Mama PhD

On the eve of his high school graduation, Ben told me he had a recurring fear that his diploma would actually be the blank sheet that the principal hands students who have not completed graduation requirements, but wish to walk with their class. I assured him that if he was missing or failing something, I would know about it — but in the event, we both checked.

Like most people, my first encounter with the word “Monopoly” was through the board game by that name. It would...

I am in California on an academic “vacation,” which means, as any college professor knows, that I am taking a few extra days to enjoy the area where I am attending a conference. Next week I will attend a workshop in San Diego sponsored by the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) for “Sustainability Across the Curriculum.”

My daughter said recently, “Mom does still have a tiny sense of humor, it’s just buried deep down inside the momness.” As we finished off the semester and are preparing for our move across the country in August, there is always just too much to squeeze into a day, leaving much stressful unfinished business that seems to get done only just before it absolutely needs to. In these times, you need to remember to laugh, and I thank my daughter for reminding me.

Last week at this time I was about to leave for my annual conference, which is now over. As I mentioned, I brought my daughter with me, and I promised to report back on how attending a conference with her went. In a word: great.

As of this writing, Ben will graduate from high school in four days. On the one hand, this doesn't feel like a big deal — he, and most of his close friends, will stay in the city for college and continue to live at home, so it's not that different from being promoted to the next grade. On the other hand, of course, it is huge. In important ways, this ritual marks the official end of his childhood, and of his emotional dependence on his father and me.

I find it interesting when economics is applied to offbeat topics.This is done in the best seller “Freakonomics,” which looks at a variety of social issues using the tools of economics. My own research applies the discipline of economics to studying altruism and nonprofit organizations, topics that are probably not the first things that come to mind when one thinks of economics. I also recall the professor who taught me macroeconomics many years ago, whose own research was on “envy”. I found myself thinking of him recently as I ran into one of my daughter’s former teachers as we stopped by the library on the way home from her summer camp. With wet hair and a bathing suit under her shorts, the teacher said that she looked like she was having fun. I could only add “I want her life.”

It’s about to be conference time for me. Like Lee Bessette, who wrote last week about being among her people, I’m about to go join mine. The Children’s Literature Association, which meets annually in June, is my academic home, the group of colleagues that I don’t have here at my job. While folks at larger research universities may have colleagues in their field right on campus, those of us at smaller schools are often “the only one” in a field or subfield, so we are especially happy to gather with our peers at our once a year event.