Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1998 09:34:49 -0400 (EDT)
Random Thought: "Oh, I Can't Do That!"

It's 5:30 a.m. Just back from doing a six mile stint on the streets. The sun still hasn't shown itself. Steam from my body is making a curious mixture with the steam of the freshly brewed coffee sitting at my side. It's brutal out there. I opened the door of the den an hour ago to hit the streets and only to be hit by a clammy from south Georgia's 4-H Club: hot, humid, heavy, hazy. Temperature is 84 degrees F; heat index of 94 degrees F; air so thick and heavy the mosquitoes have to row through it. I wasn't a few blocks into my walk when the water started pouring down my body faster than the waterfall in my koi fishpond. Stalactites of salt started to form on my eyebrows and nose. I soon found myself muttering, "I was too quick." Last week I had snickered to a friend that the Dogs of August must have bayed so loud and long in June and July that they were too tired to do more than whimper this month. This morning, however, with deafening howls, they bounded out of their doldrums with a revenge to have one last fling.
Yet, as I slogged along in my own personal puddles that had formed in my shoes, it wasn't the oppressive temperature and humidity that was on my mind. I was thinking about an oppression that cast a chilling, dark cloud over too many of our campuses. Having been off campus all summer, I had forgotten about it's exitence. But, got slammed in the face by it as soon as I hit campus:

"Didn't see you at the meeting," a colleague smirked. "You missed the donuts."
"I wasn't in town," I answered with a sarcastic smile. "Besides I was still getting in shape. Did you go?"
"Yeah. I rushed back from the mountains. I didn't dare miss it even though I knew it would be boring as tears. And it was. You didn't miss a thing. It was a two hour waste of time. Wasn't worth the trip back to miss a weekend."
"So, why not go?"
"Oh, I can't do that. I don't have tenure!"
"I don't have tenure." There's an enslaving attitude as you'll ever hear on any campus.
That depleting sentence reverberates in our soul, rings in our ears, beats in our hearts. We feel its pressure as we perform in class, sit at our desks, attend meetings, pour over some research, hear the budget cutters, seek committee asignments, listen to the politicians, whisper in small private conversations, look out the windows, peer over our shoulders, watch the recruited adjuncts--staff they're called in the schedules--some of whom are almost literally dragged off the streets--and out of high school rooms--to provide a body at the head of a class and are being paid budget-saving, sweat-shop wages.
We walk the halls of ivy with a delicate step as if we were in a lifeboat at sea and were afraid of rocking the proverbial boat and capsizing our career.
There is a nervousness in our eyes, an insecurity in our step that scream out to those who would see and hear: "Who's there?" "Did you see that?" "What was that?" "Did you hear something?"
We silently ask, as if we were students dependent on the professors judgement for a grade, "What do you want?" "What should I do?"
We silently excuse our silence with a "What good would it do?" "No would listen?"
We silently explain away our inactivity, as a friend on another campus recently told me, with a "It's not all that important anyway. I've got better things to do with my time."
With a resigned "What's the use, nothing is going to change" we silently sit rather than take a stand.
With a frightened, as times unspoken as if we don't want to hear the words, "I could lose my position," we stand on the sidelines watching the game rather than getting into the game saying, "It's all a game anyway."
With argue in our defense, "It's more complicated than that;" or "that's impractical;" or "you're an idealist."
Saying that we need to have a job or have mouths to feed, with a frightening crunching of our hats in hand, we merely offer a groveling "yes, sir" and work hard to perfect our talents in the artful sport of hoop jumping.
We don't like to think of it as oppression. We use more accommodating buzzwords and phrases like "that's life," "be practical", "get real." Call it what you will, seeing as a sword hanging ominously over our heads, a potential weapon to penalize, a whip, a billyclub is an oppresion that reflects a lack of mutual trust, lack of mutual communication, lack of respect, lack of collegiality, personal insecurity. Whatever the cause, understand that a fear for tenure that constricts our minds and souls and heart like a ravenous python squeezing out the vitality of our spirit and the dynamism of our life forces reduces us from colleagues to a crushed pulp of employees merely carrying out the orders of the boss.
Am I exaggerating? Perhaps. Is it more complicated than that? I don't think so, but lot of us would disagree. Nevertheless, it is something to think about when we look in the mirror next time. And, understand that:

If there is fear, there is no imagination;

If there is fear, there is no creativity;

If there is fear, there is no risk;

If there is fear, there is no daring;

If there is fear, there is no experimentation;

If there is fear, there is no dream;

If there is fear, there is no sacrifice;

If there is fear, there is no questioning;

If there is fear, there is no courage;

If there is fear, there is no honesty;

If there is fear, there is no looking forwards;

If there is fear, there is no freedom and independence;

If there is fear, there is no voice;

If there is fear, there is no action;

If there is fear, there is no individuality;

If there is fear, there is no real happiness, no real comfort,

If there is fear, there is no excitement, no vitality;

If there is fear, there is no reaching our full potential;

If there is fear, there is weakening;

If there is fear, there is silence;

If there is fear, there is surrender;

If there is fear, there is cowering;

If there is fear, there is only an echo;

If there is fear, there is only acquiesence;

If there is fear, there is playing it safe, being conventional;

If there is fear, there is going along to get along;

If there is fear, there is a bondage;

If there is fear, there really isn't very much going on except going through the motions.