Too Much Talking?

Memorial Day has passed, along with the unofficial start to summer. That does not mean my spring schedule of speaking has stopped though, but a decrease is in sight. Since last week's post, I have spoken to three classes at two different colleges. Tuesday was an EMS class followed by respiratory therapy students and Thursday was another EMS class.

I have always said that I don't care what school I'm at, I just want to help students for their future careers and hopefully help patients. I have spoken to EMS students for several years, but Tuesday was my first time at that particular college. My normal presentation takes about an hour, and that is what I told the instructor. When the usual finish time came, I somewhat breezed through my final PowerPoint slides to get them covered in my time slot. After the students had a 15-minute break, we then went on for another 30 minutes.

When I start my presentation, I always say I welcome questions at any time. This particular class fully took me up on the offer, as well as the instructor. I was very glad to see they had concern for patients and wanted to ensure best practices in etiquette as well as patient care. It was great to see and is what I would like all classes to do, but I wasn't prepared. After nearly 90 minutes of talking, I had a ten-minute break to have a 3 Musketeers lunch before starting another hour-long class. This one wasn't as interactive as the first and I showed a little more video than I usually do. After I was finished, my voice and throat were sore and very ready for a break.

Thursday's class was also good at asking questions and learning what they could glean from my experience. With Tuesday's class in mind, I covered a few extra items to try to preemptively answer questions and save some time and voice. This morning, I also filled a local church's pulpit by covering the entire service, not just the sermon message.

Along with this, I'm still battling an infection and am now having quite a few problems. I'm thankful I can be used by God to serve Him and have an active quad life. This week, I'm only scheduled for a doctor's appointment and no other outings. I'm looking forward to the break with time to recover and get caught up on other work. I only have one more college class coming and two evening church services. I will see what comes up next and continue to serve as I can.