It's not super bad news. I mean, the reviewers didn't say, you suck, go back to SE Portland where you belong... loser. It's all fixable. Probably. Yes, sure, what am I saying, sure it's fixable. There's no way the story ends here.
Today, speaking of stories ending, no speaking of unfixable things, I got a terse message from the president of the career college that employed me until May 2 when they laid me off along with a number of other faculty with the closing of the Clackamas campus. I had placed a call to the president last week, or tried to—no one seemed to be able to locate him or even transfer me to a voice mail. I'd planned to ask him if he would let me interview some of the faculty that teach at the college.After I didn't hear from him, I pursued another sampling strategy to find faculty members to interview. Leading to the submission that just got rejected today.
And then he called. His voice sounded hesitant, just ever-so-slightly belligerent as he left his cell phone number. He probably thought I was calling to berate him for his crimes of mismanagement. I know Sheryl, now forced to job hunt at age 66, has a few choice things to say.
I called him back a few hours after I got his message. He answered his cell.
“Hi, this is Carol.”
“Hello, Carol, how are you,” he replied in a flat voice.
I launched into my brief explanation for why I had tried to reach him last week and trailed off when I got no response. He was silent. There was nothing, not a sound, not even a sigh.
“So, as it turns out, it looks like I won't be needing to interview your faculty after all. Thanks,” I finished lamely and waited for something, anything, a sign that he was still the person I used to know and like.
“Ok. Good luck,” he said in a dead voice.
I don't know if I caught him at a bad time, or I just happened to catch him at a moment when he felt like hanging himself. Not my problem, not my concern. I didn't linger, I didn't try to chat, I just wished him well and let him go. Later I sent an email thanking him for returning my call and offering him some empathy for the hard times, as honestly and authentically as I could... (considering the dude let us all down and now I'm unemployed. No, I didn't say that.)
A half hour later I got a very nice reply, in which thanked me for my kind words. And he said if I need to interview faculty at the college, to let him know. Wha—? I know, like, now you tell me!? Where were you last week!? Because you went AWOL, Mr. Invisible, I am now having to rewrite my IRB application with a sampling method pulled pretty much from far left field (think social media! I know! The anathema of academe!) Lots of eye-rolling going on here in the Love Shack tonight.
The episode is just one more hurdle in this long journey to earn a doctoral degree I'm fairly sure I don't actually want all that much anymore. Do I sound ambivalent? Well, hell in a hand-basket. As usual. It's just a special kind of hell, another level of hell... I call it Dissertation Hell. You'd think after eight years I'd be used to it by now.
