September 27, 2009

Unusual faithfulness to meetings at the university. In part, this is like indulging a taste for horror films, for much effort goes into giving a straight path meanders and pitfalls. Over all the good intentions of the workers in the fields lies the pall of an administration, some of whom still carry around the illusion that a university works the same way as an investment bank, some of whom harbor the illusion that it’s their work which is important, rather than that of teachers and students. Everyone talks about assessment, though the model of assessment imposed has little to do with what happens at a university. I think this is intentional. The modern university administration seeks to make academia embarrassed with itself, so it will deliver itself unquestioningly into their hands. Someone suggests that we tell what actually goes on and hold ourselves to standards which actually matter, but the response is, “L would never accept that,” or. “We tried that, but L fired it right back.” No doubt L sees herself as a paramount of rigor and exactness amid a swamp of fuzzy-headed Ph.d’s, but perhaps L would be happier in a job where her efforts would be less delayed and harassed by actualities. For one to have say in the university process who is not directly involved in the teaching and learning process is always counterproductive. It doesn’t seem to matter if the counter-producers once were involved; some germ of arrogance, some virus of delight in top-down arbitrariness infects them the instant they step over into Administration.

One notices that people who lecture most about “the real world” and “reality” are inevitably selling some grand illusion of their own.

Memorial service for Jeff Rackham. It was well enough attended, and the moments of embarrassment were so clearly well-intentioned that they must not have mattered. I think Jeff would be happy with what was said. He was, among other things, that rare amalgam of kindness and efficiency, that we could use so sorely today. Considering that he helped me professionally more than any other person in my life–by whole levels of magnitude-- I had to stop and consider why I remained so lighthearted about his passing. Not indifferent, lighthearted. I think because he is a continuing presence in my consciousness, and that in life he allowed nothing morbid or backward-glancing.

SZ, a long-time-ago student, talked to me after the service a long time about how a Southern Lit class we had together– twenty years ago?– changed and continues to inform her life. THAT is assessment.

AH talked to me a long time on the sidewalk outside about his harrowing last few years. It was good. I forget sometimes what good friends you can be with someone to talk to, maybe, five times a year.

Chall generously offered tickets to last night’s Bravo concert, and DJ and I went to hear Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg and Anne-Marie McDermott. They were perfection. The hall, of course, was not. That music was meant for my living room, not for that great hollow barn, into which this and the next ten houses on the street could fit– thirty if you stacked them up. But I am not so musical that this bothered me very much. The Debussy G minor and the Frank A major were on the bill, and I was glad, for they were both cerebral and contemplative, but in ways so various and unrelated to each other that it was delightful to hear the expanse achievable between two human minds one would have imagined emerging from a very similar milieu. That I fell asleep during the Frank is a reflection on nothing but the gift of great peace. Zambra’s afterward with Charles and Virginia. Good talk. Excellent vodka. I got to cuddle all the handsome waiters, knowing them from class or stage.

Ingrid is back in town, working at Malaprop’s.

Driving home, we watched a rat scurry across Lakeshore, looking miserable in the rain and the intrusion of headlights.