Sitting at graduation today, something hit me.

This feeling hits me periodically - often at graduation, or when a student is giving a research presentation on work they've done, or when a student comes to talk to me about something and I realize that they are looking at things in a different way because of something I've said/done in class, or even just walking across campus on a busy fall afternoon. Sometimes it hits me hard enough that I tear up a little, and I did today, and I had to kind of scratch my nose until the feeling went away, because I was sitting on the front row and all the people on the podium could SEE me, but:

the feeling is one of amazement at how blessed (or if you prefer, "lucky") I am to be doing what I am doing. I am working in the field I planned to go into - I think I knew as far back as high school that I wanted to be a biologist, and in particular, I wanted to be involved with teaching.

And while it's true I've worked hard to get where I am - and that I continue to work hard - but there are probably THOUSANDS of people in the U.S. with doctoral degrees who are as smart or smarter than I am, and who have worked as hard or harder than I have, and who don't have the academic employment that they want.

And, as much as I bitch (yes, it's a strong word but I think what I do amounts to that) about some of the students and their attitudes, that's 10% or less of the population. And most of the time, things are very good. And I'm very lucky-or-blessed to have the career I do. And the co-workers I do. And the problems I have with students are far less than they could be and far less than they are at some colleges.

And I recognize that. Sometimes, ripping open my 'paycheck advice' (basically the statement that says "we deposited x dollars to your checking account via Direct Deposit") at the end of the month, I sort of chuckle to myself: they PAY me for this.

As I walked to graduation, I was very buttoned up: I had my robe on and zipped up and the hood fastened (I have since learned to wear a blouse with buttons to graduation; the academic "hood" has a loop you can attach to a button to prevent it from choking you) and the little cap (I favor the six-sided velvet hat - it looks more old-fashioned to me and it also stays on better) on my head. But walking back - it was warm, so I took off the cap and the hood, and unzipped the front of the gown. And I walked across campus, with the gown billowing out behind me in the warm breeze.

And I realized something. Back as a freshman in college or so, I wrote a story - just a story for my own self, you understand - about a sort of never-never-land college campus where all of the students cared a lot about education, and there were a lot of traditions, and there was the tradition of the "masters" (professors) wearing caps and gowns to class. Kind of a fusion of the old British school-story (which is, in some ways, embodied today in the Harry Potter series), and the idealized portrayals of college life I had seen in Norman Rockwell illustrations. (It was largely a counter-reaction to what I saw as disappointing crassness on the part of some of the students and an alarming lack-of-concern on the part of some professors).

Anyway, at one point in the story, one of my characters was walking across campus on her way to class - in dark trousers and a crisp white blouse - with her gown billowing out behind her as she strode purposefully across campus. And that was an image that stuck with me even though most of the story is long gone.

And as I walked across campus this afternoon, I realized: to a certain extent, I have BECOME the character I wrote somewhat longingly about nearly 20 years ago.

I don't know if that's deeply meaningful or just deeply geeky, but it made me happy to think about it.

As Gene Wilder commented at the end of the original Willy Wonka movie:
"Do you know what happened to the man who got exactly what he wanted? He lived happily ever after."

And, despite the occasional crises-of-confidence, the occasional frustrations with students, I DO pretty much have what I wanted.

And here's to many more years of that, of wanting what I get. (Because the secret of happiness, I read somewhere, is not so much getting what you want, but wanting what you get.)