Friday, April 29, 2005
Fear Not
I have hestitated for quite some time in joining the blogger world thinking I might bore my self to tears or waste time writing unimportant sentiment that others may critique. I realize I have learned much from the writings of others, shared experiences, and humorous stories that may help me continue to solidify my own purpose, make me smile and perhaps if others choose to read my view, they, too, might benefit in some way. I guess we'll see.
Wednesday, April 27, 2005
There is intelligent life on this campus
Today started out as any normal anxiety ridden day - me wondering what to accomplish first with regard to my work load and then it happened like it does often . . . things come up on campus other than my daily tasks. Arriving I realize today is the day we have no classes and our seniors are scheduled throughout the entire day to present their final projects. No tasks will get checked off my list today. But thinking about this gives me a wonderful excuse to put off those things that seem rather burdensome.
I hurry across the parking lot very alert from the consumption of my daily home-made espresso and carefully turn the door handle to the classroom where I had promised one of my fav-o-rite students that I would attend their presentation. He was concerned there wouldn't be a crowd but there was a nice group of interested looking folks. Even the president has joined us. The presentation is nicely done, well researched, and as his professors articulate questions - they are answered efficiently and effectively.
I grab my bag and hurry to let the office mates, particularly our pretty front office manager (several of our male students are smitten and truthfully she is not only young and pretty but owns a sense of dry wit which is a must to survive in this office), know that I am indeed on campus and have not abandoned my responsibilites completely. I check email, voice mails, and make a couple of calls before deciding what student session I wish to attend.
Next on the agenda for the day is the special speaker brought in to inspire and help add a more professional flair to the event. I attend dutifully as an adminstrator and am surprised at not only the content, abundant personality, and inspiration but this is one of our own board members who I am proud to see is so passionate and capable. I want to hang around this woman and wonder if her commitment and conviction might rub off on me but she has a swarm of well-wishers around and I am uncertain what I could say - so I thank her and move on. I wrote several notes down hopeful that I can ruminate over them later and perhaps pass them on. I am always looking for new material to share.
We are short-handed and I hang around the outer office to cover for lunch. This change in location and view always keeps me aware of how important it is to get to know the students and of course this gives me the chance to service them in ways different from my usual job. I get relieved and attend another presentation and am again impressed by the thoroughness of the thoughts and maturity of our seniors. This day is a great opportunity to showcase the talent we have. I enjoy being impressed in this way so different from how I often feel given my particular responsibilites as one of the keepers of the rules.
I get back to my office which is a suite that is usually buzzing with students hanging out, laughing loud, and several of my office mates yelling out commentary or actually coming into the outer office to join the barrage of conversation and noise. I normally just roll out in my office chair which is high-backed and well equipped with what looks like over-sized roller blades wheels. Once I give my comment I happily roll back thus indicating that I actually do have some work to attend to, perhaps I am not really fooling anyone :-) . It is quite the sight and today is no different.
The topic today is the love-life of one of my fellow employees and he is being goaded by one of our most capable student workers who we believe has never kept an opinion to herself - ever. But she has worthwhile opinions so this isn't really a negative. She further pursues the subject as she is a close friend of his by indicating he may be batting for the other team, so to speak, as he seemingly has little interest in her interest in his love-life - did you get that? So now I feel the need to roll out in my office chair adding my often sarcastic remarks and with not much encouragement we are settled in my office discussing my lovelife or past loves and get around to the subjects of relationships, homosexuality, infidelity, premarital sex, sex, pornography, masturbation, friendships, accountability, betrayal, respect, and many instances in which we can and do struggle in our commitment to God's way as Christians.
Here are a couple of the questions/topics we attempted to address: How do we broach these issues in a way that is conducive to those of our friends who struggle with these issues or ourselves, for that matter, and also remain true to our Christian faith?? Great discussion and interaction of thoughts occured. Soon we had a small crowd in my office, because I think we were talking about real life issuesand unfortunatley things we often pass over quickly with pat answers that don't really ever help us. Our resident goader states, "Maybe we are only dealing with the symtoms and not the real issues?" We all shook our heads in agreement. What is the real issue? I think when we missuse relationship (and there are lots of ways to do this) we disrespect God and each other because we are pushing our needs or wants on someone else. With sex outside marriage that certainly seems the case as sex was meant to be something intentional and sacred between two committed people and when it occurs haphazardly or without commitment the result is normally betrayal followed by disrespect. I have read several accounts of Christians (Please keep in mind that this is the view from which I am seeing this) who were engaged to be married or intended for marriage but out of passion had sex, Johnny on the Spot, and later, 20 years later, felt the other one should have honored them by being the stronger person. Sad but true.
