My Soul Still Hungers

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Before my sister left for military training, she fulfilled one of my final requests on how I wanted to spend time with her. After dinner that Sunday night, I sat at the piano with her and sang while she played. Since then, I intended to post that video here, and this week when someone asked to see it, I felt like the time was right. Although that person no longer speaks to me, I still feel like it's the right thing to do.

Keep in mind that I am not a professional entertainer. My students all know that my jokes suck. I am sharing this with you because I love to sing, because it is a pleasant memory of my sister, and because I feel impressed that it may help one of you better understand the love of our Savior.

Oh My Soul Hungered

My soul still hungers. I feel pain and doubt daily. Just last night, my psychologist friend told me to stop second guessing myself. Most of the time when I pray all I get is enough peace of mind so that I can sleep. I slept well this weekend, despite my recent Pinocchio experience, and although some doubts persist, I am fairsure I made the right call. If I didn't, I hope God will be merciful to me and to the person I hurt and not punish her for my mistakes. I don't like being lonely, but God does speak peace to my soul and tell me things only He knows, and I take comfort in that, because I know He won't decide tomorrow that I'm no longer His son and forsake me. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoso believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.

I testify that God is real. I haven't seen His face or heard His voice, but I feel His presence, and I know His love for me.

I Was Pinocchioed

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In the Disney adaptation of Pinocchio, Pinocchio finds himself in the company of a puppeteer troupe. He participates in a memorable dance number, "There Are No Strings On Me", in which the point of the song is that he is free. He is emancipated, and he dances and sings opposite another marionette from Russia who claims she would cut her strings for him. Ultimately, however, as the song goes on, she doesn't end up cutting anything but rather Pinocchio ends up encumbering himself in HER strings. He was led on and in the whirlwind of activity finds himself tied up by her rather than being freed by her. That's the ultimate goal of every encounter Pinocchio has while away from his maker, Jappeto. People try to encumber him and tie him up in things that will make him a slave to his puppet nature. In essence, people are trying to Pinocchio him.

This past week, I was Pinocchioed by a woman. Last Friday I went out with a nice young lady from Ukraine. We seemed to hit it off rather well, surprisingly so in my mind since we've known each other for months but not really spoken much. I even planned to use my two days off next week to show her some cool things in Nevada that I have never shared with anyone, which says quite a bit. Thursday I called to talk about it with her, to find out how her mother is since Ukraine is at war, and then I was blindsided by a demand she had that I failed to fulfill. She wanted me to join her gym which is as far from where I live in town as possible almost and then drive over there and work out with her. When I told her I wasn't sure how I felt about that, the relationship died. Apparently this was a test, and I failed because I was unwilling to do "something small" that she wanted to do. In essence, there were strings attached to this relationship of which I was unaware. I didn't know I was supposed to bend over backwards to impress her, and it doesn't make much sense given that she pursued me. Shouldn't she be trying to convince me why I should pick her? To me it wasn't a small thing. I pay for a gym already, and she knows that. I would have to drive an hour round trip to do this each time, and I wasn't sure that's how I wanted to spend my time since there are other alternatives. However, I told her that if that was the only way we could spend time together I would, but it was too late, and she "knew" that because I didn't want to do this that meant I didn't want to be with her at all.

By choosing to pick a fight over something this small at this early stage in dating, she showed me that she suffers from the perfect trifecta of problems. She exhibits behavior that comes across as controlling, manipulative, and unwilling to compromise, even though she projects that last one onto me. Although she claimed that she cared about me and wanted me to be the man and leader and promised to sustain me, when the time came to prove it, she showed only a willingness to ensnare me in her strings like that Russian marionette did to Pinocchio. Rather than choosing an independent man and emancipating herself to match him like in the song, she followed the actions of the cartoon character and attempted to wrap her strings around me.

The comparison could not have been more apt to the story of Pinocchio. I was the one who was emancipated and free. I have my own house, two cars, a full time career, and money in the bank. She has a car, rents, is going to school, and has a penchant for shoe purchasing which is apparently her idea of an investment portfolio. I am the one in our relationship who acknowledges the role of his Maker more, and she is from a former soviet republic. Although she promised to cut her strings for me, rather than cut anything, she tried to spin me around and turn me about until I was wrapped up in her strings and became absorbed into her story.

