The polar vortex has claimed a lot of victims on campus:
trees. The grounds crew is removing a bunch of trees all over campus that
either died or mostly died this winter. Part of this is a project to revamp
cables and steam pipes underground, but when I wrote to ask if any healthy
trees were being removed for this reason, I got this ambiguous answer: “During
the design phase, each tree and bush was evaluated by a 3rd party arborist and
tree removal was avoided where possible. The project also includes new tree
plantings after completion.” Great, I’m glad they are not going to leave the
campus bare of trees, but I’m still unclear about whether any healthy trees are
being removed. It seems like such a shame to remove large, healthy trees and
then replace them with spindly saplings that are easily torn apart by drunken
college students. It’s unnecessary death, in my opinion.
Today I had a monthly meeting headed by our college’s dean.
When I first joined this committee, I was intimidated to be in the room with him, but he is a funny,
self-deprecating guy who instantly puts a person at ease so I quickly got over
that. However, we just found out that he is getting a HUGE promotion to provost
of the university, so today I felt a little shy around him once again. Then sometime
after the meeting was over, I was in the restroom and saw in the mirror that my
scapular was hanging out in the back. It looked fine in the front, which is all
people mostly saw at this meeting, although of course this time there were some
interested observers who sat right behind me. Even if they noticed, how likely
is it that they would have known what a scapular is? And I’m not entirely clear
if it had been like this all morning, or if it happened well after the meeting.
Still, I am a little embarrassed to think I could have been at a meeting that
included our future provost with my scapular hanging out!
Famous Hat
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