I am worth more than this

Knight, knight, knight
on a white horse
fixing everything
but me
but himself

I am worth more than this

Not a substitute
Not a replacement
Not a role
Not something to occupy
the place of someone or something else

I am worth more than this

I am not a dish rag
to be put aside
when something more
interesting, shiny
comes along

I am worth more than this

I don't know if I am who you think I am
I want to be for you no longer
and I want you to know my value to you

[I wrote this in 2015.]

A testimonial for YNAB

I don't think I've ever done anything like this before: a testimonial, a.k.a., free advertising for a company, YNAB (You Need A Budget). I've been using YNAB for my personal finances for a few years and because of the control that YNAB gives me over my finances, I was able to get out of credit card debt many months ahead of schedule. The software is intuitive, logical, and easy to use, and they provide tutorials that are actually smartly designed and run.

If you click on this link and start using YNAB, we'll each get a month's subscription for free.

That's it. Feel free to comment, especially if you give YNAB a try.

I am a professor and a human being.

I am a professor and a human being.

I am not my email address, I am not D2L, and I am not my cell phone. I am not instant messaging.

I am not hardware or software, and I am not a machine, always “on” and ready to reply. I will not let the devices of today dictate my behavior.

I am a human being.

I make time for students and work. I give thoughtful consideration to a student’s concern in a timely manner which means, when the time is right. I give thoughtful consideration to the work that crosses my desk.

I give thoughtful consideration to ideas. Ideas, questions, and rational thinking are worth my time. I make time for ideas. I read and think about them. I write and think about them. I revise and think about them. I discuss and think about them.

Make it a hybrid

I just switched one of my spring classes from a regular lecture course to a hybrid that will meet every other week in the classroom and online. Why? In the futile hopes that hybrid will attract more students, because history courses are interchangeable from a certain point of view. 

Solitude

Roles in life

complete with scripts

Be a man

Be a woman

Follow the script

Imagine understanding

Imagine connection

when the script of another

resembles one's own

The script reinforces

connections

Connections reinforce

the scripts

A few accept solitude

A few ask why

and disrupt the circle

and cause discomfort

Does the past have a hold on the present?

Plenary Session Hall (Jednací sál) in Valdštejnský palác.

    Yesterday Czechs, and many others, celebrated the seventieth anniversary of the end of the Second World War. Flags appeared everywhere, sticking out of cars’ windows, stuck on the front of trams, which is reminiscent of a college football gameday in the U.S., and which, come to think of it, may in fact more accurately reflect the flags’ purpose since the World Hockey Championship is happening in Prague.

     Some buildings, normally closed to the public, were opened in honor of the holiday. One such building was Valdštejn palace, where the Senate meets and works. I wish that visiting the palace in this way could have been part of my class’s global experience, because I would have liked to hear their thoughts on what kind of impact the history of the location might have on the workings of modern politics. For example, do senators look up at the Main Hall’s ceiling mural of Valdštejn as Mars, in true seventeenth-century metaphor, and think they are countering or fulfilling that vision? Or does the fact that the Plenary Session Hall (Jednací sál) was originally a horse stable allow for more humble thoughts of their work?

Main Hall ceiling mural of Valdštejnský palác