rachel’s blog

When I walked into my office at 8:00 this morning, I found an unusual gift on my desk.

Clever, eh? It’s from my boss. I’ve been working on a big project and there is a major deadline tomorrow, so the past couple weeks have been pretty intense. The good news? There IS a light at the end of the tunnel.

The bad news? It’s off.

Vernon is a long-time professor who is trying to retire. He has a brilliant but terribly dry sense of humor. Dave is my boss who has known Vernon longer than I’ve been alive. Following are the opening lines of a conversation I had with Vernon this afternoon when he stopped by our office…

Vernon: I have a simple question.
Me: I’ll try to have a simple answer.
Vernon: You might need to check with Dave about this. He does simple things.

“Is it as riveting as I imagine it would be?”

Adam’s question arrived via email, poking good-natured fun at my field of professional quasi-expertise. Grades and GPAs may not make for stimulating dinnertime conversation, but the Registrar’s Office isn’t as dull as one might think.

The students, on the other hand…

This afternoon I answered a call on the main phone line at work while our receptionist was out of the office. The caller told me that she had recently requested that we send a copy of her official transcript to her in a sealed envelope. (It is standard practice in higher education to send an official transcript in a sealed envelope with a signature or stamp across the sealed flap. I rarely process transcripts, but I do know that accommodating her request wouldn’t have required anything unusual.)

The woman informed me that when the transcript arrived, it was not in a sealed envelope as she had requested. (Really?) She went on to say that the outer envelope had been sealed, but when she opened it up, she found that the transcript hadn’t been placed in a sealed envelope.

Um, lady? You know that envelope you opened? The one with the Registrar’s signature stamped across the flap in blue ink? The one with the words “Official Transcript Enclosed” printed on the front? The one with your transcript inside? That WAS the sealed envelope you requested…

Here’s your sign.

Today my co-workers and I all went out for lunch to celebrate my boss’s birthday. (When I say “all,” I really just mean five people. And our work-study student was one of those.) It has been determined that our beloved registrar needs a new Facebook profile picture, so I took my camera along, thinking I could snap a good picture of him eating a chimichanga or something. Unfortunately, I forgot all about the camera until the end of the meal… and who wants to have their picture taken with a dirty plate? So his original profile picture remains.

Yep, that’s pretty much what my boss looks like. (Kudos to Jess, the artist.) Actually, he’s not quite so slender in real life, but… well, few people are. If you look closely, you can see how happy he is that someone is finally graduating.

During the three years I’ve worked with him, I’ve been gradually perfecting the art of interpreting the messages he leaves for me on post-it notes. It’s not that his handwriting is illegible — it’s just that his notes are sometime rather cryptic. When I first started working there, he would leave simple messages such as:

SMAT

Some of you have probably seen this before and know what it means. It’s an acronym for See Me About This. That one is pretty easy. But I’ve been honing my skills and have now advanced to more complex sequences of letters. The other day he wrote this message on a post-it note for me:

IHSILTAYHW…

We were both in his office when I saw it, so I tried decoding it out loud. “I Have… Something… I… I‘d Like To… Ask You… Your Help With!”

I’d like to take full credit for my amazing ability to decipher the true meaning of this acronym, but I can’t. I think a big part of the reason I was able to figure this one out so quickly is that I’ve heard those words before. More than once, in fact…

If the title of this blog entry leads you to think that I hate my job and plan to quit, you’re wrong. If you’re my boss and you’re reading this (and I know you occasionally do!), you can breathe a sigh of relief.

If you actually understood my blog title, well, that’s just kind of pathetic. My average blog readers shouldn’t… wait, what am I saying? My blog readers aren’t average. Y’all are the Lake Wobegon type — ABOVE average!! Nevertheless, I’m really not expecting you to know what SCHEV is. It’s just not a word that escapes most people’s lips on a regular basis. But today I was a living, breathing, SCHEV Machine.

For the uninitiated, SCHEV is the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia, and I basically spent all day working on a report to submit to them. I’m maybe halfway finished with my part, but I won’t really know ’til I’m done.

Sometimes people will say to me, “So what is it that you actually DO in your job?” I quickly scan through a mental list of possible responses and then say something inane like, “I create a lot of reports.” This, of course, is a ridiculously simplified answer. It’s like a teacher describing his/her job by saying, “I tell people things.”

I usually try to mention a few interesting projects I work on, but do people really want a detailed, full-length discourse on the types of reports I develop, and why they’re so important, and the factors that can make the compilation so complex… and what I do when I’m NOT working on reports? Trust me, you don’t. Unless you know what IPEDS stands for and can calculate a GPA in your sleep (not that I ever DO calculate GPAs manually), you probably just don’t care about the nitty gritty details of my daily work life.

And at 11:56 on a Friday night, neither do I.

This afternoon some colleagues and I spent almost three hours sitting in a meeting. Actually, it was more of a presentation than a meeting, but whatever you want to call it, it involved sitting still for an extended period of time while slowly flipping through our three-ring binders. The presenter is a very likeable and knowledgeable guy, and the project we’re working on is important, but since we had already sat through a four-hour presentation/meeting with him on Wednesday, I’m sure none of us were terribly eager to sit through three more hours today.

Today’s meeting was actually much better than I expected, but the highlight of my afternoon was when the presenter said something that no public speaker should ever say:

“I’m getting to my point sooner than I wanted to.”

Unbelievable.

My calendar tells me that today is a holiday — Labor Day, to be specific. Unlike other people in my neighborhood, who spent the day working in their yards, flying kites (no joke), and enjoying their backyard BBQs, I celebrated Labor Day by laboring. My colleagues and I even kicked off the holiday with a staff meeting at 8:15. (On a Monday? What were we thinking?)

