End of an Era

Spring semester: day eighty-two
Finals week: day four

It's over. It's all over.

Last night, around 10PM, I put my office keys in an envelope with my forwarding address in Omaha, stuck them in the administrator's box, put my graded exams and filled tally sheets in my friend Amanda's box for her to grade/fill in and drop off, and gathered all of my possessions into a paper ream box. I took my stuff downstairs, through the empty building, smoked a final cigarette on the back landing, and then carried the box a good half-mile out to my car, leaving campus to more than likely never return again.

It's a strange, sad feeling, really. I don't know how to describe it. I feel really...well...empty. For the past five semester years, my life has been defined by academia, both as a graduate student for three years of that and as a professor ever since. I lived my life according to school schedules, according to work for the school that had to be done in its proper times and proper places. As I sat in the front of my 011 classroom for the last time last night, watching them take their final exam, I realized that it would certainly be the last time I ever held sway over a class on that campus, if not for the rest of my life.

That university has meant a lot to me over the years -- it has acted as an insular bubble at times, yes, but it also gave me direction in life. When I first started there as a graduate student, it was a means to an end more than anything else. I was working for the local newspaper up until that point, doing a job that I loved, yes, and a job that I wanted, but a job that would not last forever (it didn't; the paper's staff was overhauled and all laid off, basically, less than a year after I left). Grad school, and the university in general, gave me a purpose in life. It let me focus my energies towards something positive. It showed me that yes, my life had meaning, and yes, I could make a difference in the world -- even if that difference was a small one. This feeling amplified after graduation and after my return as an actual professor (though the lowest-ranked, lowest-paid one on the proverbial totem pole).

And now, a short year later, it's all over. All over at least here, anyway, in person. I still have to upload final grades for one of my classes (the aforementioned 011 class I gave the exam to last night) but everything else is done. I know that I saw many people in the department for quite possibly the last time ever yesterday, and there are many more I'll never see in person again. I may never teach another class again anywhere. I may never have a student call me "professor" ever again. If being a professor made me rise above the rank and file of normal people and students, I have now been knocked down to a simple rank-and-file citizen again. In saying that I mean that many people, especially those not in academia, look up to professors; it's a class similar to police officer or someone who has done military service -- there's an immediate level of respect given because it's something not everyone does or can do, and so as I leave that profession behind me for the time being, I just feel...normal again. Saying "well, I used to be a professor" when asked what I do for a living compared to "I'm an English professor at [University]" sounds different, it feels different. It doesn't command the same level of respect.

At the end of every semester -- especially at the end of spring semesters, when there's always a three-month gap, I feel listless and lost. I tend to get depressed when all of my responsibility and power just, well, goes away. It's a cycle, really. When you get used to giving something your all day in, day out for many months (or years) on end, only to have it stop suddenly, it's like a metaphorical punch to the gut. I got really depressed for a long time last summer because I'd just graduated, I couldn't get anyone to hire me, and my academic life at the time was completely over -- I didn't know then if I'd ever teach again, either. Adjuncting at the university for this past year was a safety net that I didn't know, at the time, would hold if I was forced to fall into it.

Taking stock of everything, not much is different now than it was a year ago at this time. A year ago I was graduating with no job lined up for me, crossing my fingers that my car would just hold up until the end of the semester (I'm still crossing my fingers for my car to keep running now), and I was applying for jobs everywhere hoping that I'd get that magical call and would be able to uproot myself and begin teaching somewhere else, even somewhere completely different where I'd never lived before. I even packed probably fifteen boxes or so of things in preparation for such a move -- they've remained packed in the spare room with all of the ones I've filled since, of course. Last year at this time I was so poor I could barely afford to eat a lot of the time, and I ended up dropping a good amount of weight over the summer. This year I'm not too poor to eat, I just don't really have anything in the house because anything I buy and don't finish obviously has to come with me to Omaha in the move, and that's a pain in the ass.

In retrospect, I should've uprooted myself last summer and moved to Omaha then. I could've been living with Daisy for all this time and I could've been making more money, more than likely. But I wouldn't have been teaching. It was when I had this thought that I realized I stayed here and kept myself in poverty here because teaching meant so much to me. It's not about the money (which, really, is slave wages) but it was about comfort and doing something I wanted to do, instead of something I had to do.

Well, part of it was about lack of money, I suppose. I didn't have the money then (and barely have it now) to go anywhere or do anything else. Someplace else could've hired me, yes, but after a certain point of the summer I would've had to say "yes, I would love to work for your university, but I have $100 to my name right now and unless you're willing to pay for moving costs and can secure me a new home in your city as part of the deal..." etc.

So, for the moment, my profession ends. I have one more paycheck coming, and after that, I am officially unemployed again. That paycheck will come next Friday, after I've already moved to Omaha. It'll be the last income I receive until I get a new job, not counting whatever money we get for the wedding (which I don't expect to be a lot).

The countdown is on now, by the way; today is Wednesday. By Saturday night, when I'll drive up to Omaha to drop off the Monte Carlo, I'll need to have the majority of my stuff ready to go and ready to be loaded into the truck. That means I'll be moving furniture, cleaning it off with various cleaners (like Pledge) and will be packing boxes full of absolutely everything that will be non-essential between now and next week. I'll be washing things, hosing things down, throwing away everything I can that I don't need, and will generally be busting my ass for the next three days straight. Monday is truck day and cleaning day, after all.  All of my attention and efforts are focused on those things, with no room or time for much else. Add to this that I'm really cold today -- it's barely 70 outside, but it's so much cooler in the house and I've had goosebumps/a chill all day, so doing stuff outdoors involving hosing things down isn't exactly something I'm a fan of right now.