People like to manipulate other people with ultimatums. What I understand when they do that is that their love or concern for us is conditional, dependent on whether we acquiesce to their every request. Ultimatums are rarely, if ever, given out of love. They are used normally to manipulate emotions and get people to voluntarily string themselves up so that they can be played like marionettes to the tune of the puppeteer. Unfortunately, I have seen many people successfully ply this art and steal people out of my life. One person for whom I cared deeply was told that if she followed me, her mother would kill herself. What do you expect someone to do under that kind of duress? I try very hard not to use these ultimatums, not to reduce myself to the reducto ad absurdium argument that claims that if you aren't a doormat to my will then you don't love me at all. Whenever I can, I absolutely love absolutely.

Far too often, people will Pinocchio each other in relationships. Either they are so desperate for companionship that they will settle for abuse, containment, and some sort of submission in order to be with someone or they are trying to exercise hegemony over someone else. I suppose they both really stem from insecurities and selfishness. We have this asinine desire as humans to feel like we're in control. Ultimately however you can't make anyone do anything. Ultimately even if you enslave them to your will what you find is a cursed life, a half life, full of semblance without substance, one that cannot satisfy. If this woman really likes me, I want her to decide she does and come with me of her own free will and choice. I do not desire a stockholm syndrome love story. If I am choice, then choose me.

Pinocchio taught us about what Samuel Adams referred to as the "animating contest of freedom". He shows us that sometimes we make mistakes. He showed us that ultimately the only way to return to our Maker and become real men is to keep ourselves free from the strings of false love, false friends, and false satisfactions. He resisted efforts by people and powers around him to put him back into the strings of sin that hold men down and hold men back, and when he found himself partly ensnared he allowed a Greater Power to free him. It was very hard for me to resist the ovations and the temptation because I have been lonely for so long. I liked being told that I was hot, that I was perfect, that I was worthy of love, but I will not trade the freedom my Maker gave me just to have someone tell me things I want to hear. Do not let yourself be Pinocchioed. I will not ask you to string yourself up in order to be with you. Do not let others do that to you. There are no strings on me.

Defining the Relationship With the Department

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I spoke with my father last weekend about my position and prospects at the college, because I was afraid I had shot myself in the foot. Several weeks back, the provost asked me to teach an advanced chemistry course in lieu of another lower level class. Flattered though I was, I opted against it, because I wasn’t sure that was a good move for me. I’m not sure if they intend to make me part of their organization long term or use me as a door mat. Fortunately for me, like every other job I have ever had so far, they need me more than I need them, so I’m in a good position.

When they first hired me on a provisional basis, I accepted everything eagerly and quickly. I had hope that in doing so they would see me as an asset and decide to make my position with them more permanent and secure. My first spring semester, I gave up every Saturday to teach a microbiology class. I accepted changes last minute to my schedule on multiple occasions, even when students had eagerly enrolled in order to have me as their teacher. I took on as many credits to teach as they let students take one term, and it almost burned me out completely, but I wanted to know my limits and volunteered to help them. My first summer, I was rejected on an application for a permanent professional position for which the Chair had insisted I apply in favor of the incumbent.  Yet, they keep talking about how they’re “working on it” when I ask about making my spot permanent.

While filling out my contract for fall, the chemistry coordinator popped in to ask me if I could take on an additional two courses. I know they see this as a win-win scenario, but it’s mostly a win for them. However popular I am with students, I don’t get any extra money for doing more than my “fair share”. In fact, they cannot pay less than I earn. I got a raise in 2014 because they raised the minimum pay, not because I am a valued member of the team. When I realized that teaching this higher level course would require lots more work with no increase in pay, I decided against it and asked to keep my load. They were surprised.

Hopefully, this is a wake up call for them rather than a misstep for me. If they intend to make me a long term asset in their organization, now is the time to show: accommodate me and make me part of the regular pay paradigm instead of paying me on a per course basis in which I earn the same per class regardless of how many students or the course complexity. In the past three years, I have taught seven unique course numbers requiring new prep and lectures and tests, and since I rewrite all my tests and quizzes, it’s more work than using a test bank. I also don’t use scantrons, so I have to read everything, and I don’t have a TA to help me grade. Oh, they also asked me this summer for copies of the unique laboratory exercises I wrote and use. I told them that they could buy them from me like they buy labs from other people. Since I’m not technically a full time employee of the institution, they do not have rights to my intellectual property.

