Every time I say to myself "wow, self, you should really try writing in your online blog more often" and resolve to do this, suddenly there's a huge time jump to about a year ahead and I haven't written here. The times I notice this tend to sync up with the summertime, when, traditionally, I am off work (formally. I often am working anyway, but in a less "getting paid" kind of way.)
So let's just start with the premise that this has happened again, hand waving, yes, we know.
Last year was wild. The Fall season was completely tied to the scheduling and planning of my sister in law's funeral. If you know me, you know that I have a tendency to volunteer to help, and then end up doing it all (mostly) myself because I'm also a perfectionist. So when she wanted her funeral to be in Hondo, where her father was buried, I said I'd help and then basically planned pretty much all of it. It was very nice!!! It was my entire mental space for MONTHS.
Then, when things were finally getting back to what passes as "normal" around here, a co-worker announced her retirement (in early December.) Her job, which is now my job, was/is Director of the Honors Academy at my smol school. Since she is not much older than I am, I never anticipated her retiring, and so did not even know that was a possible job to aspire towards.
Side story: when I was in grad school at TX State, a beloved faculty mentor said, in her West Texas drawl, "You keep thinking like that and you're gonna end up in Admin someday." And by "thinking like that" I and she meant "like you should DO something to make things better." Be a true believer. At the time I laughed and crossed myself and said "never." Well. There was apparently ONE thing that would pull me out of the classroom, and my co worker's retirement waved the "free kittens and ice cream" white van in my face and I jumped RIGHT IN.
Those kittens are shady. Sure they look cute, but that's how they get you, every time.
This van is way too cute for what's lurking inside (meetings!! Spreadsheets!! Microsoft Teams!!!). Look at the cute ginger one!! I'll bet there's music from JEM on the speakers, too.
So. Now I am Interim (which means-- not totally permanent until some nebulous thing happens that takes that off the title but probably you'll get it unless you mess up but what does mess up really mean?) Director of our Honors Academy. I stepped into that whirlwind on January 12th with a meeting in the Admin Building.... and everything is a little hazy since then. I think there were a lot of meetings. (said in a deep, ringing voice of doom).
That's mostly a joke. No one "admin roofied" me. And I LOVE the job for a lot of reasons, and honestly, it's sort of perfect for me in a lot of ways. I get to spend a LOT of time shmoozing with students, a lot more than you get when you're the teacher in a classroom. 'Cause in those, you're really supposed to focus on a specific curriculum, and I try really hard to not let myself get derailed and "chat" in those situations. But Honors Director goes to club events, and recruitment, and spends a lot of time chatting with students in our Honors Center. I also shmoozed into getting the students some new cozy stuff for their room, which includes a mini fridge and some other swag (armadillo throw pillow...free books..... snacks....yes!!) to make them a nice space for studying and for having meetings. That was a whole lot of balancing on cliff edges of memos and work credit cards and emails and other things behind the scenes, too, and that dang dog TOTO keeps pulling on the curtain that's supposed to keep the work hidden. ::shoo::
But yes. There ARE a lot of meetings. It turns out, there really are a lot of things happening every day to make a university (sure, it's a college, same old, but maybe smaller) run smoothly. And there are people arguing about things like deadlines and schedules and what exactly to do to make it work. Arguing in a nice way (mostly).
So. Today is the last day of the full "semester" because I'm about to add the grades to the one class I still get to teach (a lovely group of Honors students and I am super glad I still get to teach at least ONE) and now I'll move into full on "RECRUIT ALL THE NEW NERDS" mode next week (and also graduation, which is "SAY BYE TO THE OLD NERDS AS THEY MOVE SOMEPLACE ELSE TO BE SCOOPED UP BY A DIFFERENT YOU" day.
Anyway. It's been a LOT.
I know now that I MUST put everything into a calendar, and my Squirrel ADHD brain MUST remember to LOOK AT SAID CALENDAR. More than once an hour. Because my position does come with a few helpers but they aren't that kind of helper (and while I joke about wanting a Miranda Priestly style assistant, I really don't).
I luckily messed up an email last week that would have invited an unholy number of people (around 6000) to make an appointment with me soon to join the HAP-- like.... victim of my own successful marketing and the movie Accepted style. Like. I sent it out to only about fifty of them before I had to stop the send, and then got about a 10% return on the number, which means I would have been in (mostly) Zoom Hades for WEEKS with maybe 600 enthusiastic students saying "wow, yes, let's do a meeting." And I really don't even have close to that number of hours in the day.
Thank you, mail merge error, and the fairies of "Microsoft doesn't really want to send that email for you" delay so that I caught the problem before it was quite that big.
I'm still going to recruit students with the data I have, but a little more judiciously. And maybe in group settings rather than JUST ME.
I love it!! I am learning a ton, and still a little squirrely about some things. And sometimes I bang my head against a brick wall and come away with glitter all over my forehead because the wall is not really brick but fairies. I hope I keep doing it and getting better at it for a long time. Because so far, it really looks like this is my White Candy Van for realz, but I might be the one driving it. Free kittens inside, indeed.
