July 22, 2015: Being Away

Thank you for my victories, and for my defeats! Old Lodge Skins (Chief Dan George in the movie Little Big Man)

I have not been here for nearly two months. That’s the longest time away in over ten years.

New life phases are afoot and I’ve been navigating the transition busyness and getting ready to once again slowdown, a particular propensity of mine, though most of the folks I’m around have no idea. When I mentioned that I was stepping away from a plethora of responsibilities and would become invisible, everyone I spoke with replied that it was not possible or they couldn’t imagine me not being involved.

I smile. I have stepped away. And I’m lining up on improving the work I’ll continue to do for a while yet, which is in the classroom not the institution.

The institutional work was good for me, though politics is so far outside my comfort zone it was unnerving. Apparently no one noticed the latter, which is good I guess. The institution of community colleges is an amazing entity, one I am still thrilled exists. Politics is inevitable I suppose, but mostly in the way. Whatever kind of teacher I am, I think I became worse in having to deal with politics. Now it’s time to improve the classroom work before moving on towards retirement and other adventures. However, I’ll never forget that I had a job in which I was paid to learn! I will be forever grateful to the existence of community colleges and to the many folks who work or study or both in that arena, especially community college students who might not have believed me when I told them that I was also a student and they were also teachers. Thank you!