Blogging on the Powwow

Twenty years ago this February, I was living in Worcester, MA while I attended college at Clark University. I lived on Hollywood Street, in the "Main South" portion of Worcester, which is not the most desirable place to live. One day, very near my 20th birthday, I returned to my apartment building after a day on campus, climbed to the third floor, and found a large cardboard box sitting outside my apartment door. A new Sharp TV  from my mother! Oh, the delight! At the time I had a black and white TV, which was probably 20 years old if it was a day old, which operated with the help of a failing antenna and  tinfoil. The Sharp TV has been with me/us every since. It has lived in Massachusetts and Maine; in Worcester, Old Orchard Beach, two homes in Saco, and Amesbury. It has been faithful, never failing us even once. I have the original remote control, which with some excessive pressure, still works. We finally decided to give into the pressure and get a flat screen ...

Wander the halls of any academic institution in June or July and when one academic encounters the other the conversation usually goes along the lines of... "Have you recovered from the end of the semester? Are you getting a break... at all ?" Fast forward to late August and regardless of where you wander, you'll note that the conversation has changed to... "Are you ready? Are you ready for it to all begin... again ?"  I used to try to get ready for the semester and then I realized it doesn't really matter. One can anticipate some of the potential obligations - faculty meetings, applications for endless committees to join, endless work to get those committees up and running, getting course Blackboard sites up and running, copying syllabi, etc. But, the tsunami comes and crashes regardless of preparation. At that moment, it's sink or swim. After week two or three of the semester, we usually find ourselves lying on the equivalent of a trash ridden beach, ...