Easter's Coming And I Can Use A Resurrection of My Own

Regina called a little while ago. I haven't seen her since the summer and haven't talked to her in a few months. We made plans to have dinner next week. I am not merely looking forward to it; I feel as if I am looking at an oasis that's within sight, if not within reach.

I feel the same way about my parents' planned visit. I hope they stay well enough to make the trip. I also hope that Marilynne and her daughter can make the trip they'd been talking about, or that I can see them again soon, one way or another.

Yesterday morning Millie stopped by just before I left for work. It was about the only thing--besides a conversation I had with Marion, an adjunct prof who recently divorced and is now caring for her elderly father--that got me through the days' work yesterday or today.

Marion thanked me for the bits of advice I've given her about navigating the college and for my offers to help her. It's strange: Sometimes it doesn't occur to me that I've done anything for someone until she thanks me for something that, until she thanked me, I'd forgotten about. And, at other times, I give until I have nothing left to give and people only remember what I didn't give them because I didn't have it.

Then again, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised: I realize that on my current job, whatever praise or rewards I've been given have had almost nothing to do with how well I did anything, and I've been ostracized or even penalized when I was doing my best and actually getting something done. Worse, the more I do, and the more I try to be a "good" citizen of the college by working voluntarily on various projects and committes, the more alienated I feel. I can honestly say that when I'm on the campus but not in the classroom, I feel more like a stranger than I did on my very first day there.

And, as I mentioned in an earlier post, faculty members whom I once thought to be friends--because they told me they were--and allies have, so far, been anything but.

What all of that means is that I'm in a dysfunctional environment. And, it seems, the more anyone--like the provost--tries to impose order upon it, the more dysfunctional--or, at least, asynchronistic--it becomes.

Perhaps that's the reason why I've felt so tired most of the time, as I do now. And it's the reason why I want friends and family--particularly the females--around me now. They are an antidote to the games and all-around pettiness and game-playing I'm experiencing from some of my co-workers, particularly the female colleagues who liked me until I got my surgery.

Oh well. I didn't do--or not do--my surgery or anything else for, or in spite of, them. I'm not about to start now.