Month: November 2009

It’s the last week of Fall Term here at Carleton. In fact, tomorrow is the last day of classes. Then we get two days of reading days followed by our infamous Saturday, Sunday, Monday exam schedule.

Some year it’ll cease to surprise me when I get blindsided by extra work this week. Students panic over their final assignments (like, literally hyperventilate at the reference desk or navigate the computer with shaky hands in my office). Interlibrary Loan isn’t really an option any more, so we have to work a lot harder to find workable evidence for some arguments. Freshmen, faced with their first “long” papers are having trouble negotiating topic size. Everyone’s just a little more stressed and impatient (including me). And it’s quite possible to work with one student for 45 minutes on three citations. (I know this because I just did.)

Meanwhile we’re also gearing up for Winter “Break” activities. Planning has ramped up for the December faculty development workshops here on campus, the copyright committee has a work-in scheduled, and all the other committees and working groups and task forces I’m on are looking forward to the amount of work they can accomplish during “break.”

At the same time, various holidays and special family days are coming up, all of which require preparation and planning.

Some year I’ll see this coming and prepare… somehow. Tonight, though, I’m going to forget all about everything and let my brain turn off for a few hours.

Veterans Day changes for me every year. It used to be one of those days whose frequency and timing I could never quite predict, but which signaled that my friends would have the day off from school, no mail would arrive, and the public library would be closed so that if you happened to time it right and your books would have been due that day, the date stamped in them would miraculously be one day later — a bonus day.

Then one year, we took my grandpa to a nearby mansion-turned-war- museum and he pointed out the tank he had driven in the second World War, telling us for the first time about maneuvering that tank over uneven ground, it’s deafening sounds which robbed him of much of his hearing, and how cold they would get inside of it. I could barely understand him as he talked, his booming pastor’s voice and clear articulation long gone by this point in his struggle with MSA, but that day changed Veterans Day for me. One of the gentlest men I’ve ever known had been forced to face hardship and fear and to find the strength to endure.

Over the years I’ve met veterans young and old, and I’ve been struck by the diversity of their experiences and motivations. But one thing that’s been consistent is that their experiences changed them, fundamentally and irrevocably. And while it’s trite to say that our experiences change us, I’ve always been struck by the depth of that change in these people I’ve known. Some joined to serve their country, experience intense camaraderie, and be all they could be. Others joined because they didn’t see any other choice in life. Many fell somewhere in the middle. And none could have predicted the effects.

I am grateful, today, for the service of these brave people. I grieve for those who never got the chance to point out their tanks to their grandchildren. I grieve, too,  for those who live broken lives that could have been whole. And I marvel at the bravery that I can’t begin to imagine – bravery to face hardship and fear, and bravery to face the possibility that even among the good experiences, this service may strip you of yourself. This is not something I could face. I’m not even sure I could handle watching someone close to me face it.  So I am deeply grateful that there are those who can and do.