Some happy things (more or less)

I skipped Happy Woman Professor Day because I was feeling grumpy on Wednesday. And even though Debbie said that if she could think of good things to post about then surely being a WP must be pretty good, I still refused to participate. (Well, that's a little more active than the reality. I just didn't participate. Out of grumpiness.)

But even on that day of grumpiness, I was sharing it with some other grumpy colleagues, and we seemed to enjoy each other in our grumpiness. The next day we were emailing each other all day, apologizing about our various levels of grumpiness the previous day. And it all became silly, and I won't even tell you how silly. Just silly, and the ability to be silly with one's colleagues isn't something to be taken lightly. It makes me happy, it does.

So that's one thing.

And last night I had dinner with two colleagues and the last (if the gods are willing) of our eleven job candidates, and I enjoyed the pleasure of the company, including the company of one colleague I had hardly ever spoken to before last night. And part of the pleasure was the pleasure of connections, sharing in shared affection for other folks in the field (not mine, theirs). Even with all the strangeness that can come with sharing space with academics, there are also these moments of pure delight and pleasure.

So that's another thing.

And I also had an email yesterday from a grad student at another institution, a grad student whose dissertation committee I'm serving on. And what a privilege is that, to be able to be in on new work being done not just here at my home institution but sometimes at other institutions as well? It's a stunning privilege, and a humbling one, too. (I hope that makes sense.)

So that's a third thing--the pleasure of being in on new ideas. Sharing ideas. Letting the mind expand and even explode with the newness.

And that brings me to you, gentle reader, and the blogosphere. It makes me happy, this thing that we do here. Thanks to you all.