Several years ago, I was in the Dean’s office. One of my responsibilities was to coordinate nominations for the commencement ceremony Grand Marshal each spring. The generic guidance from the University commencement committee was to start the deliberations with a list of faculty by seniority. Of course, the Dean of the College had the freedom to nominate anyone.

In any event, I found the seniority list from 2015. I was near the bottom of the first page (#22 for those keeping track). It’s four years later, and I’m just outside the top ten (tied for #12). Another couple of folks above my name on the list are retiring imminently.

Why does this matter? It probably doesn’t. I guess the only concern was a quick series of conversations I had yesterday. One was in relation to my alphabetic location in the Dean’s Office mailroom (the names get re-sorted around this time of year; some new folks added and some retirees and “greener pastures” folks removed). The other conversation was about some office restructuring related to a staff member’s retirement and some space and priority reconfiguration.

Long story short: My hair is grayer, but I still feel like a young person at heart.

Why this concern today? Who knows? Maybe it’s Switzerland’s birthday.

Comments?