On the summer, finally

There is a specific moment at the end of the academic year that no amount of professional composure can fully conceal.

The last student has submitted. The final grade has been entered. The inbox, which has spent the better part of nine months in a state of low-grade emergency, goes quiet. And somewhere between closing the laptop and opening something cold, a thought arrives with the particular clarity that only exhaustion can produce.

I need to lie down for approximately three weeks. This is not a complaint. It is a medical observation.