According to the U.S. Department of Labor website, Labor Day is “dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers. It constitutes a yearly national tribute to the contributions workers have made to the strength, prosperity, and well-being of our country.” Never mind what the DOL says. This American worker spent the day working, um, I mean, contributing to the strength, prosperity, and well-being of a certain private institution of higher education that chooses NOT to give their employees the day off.

Of course, I certainly wasn’t the only person in America who labored on Labor Day. There are many, many people who spent the day working hard just so other people could enjoy a day off. And really, I’m not so sure our nation is ready for what it would mean to actually give the “American workers” the day off. Gas stations, restaurants, grocery stores… all closed. Americans would have a fit (to put it mildly) if they were all prohibited from spending money for an entire day.

I find it particularly sad that some of the people who worked today probably didn’t even WANT the day off… because having a day off means a day without pay. This became glaringly obvious to me several years ago when we had a heavy snow/ice storm one night and the organization I worked for decided not to open the next day. While I was outside shoveling, my neighbor came out, and I made a comment about his having the day off too. “Yeah, unfortunately.” Oh, right. If he doesn’t work, he doesn’t get paid.

On behalf of those of us who get paid holidays, a huge heart-felt THANK YOU to those of you who don’t.

Hello Orlando…

Hello palm trees, beautiful flowers, and the heron by the side of the road.

Hello Marriott and your glass elevator that carries me through the roof to my luxurious bed on the 19th floor.

Hello colleagues and our not-so-wise decision to have so many key employees travel on the same flight.

Hello Gaylord Palms with your gorgeous decorations (even in the bathroom stalls!), automatic soap dispensers, and a shuttle bus that carries me from my hotel to the place where Michael Jordan is staying… and where I sit in meetings.

Hello Bahama Breeze and your amazing grilled salmon with mashed cinnamon sweet potatoes.

Oh yeah. And hello 1000-plus other conference attendees. We have a rough life.

College students are often surprised to learn that many offices on campus stay open throughout the summer. When I decided to pick up our receptionist’s ringing phone over lunchtime today, I encountered one of the Many Reasons We Do:

Caller: I’d like to talk to someone who could tell me whether you have a certain major there.

Me: OK, what is the major you’re interested in?

Caller: Public Relations.

Me: I’m sorry, we don’t offer a major in Public Relations.

Caller: [To someone else] They don’t have it.

[To me] Well, do you have something similar?

Me: Hmm… I can’t really think of anything. What kinds of things would you consider to be similar to Public Relations?

Caller: [snippy voice] I don’t know — that’s what I’m asking YOU!

[pause]

Caller: You know, something where you work with people.

Me: [I-can't-believe-that-was-her-answer, I'll-just-echo-thoughtfully voice] Something where you work with people…

Caller: [you-must-be-stupid voice] That’s what Public Relations IS — you work with people.

Me: Right, I’m aware of what PR is, but I just don’t think we have any programs of study that would be comparable.

Caller: You don’t have anything similar??

Me: I don’t think so, but you’re welcome to visit our website and look through the list of majors we DO offer to see if you can find something suitable.

Caller: OK, thanks. Bye.

::

By the end of the conversation, I was secretly glad that we don’t offer a major in public relations… or anything similar.

Yesterday I was minding my own business at work when some students stopped by the office and invited my colleagues and I to go upstairs to a classroom for food and drink. We were a bit confused, so as we started asking questions, we learned that some other students in their class were doing a group project that involved a modern-day interpretation of a Biblical parable.

I asked Ryan if he had been sent out to the “highways and byways” to invite any poor soul he could find. He wasn’t exactly sure WHAT he was doing; after all, it wasn’t HIS group project. He was just following the instructions he had been given.

As we were talking, another young woman from the class called out to me as she approached. She clearly wanted me to go with her, but said that she wasn’t allowed to FORCE me to go. The students told us that we wouldn’t have to stay long, but if we chose not to go, we had to tell them why we declined the invitation.

I suppose the masterminds behind this project were focusing on the “Parable of the Great Banquet” as recorded in Luke 14. Jesus tells the story of a man who had invited a lot of guests to a banquet. When the banquet was ready, the man sent his servant out to call the guests to the banquet, but the invited guests all backed out and started making excuses. One had just bought a plot of land, another recently bought some oxen (where DO you buy those critters anyhow?), and another had just gotten married. The banquet host was angry and directed his servant to go out and invite poor, blind, lame, and otherwise downtrodden people to the banquet.

Walking upstairs to eat chips and brownies for a few minutes can’t be compared to making a commitment to follow Jesus Christ. But although the class project may not have resulted in a perfect interpretation of the parable, I was fascinated by my own response. When Ryan first extended the invitation to us, my immediate thoughts were that I was swamped with work (which was true!) and that I was ready to head to lunch in a few minutes. I didn’t really need or want a snack break.

But something changed when Lindsay approached to join in the recruitment efforts. Even while she was still far off, she called me by name. Suddenly it was a personal invitation. No longer was I just another generic person who could help them reach their recruitment goal; Lindsay wanted ME to come.

I might have gone along with them even if she hadn’t used my name, but that seemingly small detail actually made a very significant impact as I debated whether to join them.

Just as Lindsay called me by name, the Lord calls each one of US by name (Is. 43:1) and asks us to follow Him. A lifetime of obedience to Christ is obviously much more challenging and much more rewarding than taking a few minutes out of my busy schedule to eat a snack with college students before lunch. But if Jesus DID stop by my office tomorrow and issue an invitation, would I be ready and willing to go with Him? Perhaps more importantly, would I even recognize Him?