Unfortunately, most organizations do not really look at things with the proper long term perspective. They look at what helps them in the moment rather than what helps the organization achieve its mission. So, what they also don’t know yet is that I don’t intend to teach next summer at all. I don’t get any extra money above the per class rate, and I hate having to squeeze my vacation into the three weeks bracketing summer in order to not miss out on any vacation at all. I don’t live to work. If they are looking to add someone else to their family besides myself, it’s probably time they started searching for that individual instead.

If this goes towards the unfortunate conclusion in which my association with them ends, it will be a loss for everyone. The nice thing is that I am the one who loses the least. I don’t need the money. I do this because it fills my days with productive endeavors for which I get paid. They will be robbed of a good instructor, and the students who come after will have a different exposure and appreciation. Someone in the office told me recently, “Finding instructors is easier than finding highly qualified ones” and yet they are not interested apparently in making me a permanent member of the team. Where do they see this going? Why do they keep me? What do they hope to accomplish by hiring me on a provisional basis? The two classes that the Coordinator wants staffed came open because another person took a full time permanent station elsewhere. The writing is on the wall. I teach because I enjoy it and because it's sufficiently rewarding to allow me to do everything I like to do that lies in my power. If they like my work, they should lock it down before it flies away somewhere else or before I simply decide I would rather exercise, go out, or do something other than teach at times they find difficult to staff.

College and Earnings

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People like to equate college success with earning potential. The truth is somewhat more complicated than that. For weeks, I have listened to advertisements from Nevada schools claiming that you can earn more with a degree than without one, and while that’s possible, it’s not guaranteed. Although there are things for which a college education is requisite, it is not necessarily true that a college degree means that you will earn more money or that it will help you be more successful in life. What a college degree mostly does is give you options.

Many of the most successful never finished college. Both the founders of Facebook and Twitter dropped out of college, but they rank among the richest people in the nation. We still haven’t seen the president’s transcripts, yet he’s the most powerful man in America. At least one Nevada Congressman dropped out of college and lives an opulent lifestyle. Plus, I don’t know if Steve Wynn or Donald Trump have degrees. They certainly aren’t needed for their particular endeavors. I have a friend from HS who drives a dump truck for a NV gold mine who earns over $80K per year. I met the mechanic for the mine, and he earns six figures. Plumbers, electricians, and a whole slieu of trades have apprenticeships in lieu of college, and many of them earn more today than I ever will in education.

Many jobs require college education but not a degree. The JUMP START program offered through NSHE prepares people to work for the government contractors in Nevada. It doesn’t require you to complete a degree, although you get more money automatically if you do graduate. The program trains you in specific courses for the job (sort of like ITT Tech but cheaper), and then it turns you loose to work. Other jobs require skills or math or other things without a full degree. In fact, that’s why community college programs were originally created, to provide initial job placement training for people who didn’t require an actual degree. The US military considers it qualifying for any officer applicant to have a degree even if the degree is unrelated to the MOS. They see that as a qualification for officer candidacy and use it to train the officers for their own needs after college graduation.

Some jobs require a specific degree as training. Classically speaking, many prominent jobs require certain educational programs. Doctors, lawyers, and other professionals frequently gain their licenses only after they complete a collegiate program that arrives thereat. However, contrary to popular belief, law enforcement does not require a degree at all, and I know from personal experience that they do not think that an advanced Biochemistry degree is helpful if you don’t ride along or take some classes in criminal justice. You can’t become an accountant or nurse or an engineer usually without a degree in those areas, but many jobs do not require a bachelor’s degree.

Pay is not commensurate with your diploma. I have coworkers who earn more than I do because they have worked for the state longer than I have, regardless of their qualifications or contributions. The president of the university earns more in base pay than the president of the united states. However, he makes far less than the CEO of GE or Facebook, the latter of whom is a college drop out. While you may find yourself locked into lower pay without an advanced degree or in a lower rank, it does not necessarily follow that just because you have a higher degree you must earn more or will earn more.

