Nothing Ever Really Ends

An Essay on Unfinishedness

This is day two of the ice storm.

The power is out.
My laptop is running on a generator.
The fireplace has been fed steadily, and breakfast and lunch were made in a Dutch oven set directly into the coals.

Outside, tree after tree keeps snapping in the woods around us - thirteen acres of oaks and pines giving way under the weight of ice. Each crack is sharp, final, and then replaced by waiting.

In between stacking wood and listening for the next break, I keep checking for updates from campus… power status, heat, how we’re feeding students, what still needs to be decided.

You do what needs doing, and then you stay alert.
Stack wood. Check lines. Wait.

Nothing feels finished. Only held.

And somewhere in the middle of it, it struck me:

This is what so many days feel like now- even without a storm.

Lately I’ve been noticing how little actually ends.

The workday doesn’t end -it just loosens its grip.
Messages trail into the evening.
Decisions linger in the back of your mind, unresolved and still present.

Even rest feels provisional. Like it could be interrupted at any moment.

I don’t think we’re tired because we’re weak.
And I don’t think we’re tired simply because we’re doing too much… though that’s part of it.

I think we’re tired because nothing ever truly finishes.

~ Sami