe directing or trying out for another.

Not to mention that, theoretically, I'm supposed to have a social life. (LOL JK. I'm pretty much a hermit, but at least my friends are hermits, too.)

Now, this may just seem like unstructured, vaguely classically-themed bitching, but I promise I have a point.

Why do this? Why suffer through a semester of Herodotus? Why work so hard? Yes, to get a good education, but I'm not quite noble enough to work so hard if that is the only reason.

There are things I want to do.

I want to translate part of the Odyssey and the Iliad, because they have changed my life. I want to understand language and the little quirks and foibles of translation. I want to be accessible as a teacher, and convey information and meaning.

What do I have to do to get to this end goal?

Durate (dur-AH-tay). To expand on that? "Durate, et vosmet rebus servate secundis." Aeneas says this in his first major speech to his men after they've been through severe storms and are shipwrecked on Carthage's coast.  They've lost several ships and many friends. But he tells them: "Endure, and save yourselves for other things."

I tend to think that Aeneas is a pretty shitty leader, but that's my personal opinion. And, within context, this line makes it sound like he's saying that eventually, once Rome is founded and they're all happy and safe, they'll look back on this and laugh. Even without my bias, Aeneas is telling them to shove their grief away until a better time, when they have distance and can heal their wounds.

As a psychological tactic, this leaves much to be desired. Bottling emotions is really never productive for more than an infinitesimal period of time. But the message of "endure" is something that I've latched onto.

I can endure some Herodotus (whom I have no specific ire towards) to get to my Homer class next semester. I can work with some middle schoolers so I can help their older counterparts in high school. And really, I'll probably end up liking these classes, in spite of the workload and all of my whining.

In either case, I'll get through this semester and have a great time. And I hope you all will, too. Durate, friends.