Every year at school on Kwajalein, the students and teachers get at least two half days off due to parent teacher conferences. The teachers work one long day, usually until about 8 at night, then they are given the following afternoon off because of the extra hours the day before. With my new position and work schedule, I no longer get this time off with my own children as I did last year, but I decided to use some of my saved up personal time to take the afternoon off anyway and spend it with my boys. In addition, the half day gave us a chance to make it up to Roi a little earlier for the weekend. This was important to me as it may be the last time on Roi all together for awhile as I will be moving into my house in less than 2 weeks now, which makes me both happy and a little sad all at the same time. I will miss having so much time on Roi, and I believe the boys will too as they were so excited to be going today, and they talked about it all week long! It was a different kind of week for them because they had all day Friday off from school while the teachers held conferences, and then only had to attend from 8:30-11:30 on Saturday for the half day, so they really only went to school for three and a half days this week. They don't realize how nice it is to be a kid! And I must admit, just taking that half day off with them was quite refreshing.
I worked from 8:30-11:30 and because I knew my time was limited, I made the most of what I had at work and finished up any timely unfinished business in short order, then I headed off to lunch with my babies. Because we were not rushing to get back to work and school by exactly 12:30 as the boys will have to go to the office to get tardy slips if they are late, we were able to truly relax with our food and watch an entire movie together before getting ready to head to the terminal around 1:30. The time actually flew by as my oldest kept saying, "Oh, it's 1 already or it's 1:30 already." Once on Roi, we simply relaxed some more until dinner time, but I highly recommend implementing these half days into all our personal and work lives. Sometimes you just need a half day. It gives you time to take care of the most important priorities of the day at work or home, but it also gives you time to settle personally, so you can start your weekend off right. I guess that's why they still have "siesta" time in Spain and other European countries where their shops and places of business close for a couple of hours each afternoon because they recognize the importance of taking a long lunch or working hard for a while, the breaking hard for a while. At any rate, I like half days because I feel as if I've accomplished something both professionally and personally, and life is best when it is balanced in this way. Yea for half days!
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