We talked and talked, and discussed, and questioned so much and I ended up remebering something the special speaker had said earlier in the day (I hoped I could pass this tidbit on) and that was that we should "own our influence". Here we had some big issues and instead of thinking we could do nothing - we could be intentional with our influence. Influence is not obvious all the time, nor should it be condeming or confrontational - it is sort of marketing your self, your integrity, your faith, but without shoving it in someone's face. Intentional influence or owning our influence is just being sure of who we are, taking some responsibilitly in understanding our impact (wouldn't it be great if some of our public figures including Hollywood thought deeply about this), and be willing to share it lovingly and confidently.
Whether one agrees or not with some of what was discussed or the views expressed what I am encouraged by is these students and their willingness to question, discuss, and commit to be authentic. And for me, best of all, I was not only there to witness this process of thinking and questioning but allowed to be a part of it.
I hurry across the parking lot very alert from the consumption of my daily home-made espresso and carefully turn the door handle to the classroom where I had promised one of my fav-o-rite students that I would attend their presentation. He was concerned there wouldn't be a crowd but there was a nice group of interested looking folks. Even the president has joined us. The presentation is nicely done, well researched, and as his professors articulate questions - they are answered efficiently and effectively.
I grab my bag and hurry to let the office mates, particularly our pretty front office manager (several of our male students are smitten and truthfully she is not only young and pretty but owns a sense of dry wit which is a must to survive in this office), know that I am indeed on campus and have not abandoned my responsibilites completely. I check email, voice mails, and make a couple of calls before deciding what student session I wish to attend.
Next on the agenda for the day is the special speaker brought in to inspire and help add a more professional flair to the event. I attend dutifully as an adminstrator and am surprised at not only the content, abundant personality, and inspiration but this is one of our own board members who I am proud to see is so passionate and capable. I want to hang around this woman and wonder if her commitment and conviction might rub off on me but she has a swarm of well-wishers around and I am uncertain what I could say - so I thank her and move on. I wrote several notes down hopeful that I can ruminate over them later and perhaps pass them on. I am always looking for new material to share.
We are short-handed and I hang around the outer office to cover for lunch. This change in location and view always keeps me aware of how important it is to get to know the students and of course this gives me the chance to service them in ways different from my usual job. I get relieved and attend another presentation and am again impressed by the thoroughness of the thoughts and maturity of our seniors. This day is a great opportunity to showcase the talent we have. I enjoy being impressed in this way so different from how I often feel given my particular responsibilites as one of the keepers of the rules.
I get back to my office which is a suite that is usually buzzing with students hanging out, laughing loud, and several of my office mates yelling out commentary or actually coming into the outer office to join the barrage of conversation and noise. I normally just roll out in my office chair which is high-backed and well equipped with what looks like over-sized roller blades wheels. Once I give my comment I happily roll back thus indicating that I actually do have some work to attend to, perhaps I am not really fooling anyone :-) . It is quite the sight and today is no different.
The topic today is the love-life of one of my fellow employees and he is being goaded by one of our most capable student workers who we believe has never kept an opinion to herself - ever. But she has worthwhile opinions so this isn't really a negative. She further pursues the subject as she is a close friend of his by indicating he may be batting for the other team, so to speak, as he seemingly has little interest in her interest in his love-life - did you get that? So now I feel the need to roll out in my office chair adding my often sarcastic remarks and with not much encouragement we are settled in my office discussing my lovelife or past loves and get around to the subjects of relationships, homosexuality, infidelity, premarital sex, sex, pornography, masturbation, friendships, accountability, betrayal, respect, and many instances in which we can and do struggle in our commitment to God's way as Christians.
