Here's the thing:

I got up at 6:30 to be at the Publication Center at 7:30 so some students could work on their stuff, and print, and bind. I was in the room with the hot glue and the sharp blade until 11:30. And then there was a meeting. And then there were e-mails and phone calls from students. And students who were all, "So basically you're saying I'm missing three or four things?" with a chagrined chuckle, and I was all, "yeah." And the grading hovering in the short distance.

And still, the people, it's Friday. FRIDAY. And it's also...the end, almost, of the semester. Let the unwinding commence. I said let it commence!

Whoa, kids, busy already.

So, back to school.

I have met with the literary magazine class once. It was great. I love them. My other class, I have not met with yet--that's tomorrow, for three hours. Good times! Excited about it!

Just in case you were worried that, based upon the previous evidence, I, a public servant, am not really working, I shall now fill you in on my activities for the week:

a. finishing and fine-tuning syllabi (of course).

b. meeting with senior administrators.

c. meeting with a group of faculty on another campus.

d. Board of Trustees meeting.

e. Discussion Team meeting.

f. meeting with the Teaching and Learning Center director

g. conversation with faculty member on another another campus.

h. conversation with faculty member in my office.

i. meeting with chair, dean, and colleague.

j. meeting of the Faculty Association Executive Board

k. meeting with the Provost.

(for items c, d, e, f, j, and k, Middlebrow was also in attendance, the lucky bastard.)

Personally, I like to slide into the semester unannounced and browse for a little while before it notices me and grips me in the iron grip of its grippy paws and squeezes the life out of me.

But no.

And now, a few last touches on the syllabus for tomorrow.

Dear first day of the semester,

Thank you for taking it a little easy on me. For instance, thank you for sending willing students in the direction of the literary magazine staff, and thank you for arranging for the literary magazine class to be my first and only class today.

Thanks also for allowing me to have good conversations with multiple cherished colleagues. And I appreciate the fact that I was able to help several students find their classes, or the art department office, and to advise them informally on classes they might take to fulfill their, y'know, generals. As the kids like to say. It made me feel useful, and kind, just as I like to feel when I am at my place of employ, and elsewhere--everywhere, really. Today was a good example of that.

And thanks, dear first day of the semester, for helping me see that it would be a good idea for my son to drop me off and pick me up at the curb by my building, so he could use my car in the interim. I might have fretted, but this arrangement meant that I did not have to park on a very very busy parking day. And that meant I could wear my tall shoes, and not whine about it. Much.

I think it would be awesome, first day, if you would share your techniques for staging my day with the rest of the days of the semester. Show them how it's possible to have just one thing at a time happen, instead of an onslaught of crazy. And show them how, when just one thing at a time is happening, even a little bad news or unsettling vibrations are less like a crisis and more like a topic of conversation. Crises are bad, first day, I think we can all agree on this, unless we are revolutionaries, and then crises are opportunities. I get that. But I am not ready for such an opportunity, not yet. Not when the afternoon sun bestowing itself upon me while I waited at the curb is still hot. A hot with an autumnal tinge, but still: hot. Let's have the revolution in, like, October. And maybe we won't need one at all, not if we just take one thing at a time, and have a conversation while wearing cute shoes.

That is all I ask.

Sincerely,

htms

Harbinger.

I know it and you know it: that rain spattering and the wind hollering is the end of summer a-calling. So add these items to your list of stuff to contemplate:

• No more white shoes, dresses or trousers after tomorrow (I know, no one cares about this but me, and actually, I don't even care about it, but just this morning, I read an article about it, and in the information-sharing spirit of this blog, I am passing this time-honored style principle to you. You're very, very welcome.). Also, possibly, no more white gloves, but no one but maybe Brooke Astor ever cared about that in about fifty years.
• It's still tomato season for a few more weeks.
• There are still peaches.
• Awesome walking and bike-riding weather for several weeks.
• Sweaters.
• Less swamp cooler usage.
• Also, time to send out your manuscripts again! If you have manuscripts, send them out--it's time!
• Sleep with more covers on, which for some reason, I always find terribly comforting.
• Pumpkin pie is in your future.
• More baking in general.
• Every season that passes is an index for how much closer I am--you, too!--to old age, decrepitude, and death.

See? So many reasons to be cheerful.