During the past week, I have observed two people get into trouble on Facebook for being open-minded. First, my son attracted a good deal of ire from various folks for daring to wish Donald Trump and his wife a speedy recovery from Covid-19. My son is a vocal and frequent critic of Trump, and is second to none in his visceral loathing of the President. But that did not prohibit him (due to good home training, I’m sure) from hoping... Read more
I realized this morning that exactly seven years ago, the beautiful humanities building on our campus was dedicated. Time definitely flies when you are having fun. As the director at the time of the large interdisciplinary program that is housed in this building, I was asked to give a few remarks from the faculty for the auspicious event. As I read my remarks this morning, I was grateful to be reminded, in this challenging and confusing times for teachers (as... Read more
This is an interesting planet. It deserves all the attention you can give it. Marilynne Robinson, Gilead One of the highlights of my week during the academic year for the past several years has been “MacPhails at 4.” MacPhails is the small pub-style gathering spot on our campus, named after a beloved Dominican priest who served as the associate vice president for student services for many years at the college. Every Friday at 4:00 pm, several members of the faculty... Read more
Perhaps a novel whose main character is the squadron leader for World War II bombing raids over Germany was not the best reading material while flying from Charleston, SC to Philadelphia on the way back home to Providence last January. But that’s what I found myself doing sitting in first class (the $70 for the upgrade was more than worth it). As it turned out, my round trip to South Carolina to see my son and daughter-in-law run in a... Read more
Last Sunday, it was my turn to be lector at church. The reading from the Jewish scriptures was as basic as they come—the Decalogue. Any reading from scripture that begins with the words “Then God spoke all these words” is a bit intimidating, but channeling my best imitations of Cecil B. DeMille, James Earl Jones, and Morgan Freeman, I dove in. To be honest, my attention has always been drawn most strongly to what the people of Israel say when... Read more
Today is Blessing of the Animals Sunday, which this year is bittersweet for me. My beloved dachshund Frieda died two years ago; for several years she accompanied me to the reader’s lectern at church for Blessing of the Animals Sunday as I read the story of Balaam and his ass from Numbers. My friend and confidant Marsue, an Episcopal priest who loved Saint Francis, and for whom Blessing of the Animals was a bigger liturgical event than Easter or Christmas,... Read more
Jeanne and I did not watch the presidential “debate” on Tuesday evening, choosing instead to preserve our sanity by watching the newest episode of “The Sounds,” our latest favorite show from Acorn. After listening to an hour of post-game analysis on MSNBC after the debate, followed by some of “Morning Joe” Wednesday morning, it was clear that we had made a wise choice. I posted the following on Facebook: “Take a deep breath, people. It’s a new day,” above this... Read more
The first debate between the 2020 presidential nominees is this evening. It will come as no surprise to anyone who reads this blog regularly that I have a favorite in the race and that I am appalled by his opponent—so much so that I’m not sure that it would be a good thing for my blood pressure to watch the show. As I thought about the debate and the remaining weeks of the campaign—along with the several difficult weeks that... Read more
One of my teaching teammates this semester in the interdisciplinary course I regularly participate in is a Victorian literature scholar. This, of course, includes Charles Dickens. Her choice from Dickens for the syllabus was the über-familiar A Christmas Carol; she gave two lectures on this text over the past week (recorded and delivered on Zoom, of course, since we have no face-to-face classes right now). A Christmas Carol in September might seem anachronistic, but the text is about far more than... Read more
My college campus is in the middle of a (hopefully) temporary lockdown, due to a spike in Covid-19 positives last week. After a monumental effort over the summer to make it possible for us to open campus at the end of August to in-person students, followed by three weeks of apparent success, classes are now fully remote as they were for the last half of the spring semester. On campus students are restricted to their residences on campus, as off-campus... Read more
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