Spent the drive in thinking about parking on campus. Every quarter start up these days brings the same thing, an explosive emotional barrage of anger and hostility about perceived lack of parking between the hours of 8:00 AM and 1:00 PM Monday through Thursday. Words like "disaster" "unacceptable" and "catastrophe" get tossed around, and all the worst qualities of scarcity thinking models kick in. Yet, critically examined, the problem isn't nearly as bad as it gets cast. A little perspective about what really constitutes hardship in life might help. I would never occur to me to get so exercised about having to walk a few blocks between parking spot and work station. For some, though, this is a primary quality-of-life issue worth a great deal of time and energy. So we will spend yet more time trying to figure out how best to accommodate everyone's preferences with a fixed and scarce resource.
As someone who has spent most of his 17+ years on campus working in off-main-campus buildings, I have also spent most of those years walking the blocks to and from main campus for meetings and events. I have a backpack I slip my laptop and any papers I need into before setting off for meetings, or (increasingly) I go entirely digital and just pack my personal iPad. When it rains I wear a rain coat and a floppy-brimmed hat. When it's hot I use sunscreen. I make the one mile round trip between my office and main campus once or twice most days (and count it toward my exercise goals). It's all good.
Decided to stop for coffee this morning and actually paid for it using my iPhone. It's about time someplace in this country finally allowed cell-phone based payments, like much of the rest of the developed world has had for some time. One less card to carry in my already-minimalist wallet. Good stuff.
The music this morning was also all good, diverse, and with a few short interlude tracks extending the size of the playlist. Bruce Cockburn's Planet Of The Clowns captured my sentiments most closely this morning, given my drive in musings:
Stare into the moonlight
Silver fingers press my eyes
Probing in my heart with longing
These footprints by the sea's edge
Disappearing grain by grain
Lose their form but keep their substance
As the waves roar on the beach like a squadron of F16's
Ebb and flow like the better days they say this world has seen
Government by outrage
Hunger camps and shanty towns
Dignity and love still holding
This bluegreen ball in black space
Filled with beauty even now
battered and abused and lovely
And the waves roar on the beach like a squadron of F16's
Ebb and flow like the better days they say this world has seen
Each one in our own heart
Desperate to know where we stand
Planet of the clowns in wet shoes
The full playlist:
- My Morning Jacket: I'm Amazed
- Johann Bach: Concerto No.6 in B Flat Major BWV 1051: Allegro
- Boston: The Journey
- Bruce Cockburn: Planet Of The Clowns
- Michel Legrand: I Will Wait For You
- Charlie Hunter Quintet: Interlude5
- Posted via iPad
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