The Random Thoughts of Louis Schmier

Someone asked me if I thought about the legal liability of my interaction with students such as John. Liability is a matter that is on most people’s mind. But, I think too many people use it as an excuse or rationalization to remain disengaged. They also rely upon the confines of a narrow job description [...]

Dear Professor Y: You castigate me for “playing with fire”, of engaging in therapy and counseling for which I am not trained and which is not “our jobs as academicians.” Well, you may call our conversation therapy; I call it “wholeness” education. You may call it counseling; I call it caring. In that room, on [...]

My muscles are so tight that my fingers hurt as I bounce them from key to key. I’m so emotionally drained that I almost have no energy to move my fingers. John just left my office. That’s not his real name, but he is a very real and noble person–and maybe he is starting to [...]

I was walking the campus late yesterday afternoon, taking my mind off the ravages tropical storm Josephine has wrought on my house, watching a bunch of neat young people playing football on the front quad, lounging near the empty library foundation, going to and from the library and classess, meandering towards the Palms, just chilling, [...]

It’s 5:30 a.m. The air is cool. The campus is still. No walking today. I’m in the office pouring through student journals. It’s hard to keep focused on them. So, I’m taking a brief break. My mind was on yesterday’s imaginative, creative, exciting, issue-raising, substantive 5-15 minute student “theater productions” in my three history first [...]

Date: Sun, 6 Oct 1996 12:17:56 -0400 (EDT) Subject: Random Thought: It was one of those lazy Sundays, read the newspaper, and watched _Sunday Morning_. By the time I got around to putting on my rag-a-muffin grubbies go out for my walk, the sun had long since come over the horizon. At least, I think [...]

TGIF! It’s late in the afternoon. Everyone has gone home. A rough week has come to a surprisingly serene end no thanks to me, but thanks to a couple of student one of whom I do not know. All week I had been letting what I’ll vaguely call campus “stuff” get to me and kicking [...]