My Best Work

We're fancy.

When the Boys found out that my final, I-really-mean-it-this-time, no-I'm-not-kidding last day of work at Small College would be June 30, they asked what I wanted to do to mark the occasion. As I've mentioned here ad nauseum, it's a retirement after 30 years but one that has occurred with more of a whimper than a bang. So did I want a party, they asked? A trip? A gift card for the yarn store?

What I want, I told them, was to have everyone home for the weekend. The geographical vicissitudes that accompany employment these days have meant that the four Boys and two Lovely Girls now live in four different states, so full-family get-togethers are few and literally far between. We were last together at the Wedding of the Century Part Deux, and the last time Boy#2 was home was 18 months ago. (To my horror, he reminded me he'd never even seen the Taj MaJohn.)

So they came home.

We were missing Lovely Girl#2, since the transitional days surrounding July 1 are the absolute worst for resident doctors, but by Saturday evening everyone else had gathered. Then we were together for an entire week, split between the House on the Corner and the adjoining-state home of Boy#1 and Lovely Girl#1.

That first night they took Husband and me out to eat at a place far fancier than their childhood experiences would warrant. (A rabbit trail about fanciness: During the years when vacation meant pulling the pop-up to a lake, our camper was stranded in rising waters after a torrential downpour. There was no fast-food option near by so we went into the local truck stop for breakfast pancakes. The Boys were wide-eyed at its opulence, which today would provoke scathing Yelp comments but was a step up from McDonald's. "Do we get to keep the silverware?" one asked in amazement. At that point we realized we needed to raise our fanciness aspirations.)

Anyway, after we had stuffed ourselves with steak and asparagus and appetizers filled with upscale cheeses, Boy#1 reminded us of the event we were marking. My full-time employment at Small College started when Boy#4 was in pre-school, so our family had grown up while I was working there.

"We've had a lot of good times at SC," he said. "Let's talk about some of them."

The lump in my throat started growing while they reminisced about riding their bikes to the college and lobbing pebbles at my second-story window so that I could toss down Hershey's Kisses from my candy bowl. Or when they were ballboys at football games and learned a whole new vocabulary. Or the piano lessons they had with the head of the performing arts division, and how kind and encouraging he was.

And then it was my turn. So I talked about the man who hired me, and the man who was my boss for 17 years, and how they had believed in my abilities and encouraged me, trusting my professionalism even as I was learning from them how to lead and manage. I remembered the excitement when our department won the sweepstakes award of the professional organization for academic communications, in competition with universities dozens of times our size. I remembered the day spent with Helen Thomas, one of my journalistic idols who was a Commencement speaker. (She called me her Scout leader, and hand-wrote her address and phone number on a scrap of paper--"If you're ever in Washington, call me," she said.)

By then I was having trouble talking around that throat lump.

"But of all those things I did at the college," I managed to speak-sob, "I realize as I look around the table what my best work actually was. You all are my very best work."

It was corny and tear-stained but I'm okay with that valedictory on my career.

It was true.