Today has been what Karen Walker might call a "Fiesta del Failure."
It began with an inauspicious (and, on the plus side, increasingly rare) incident of oversleeping and therefore tardiness to work and to my first student appointment of the day, which is easily in the top three mistakes I hate making more than any other at this job. Then I breathlessly went to start up my computer while trying to minimize the obvious fountains of sweat erupting from my every surface as my lateness had required parking on the street and walking in rather than my usual, morning overheating-prevention parking spot at the Parking Center and soothing preparatory tram ride to the office. This effort was put on hold as I found my desk crawling with the ants left over from the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull...not unsurprising, in hindsight (and, to be honest, at the time too) as my desk habits, while mostly far from unacceptable, might not impress Emily Post; plus, despite Sam having had candy of every sort out in a bowl on her desk for months and never an issue, my bowl was apparently the Studio 54 of the ant world (in a way, still is, having closed its doors and therefore had a large effect on the eventual disappearance of its clients in the area).
This was a) gross - my keyboard looked like my old ant farm from middle school; b) embarassing - I was already late, and despite how pristene I not only got my desk to be prior to this week (the first in a typically intense period, twice yearly, during which every one of my 371 students comes by the office at least once) but had against all odds
maintained all week thus far, and this particular student is one to whom I really want to come off as useful, helpful, and under no circumstances even bordering incompetence; and c) unfair (in a childish, not-actually-unfair-in-the-real-world kind of way) - I've gone out of my way to try to prevent such fauna visitation ever since a furry friend showed up in the office last year. Also, when I went to try to find some ant killer (there were SO MANY ANTS) I learned that not only did the main student affairs office have its own visiting army, specifically of interest to Formicidaean tourists was apparently one of a rather high-ranking official.
This was all before 10am, and the next five or six hours featured my own personal brand of "Oh my god where the fuck am I, what am I saying and who am I supposedly saying it to" brand of escalating self-consciousness and overcompensation, forgetfulness (on a much greater scale than usual if possible), and so on. Frustration mainly at the simultaneous emergence of all of my nervous habits, great and small, common and rare, not only on a full morning of appointments, but now I was doing them out in the main room. That meant a full morning of trying to focus on the student at hand and remembering and maintaining our specific rapport/relationship/rules of operation that usually allowed me to connect better and earn trust and approval (which we all know is like oxygen for me), while also keenly aware that my next appointment, usually a new sophomore at this early point in the advisement process (they snag appointments like Miley Cyrus tickets), could witness the whole disjointed symphony that I become after starting a morning in that way (as, I suspect, would most people, but it didn't happen to "most folks" did it?).
Being late meant parking on the street despite my recent purchase of a Parking Center pass. Thursdays were a big reason behind that sale, being street cleaning days and requiring me to park either in China (which is how far away the parking center might as well be when I'm running late) or to manage to sprint four to eight South LA blocks back to my Portia by noon to escape the parking nazis (i.e. Los Angeles' response to its financial shortcomings due to the Republicans... oh I mean the State and city budget deficits. ... Okay, they're synonymous). I admit this moment offered a hint of victory, as no ticket had yet reached my car at 12:05 as I climbed in and to my delight and ironic appreciation I saw the street sweeper turn the corner behind me and wait politely as I moved out of his way. I figured that I'd at least finally got the benefit of one of my numerous previous ones, as most of them have been bestowed upon me long before I actually blocked any street sweeper and all too often arrived to find within seconds of the restricted time (welcome to living on Ellendale). So ha.
Of courser, then I mixed up two students' appointment times in my phone despite putting them in there in the first place as part of a great new effort to never miss even an informal and irregular appointment due to my natural human inclination toward routine; today this resulted in skipping the one I thought was canceled while attending the one that was.
And all that happened before lunch. The rest of the day offered no additional mishaps, perhaps knowing the damage had been done once seeing my attitude towards this particular day as the kind Nellie Bly would sing about washing right out of her hair.
And suddenly I got a one-two punch of messages about great news for two different women I know, one a student who recently sought my help with making some major academic and personal career decisions, and the other a former classmate whom I have adored since meeting her the first day of college in Dr. Amy Richlin's Latin I class at USC. And as trite and nearly vomit-inducing it sounds, even to me as I type it, I exaggerate in no way when I say I felt all of the ugly from up to that point in my day immediately vanish, or lose all effect on me, or whatever you might call it. Even though both of these bits of happy news will likely mean I will soon see a lot less of each of them, "I'm so happy they're so happy!"
And that's a nice feeling.
