Dan Zen

Today was Matriculation Day. It is an assembly in which the faculty dons its regalia and the president proclaims that the semester has begun, although this is the third week of classes.
 
The event is held in the gymnasium. I teach my 9:30 a.m. class at the gym. This morning I roll up to class at about 9:25 a.m. and discover that all of the desks are gone and it is now a lounge for VIPs attending the Matriculation Day program. I stand in the door of the class and look dazed as students arrive and then freeze.  As the maintenance guy puts the final touches on the lounge we have this exchange:

MG:   It’s Matriculation Day.

Professor Diva Mac:   I know but what about my class?

MG:   Oh y’all teacher didn’t tell you it’s Matriculation Day?

PDM:  (steaming) I am the professor. I know it’s Matriculation Day but no one informed me that my classroom would be in use two hours before the event!

MG:  Oh well we always use this room.

PDM:  (mockingly) Oh well I’ve never taught a class at the gym so how would I know.  
 
I turn away from the maintenance dude and say to the elated students that class is canceled.  As we are talking I see the university’s vice president.  He’s in the gym inspecting the set up. I tell him about my class, he shrugs and says “You don’t have to cancel (as my students flee).  Just find another empty room. Now give me a hug I haven’t seen you yet this semester.”  If there were unused rooms just sitting around I wouldn’t be teaching Intro to Communications at the gym instead of in the communications building.  
 
Post hug, I shrug off my annoyance and seize this unexpected free time.  I go home and iron my borrowed regalia and make myself a salad for lunch. I didn’t follow through on my plan to purchase regalia from American University this summer. In the midst of the beginning of semester chaos I forgot to rent a robe for today.   Luckily I remembered that my campus bestie, the professor diva of music, has two robes and I borrowed one of hers.  I had no hood or cap. Her hood is the wrong color for my discipline and my head is too big for her cap. The robe was short but so was my dress. So I came back to campus and joined the procession because after all it’s Matriculation Day.

Air Kisses,

Professor Diva Mac