In many ways it's been an angonizing semester. I was trying to do too many things at once, not exactly by my own choice. I was trying to increase the quality of my two classes by publishing class notes for each lecture. At the same time, I was trying to solve the interminable problems with the Czech student recruiting, I was trying to increase the quality of our graduate recruiting and also trying to put together a proposal for a new joint CS/CE Ph.D. At the same time I was writing and running research software for conjugate symmetries, and writing an NSF proposal. The amazing thing was that I was actually getting everything done.
Then, somebody slipped in a monkey-wrench. The graduate recruiting web pages I created were not exactly to the liking of ITS, so they came to Don Gaitros to explain what they thought was wrong with them. Their comments were only suggestions but Don treated them as commands from on-high and destroyed all of my web pages and substituted a bunch of worthless crap in their place. Don, as chairman of the department, actually has a right to do this sort of thing, but I was led to believe that it was ITS that made the changes, which absolutely infuriated me. ITS DOES NOT have the right to dictate academic matters, but Don apparently didn't want to tell me that HE made the changes and blamed it on ITS. When I went to the Dean about it, he explained to me that I just had to live with this. I've been thinking about relinquishing the job of graduate directory anyway because I detest going to the leadership committee meetings. However, this is the straw that broke the camel's back. Not really a straw actually. I refuse to work in any position where I do not have the support of the people above me. Particularly when I have the rug jerked out from under me. The Dean examined those web pages and enthusiastically approved them. A couple of days later, he gives me no support whatsoever. I refuse to do any job where I don't have the support of the people above me. Second, and probably even more important point. I refuse to work in any position where I'm the bad guy by default. I said we should do X, ITS said we should do Y, it was instantaneously assumed, without any discussion or negotiation that ITS was right and I was wrong. This is a situation that I find utterly, completely, and totally intolerable. The upshot of it is, I resigned as graduate director a couple of days after this happened. With the assumption that I would continue to work the Czech student problem and the Ph.D. proposal. I solved the Czech student problem. The Ph.D. proposal is still under construction.
But that's not what I wanted to talk about.
I was angry over this whole thing, and I couldn't stop thinking about it. I kept praying to the Lord to take the anger from my soul, and to help me to obey his command to "Love thy neighbor as thyself." It was so hard, and no matter what I did, I just couldn't put all this behind me. Then The Lord answered my prayer in a way that shows He also has a sense of humor. A few Sundays ago I had planned to do some Geocaching, but Brett Caroll (Sawdust) called up and asked if I wanted to go on a motorcycle ride. I hadn't ever been on a group ride, so I said OK. We were up by Corsicana when I took a curve a little too fast. Instead of correcting properly by leaning hard into the turn, I swung wide (as you would in a car). I wasn't really thinking. I swung just wide enough to go off the edge of the road. There was no shoulder, and no easy way to get back on the road or slow down, so I went down into the ditch to slow down and recover. My floorboard hit the edge of the ditch -- I was only going about 15 MPH at the time -- and the bike flipped on its side with my leg underneath it. It was a nice gentle slide with no damage to the bike, but my leg was trapped underneath and as I went flying off, my knee broke with a loud snap. I rode in an ambulance back to Waco and have been on crutches ever since.
And yes, my prayer was answered. I was no longer angry. In the light of this accident I was suddenly forced to focus on things that are considerably more important that a few stupid web pages. Things like life (I'm
alive.) Health (will I be healthy again?) Work (I can make it back and forth to class, but it's so exhausting I can barely stand it.) Friends (without friends I'd still be lying in a ditch somewhere near Corsicana.)
Be careful what you pray for.
