Going out with Style

Something ridiculously embarrassing happened to me today. I was talking to my class about flowers, and we were going over the basic anatomy of a flower. I mentioned the the female part of the flower was called the carpel, which is composed of the stigma, the style, and the ovary. The style is the long, thin part between the stigma and the ovary. I told my students they should put the term "style" into their long-term vocabulary, as it is often used to describe long, thin structures (think "stylus"). I then said I could think of several "styloid processes" in the human body; these were always long(ish), bony projections. As I was talking, I was sort of doodling on the board, and something resembling the doodle to the right came out right as I was talking about "long, bony projections." A few girls in the front row immediately started snickering, and I realized right away that everything was coming out all wrong. So I said, "Okay, that did NOT come out right!" and quickly erased my doodle. But not before a good number of students just about peed themselves laughing. Oh the joys of getting to make a fool out of yourself in front of a huge lecture hall on a daily basis. If I do ever leave this job, I will miss it (and I really mean that).

Speaking of possible job changes, I'm having a really good semester. Go figure, right? Of course, I have said in the past that my relationship with my job is pretty much love/hate, with not much in between. I also think a major reason things seem to be going well for me is that I am only working 50%. I started off the semester extremely far behind, due to my mini health crises that prevented me from being as productive as I had planned on being over the summer. However, now I feel like I am finally starting to get slightly caught up, and I am also reaping the benefits of having five years of experience under my belt. I have been completely redoing my lectures, which I'm semi hating myself and semi loving myself for. As a result of foolishly fixing things that ain't broke, I'm never as prepared as I want to be when I go to class. I like to have all my notes typed out, but I just haven't had time. Fortunately, I'm able to lean heavily on the past experience of having taught most of this material a bajillion times already (okay, so not a bajillion, but 12). With this in mind, the thought of teaching this course a bajillion more times in my future is either horrid or wonderful - I can't decide which. On the one hand, it gets, well, kind of boring. And my department has made it clear to me that I will never ever get a chance to do something like develop a new course. On the other hand, the more I teach the same courses over and over, the easier it gets. In 25 years, this could be a pretty sweet gig. Or not.

While I'm still moving forward with my plan to leave this job sometime within the next couple of years, I haven't closed my mind to a miracle that might make me want to stay. Of course, I think a major reason I have been so much happier about work is precisely because I feel like I'm going to be leaving soon. This allows me to let a lot of things go that I wouldn't normally be able to let go of. I feel like I can smile and make small talk with my TTF colleagues for the next few years and secretly bang my head against the wall when I hear through hallway gossip that the department is making huge changes to the courses that I teach without actually asking me what I think about said changes. But I would not be able to keep quiet if I were in this for the long haul.

I think it's a vicious cycle. The department doesn't invest in its instructors or care about their long-term happiness because this is not a position many people stay in for long. In fact, of the seven instructors in my department, only one has been here longer than I have. Our positions are somewhat of a revolving door. But it doesn't have to be this way; instructor retention in other departments is much higher. Granted, in some cases, it isn't because the instructors are treated better, it's because they have fewer options, especially in some humanities departments. As far as respect for instructors, I'd say my department falls somewhere in the middle, so I realize it could actually be worse. If I do leave, perhaps I'm just reinforcing the notion that instructors are not to be considered long-term, permanent employees; perhaps I'll just be making the department a worse place for the colleagues I leave behind. I'd feel bad about that, because I do have some pretty awesome colleagues who deserve better than they get.

Regardless of what the future may hold, I'm in a good place right now mentally. I've had some struggles with ongoing pain in my hip, DVT that doesn't seem to be getting any better, and a couple of medium-level stressors centered around various other aspects of my life. Oddly enough, these things, combined with the many philosophical thoughts that seem to be constantly running through my head as I approach my 40th birthday, seem to be making me happier. I can't even begin to understand why, but fortunately this is something that falls outside the realm of science. :)