Here are a couple of the questions/topics we attempted to address: How do we broach these issues in a way that is conducive to those of our friends who struggle with these issues or ourselves, for that matter, and also remain true to our Christian faith?? Great discussion and interaction of thoughts occured. Soon we had a small crowd in my office, because I think we were talking about real life issuesand unfortunatley things we often pass over quickly with pat answers that don't really ever help us. Our resident goader states, "Maybe we are only dealing with the symtoms and not the real issues?" We all shook our heads in agreement. What is the real issue? I think when we missuse relationship (and there are lots of ways to do this) we disrespect God and each other because we are pushing our needs or wants on someone else. With sex outside marriage that certainly seems the case as sex was meant to be something intentional and sacred between two committed people and when it occurs haphazardly or without commitment the result is normally betrayal followed by disrespect. I have read several accounts of Christians (Please keep in mind that this is the view from which I am seeing this) who were engaged to be married or intended for marriage but out of passion had sex, Johnny on the Spot, and later, 20 years later, felt the other one should have honored them by being the stronger person. Sad but true.
We talked and talked, and discussed, and questioned so much and I ended up remebering something the special speaker had said earlier in the day (I hoped I could pass this tidbit on) and that was that we should "own our influence". Here we had some big issues and instead of thinking we could do nothing - we could be intentional with our influence. Influence is not obvious all the time, nor should it be condeming or confrontational - it is sort of marketing your self, your integrity, your faith, but without shoving it in someone's face. Intentional influence or owning our influence is just being sure of who we are, taking some responsibilitly in understanding our impact (wouldn't it be great if some of our public figures including Hollywood thought deeply about this), and be willing to share it lovingly and confidently.
Whether one agrees or not with some of what was discussed or the views expressed what I am encouraged by is these students and their willingness to question, discuss, and commit to be authentic. And for me, best of all, I was not only there to witness this process of thinking and questioning but allowed to be a part of it.
Tuesday, April 26, 2005
Happy and Sad
Last night the students at the college where I work hosted an event they call "The Emmys". It's sort of a mock Oscars with somewhat silly categories and a few serious ones. Some of the categories were "Do they still go to school here?" - this one is for students who students never see but they hear are supposed to be in class; another category was for faculty members titled, "I still have 3 minutes left" for those professors who are always pushing for more lecture time. It was fun and worth attending. Being a very small college we certainly have our perks of close community and I thoroughly enjoy getting out and about with the students relishing their quick wit and ability to enjoy their time of play. I sat among of few of these very intelligent and witty beings.
One of the highlights of the evening for me was the times they took to seriously honor a few people. The evening was dedicated to Katie, one of our beloved students who passed away this past February, leaving us all in awe of her strength and then also tearfully sending off one of the favorite faculty members to another university which is much closer to his immediate family (I will mention he came with his entire family: 4 young boys and beautiful wife). The students affirmed his decision while still letting him know they would all miss him and his distinctive manner of teaching and interaction. His peers will miss him, too.
The mixture of laughter and solemnity during the event was so reflective of how life truly works on a bigger scale or any scale for that matter. I am so appreciative of the ability to guffaw with gusto (as both my assistant deans do in our suite of offices) and the equal ability to be sad when such circumstances demand. I am honored to be able to experience being both happy and sad - truthfully one without other might lessen the impact of either. Think about that.
One of the highlights of the evening for me was the times they took to seriously honor a few people. The evening was dedicated to Katie, one of our beloved students who passed away this past February, leaving us all in awe of her strength and then also tearfully sending off one of the favorite faculty members to another university which is much closer to his immediate family (I will mention he came with his entire family: 4 young boys and beautiful wife). The students affirmed his decision while still letting him know they would all miss him and his distinctive manner of teaching and interaction. His peers will miss him, too.
The mixture of laughter and solemnity during the event was so reflective of how life truly works on a bigger scale or any scale for that matter. I am so appreciative of the ability to guffaw with gusto (as both my assistant deans do in our suite of offices) and the equal ability to be sad when such circumstances demand. I am honored to be able to experience being both happy and sad - truthfully one without other might lessen the impact of either. Think about that.
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