A college degree is not a golden ticket to wealth and success. It is a passport out of obscurity and poverty for people who are not entrepreneurs or part of the GOBNet. In fact, most of the highest paid jobs are from associations rather than qualifications, as people surround themselves with cronies rather than the most qualified individuals. What college degrees do is give you options. If you have one, they cannot take it away, even if you decide to do something other than accounting or nursing when you graduate. I know a woman whose husband earns $250K working in the oil fields of North Dakota who barely finished high school. Pay can be linked to your education, but only in jobs that equate pay with education. In other jobs, your pay is frequently linked to other things. You are either paid because you are a boot licking toady or because you create so much value that they reward you with more pay (bonuses) for a job well done.

My Students Keep Me Going

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With summer term at an end and grades due by noon tomorrow, a sudden realization washes over me. The last few nights, I have arrived at my domicile several hours in advance of my normal arrival time since I no longer have class at night to attend. Within an hour of arriving, I fall asleep for several hours. For the past two months, I noticed I was very tired all day long, but now that I do not have to be awake until 9PM to lecture or monitor in lab, my body is allowing itself to crash once I arrive in a safe place even though it's not yet bedtime.

People go into education for many reasons, some of which are only tangentially related to education. Many of the professors I know teach because they must rather than because they enjoy it, whether for the paycheck or lab space or because it shows up in their contracts. In fact, most of my colleagues have been leaving early or working strange hours lately doing whatever they like such that the planetarium coordinator commented to me Monday that she sees me more than the people who have office space close to her. I am here because this is what I enjoy.

Apparently it keeps me going. Having students gives me purpose. While most of them appear suddenly out of the ether in my classroom and disapparate fifteen weeks later just as hurriedly never to appear again, they are the thing for which I live. Like the hero of my youth, Mr. Holland, they are my opus. They are my life's work. I do not see what they make of what I teach them, and maybe they forget the lessons or where they learned them, but my mark on the world is in what they choose to do with theirs. Unlike Mr. Holland, I don't have a son. They are my legacy.

Now that I don't have them, at least for the break between terms, I find that I don't last very long after I arrive home from work. Thursday, Friday, Monday, and this evening, I have crashed shortly after finishing up the errands and feeding myself only to wake just before bedtime as I have today. I don't have energy for anything else. All that I have was transferred into daily efforts to inculcate something of value in them. I am losing my life as it were for them.

In some ways this could be a blessing. Knowing myself as I do, if I were awake, I would probably eat or worry about things I can't control or try to find a logical solution to things that are irrational. Rather than do that, my body has allowed my brain to rest instead. I don't need the entire summer as a break, but I have been teaching without interruptions of more than two weeks or so for years. Consequently, I should probably take next summer off, not only to prevent myself from a burnout but also to rest myself for what may come. That's too long of a span for me to use the time wisely, and so I have not opted to do so yet, but I didn't take a summer trip this year to any place, and now the window has passed. At least in class I'm not alone.

As long as I have students, I have something that keeps me going. Some of them can attest to having seen me when I am at my limit, because by the time we get out at night I've been working for 12 hours. Knowing they needed me and desiring to do the best I could with what I have at all times, I set myself to the wheel and pushed forward to the goals. It gave me a reason to care. It gave me a reason to act. Now that I don't have that, when the urgent and important has been achieved, my body has decided it is just going to crash. May God grant that I will always be able to find purpose even in that day when I no longer have students.

Oatman Effect

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My buddy and I constantly invite people to come with us. Most of them, despite sometimes giving us their numbers or taking ours, either never contact us or find some excuse every time to not come along. We gather these potential referrals wherever we are- from the mountain itself to the gym or restaurants and even while shopping at Albertsons. The most recent invitation my buddy made, after he was finished, I asked him what the odds were that the Oatman Effect would apply. He guffawed loudly and then rated it at 90%.

Oatman, Arizona, is a living ghost town not far from where I live. The Oatman Effect refers to the continually refreshed offer our common but late friend made to me that we'd go there one day. She implied this would be soon, that it would be fun, and that it would be delayed until we could all go together. I learned a few months before her death that she had in fact already made the trip with everyone else to whom the promise had been made except for me. Although I would have probably confronted her with the notion at some point, I never made mention of it, and I make mention of it here only as reference to an inside joke and not to disparage her memory. For all of Tracie's problems, she was the only woman I have ever known who stayed in my life when she promised to do so. She's only gone because God called her home.

