Getting Right-Sized ...

My Ladybug should bring you Luck - Happy New Year 2010 !!!
Originally uploaded by Batikart
Today was a lesson in getting "right-sized" -- a term heard in recovery rooms, having to do with big-headedness, ego, arrogance and the like.

All of the students I've taught for the past year graduated today. I attended their ceremony along with a number of other faculty from the Social Work Dept, joined with multiple departments under the umbrella of Allied Health Professionals. This was new for our department to "share" a graduation ceremony. There were many feelings, mostly negative, about it.

As I walked with faculty in the processional into the ceremony, I was partnered with a male professor from the Physical Therapy Department. Numerous Social Work counterparts were paired up ahead of me. As we made our way past the graduating students, an explosion of cheers calling out my name rang out. I was taken aback and was so moved to see all these incredible joy-filled faces --many of which I would be seeing for the last time. There were no other exclamations heard for other Social Work faculty.

Seated on the stage, we all awaited our specific departments to call students up to receive their diplomas. The Social Work Dept went first. As I saw each of my students walk past, I could not help but cheer proudly and loudly. No other faculty from my department engaged in this merriment. They sat stoically, occasionally turning their heads to shoot me "a look" . A couple other department faculty engaged in the same kind of reverie when their students came up and this made me smile inside.

After the ceremony was over and I had talked to and met many of my students' family members and significant others, I headed back to the Dept to return my rented cap and gown. Running into the Dept chair and a few other faculty members doing the same task, the reception was chilly. The Dept chair, who touted me last week at the Honor Society ceremony, now turned the other cheek, so to speak.

It was in this moment that I got right-sized. While in the presence of my students I was inflated "larger-than-life", being back to the reality of the Dept and its conservative culture, I am keenly aware that I am, as an adjunct, low-man on the totem pole. I am the square peg in the round hole which is the Social Work Dept. As I drove away from campus, the fleeting thought that I may possibly be cut back or even cut out from the roster of course assignments landed with a thud in my gut.

As the celebratory fireworks fizzle from the past couple of weeks, I return to my right size. I am not the "superstar" that my ego can delude me to believe based on the positive praise of my students. I am just another teacher, like hundreds of others and I am disposable. This is the reality of the politics of academia. High marks in student-teacher adoration does not equal job security. I need to vie for future assignments just like the next person, without expecting prefential treatment or being entitled in some way.

I am attuned to the contractions as I've deflated over the past few hours. They are not devastating nor crippling, but they certainly are felt. It is about fitting in the skin and bones that I am naturally made of. It is about being aware of my ego's desire to make me bigger or taller or grander. It is standing as an observer of myself,  seeing my humanness and my imperfections and having compassion and tenderness simultaneously.

This is getting right-sized.