Other people give me the Oatman Promise. I remember showing up to a woman's front door one morning and texting her when she didn't answer saying that I was leaving in 15 minutes with or without her for some road trip. She never did contact me that day. One woman I dated promised to take me to "the tunnels". Shortly after she dumped me, she posted pictures to facebook in which she had taken others there instead. Tracie promised to take me to Oatman and to clear some items from my house by April. When I asked her, "Of what year?" she just laughed. Then, another woman said, "One day I'll come along with you on one of your adventures. I promise." Just this summer two other women, knowing my history and promising to not be like the others promised that they wouldn't vanish from my life. Their silence is deafening.

So far everyone who has told me that they are "not like other people" has turned out to be exactly like them. When you are truly different, other people will say that about you. People want to think the best of themselves and paint others in charicatures. Well, I will be humble for I know my weaknesses, but I try very hard to deliver on my promises when I can. Basically what I have learned from the Oatman Effect is that people misrepresent themselves. I don't know which part is the misrepresentation, but it means that I make decisions based on bad information. That's what makes it rough on me.

As the latter days loom large over us and the love of men waxes cold, people make more and more promises that they are either unwilling or unable to keep. Please do not continually make promises and representations to people that you might not keep. I have become very cynical and untrusting of people because they continually represent things that they then retract. I never made it to Oatman, and Tracie never made it to my house to take her belongings, and now I have a closet full of things that remind me of someone dear to me that I lost. I feel very much like the Dread Pirate Roberts felt about Inigro Montoya, except that instead of mistrusting Spaniards I mistrust women. I've watched their nonverbal cues while the words came from their lips and read transcripts of their promises and still I go home alone.

The Oatman Effect affected me in powerful ways. I don't know what information is good and what information is bad. I started doubting my choices and second guessing my life. When I pray, I ask God to forgive me when I mishear Him or when I think I've heard Him but I'm following some other prompt. I don't know any more who leads me and who the people are who lead me on, and so the practical effect of Oatman is that I hold everyone at a distance and trust nobody. I just don't know anymore who really means what they say and who is talking in order to gain some advantage. Oatman is a defense mechanism.

Accidentally Fashionable

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Like most scientists, I don't dress all that impressively. While my sister proved indispensable in selecting new shirts to wear to class each year, by and large I don't do all that much to get gussied up for anything. For the first six lectures, I wear a full suit to class, and then I gradually roll my clothing back until its more business casual, but I do not expect to wow anyone with what I wear. In fact, I've only been fashionable twice in my whole life, and that was because fashion turned to be what I already did.

My first year of college, it became trendy to wear undershirts with everything. Having recently adopted this fashion in conjunction with my religious beliefs, other people pointed out that it looked cool, and then people all over campus regardless of their Faith started wearing undershirts and collared shirts everywhere. By the time I graduated, this look became passe, and people started criticizing me for keeping up with it. I didn't adopt it. You did. I was doing it out of comfort and convenience, and that's why I still dress that way.

This week one of my students asked me how long I've had my beard. Pictures in the upstairs hallway of my parents' house attest to the fact that I've had this for at least eight years now. Apparently, it has become vogue again for men to have facial hair, and the younger among us have taken to this in droves. Although I didn't notice previously, there are people who didn't have them when I moved to Vegas who now do, including some relatives who live here, and so it is quite possible that I inspired them to follow my lead. I have never considered myself fashionable, but apparently I'm bringing bearded back. Even at BYU where it was once passe to have one, it seems everyone and their brother has facial hair now, and if not causative, my visits there at least coincide with the emergence of that trend.

I am me. I dress as I like and do what I like because I have to live with it. You don't have to look at me every day or spend any time with me, and since so many people I met wanted to change me for their own comfort only to vanish from my life, I miss the part where that's in my interests. Be you. Do what you do. As long as it's legal, ethical and moral, then what is the big deal? The beard is not the man. I originally started wearing one because my face was cold and it was free insulation. I certainly didn't do it to be trendy.