Read It Will Come to Me Online
Authors: Emily Fox Gordon
It Will Come to Me (25 page)
You have 6 new messages:
TO ALL MEMBERS OF THE LDI COMMUNITY: It has come to my attention that an incident occurred yesterday afternoon in Horace Dees Hall involving a part-time, temporary member of the LDI Philosophy Department and a campus visitor. While the details have yet to be fully sorted out, eyewitness accounts indicate that a physical assault of some kind took place. In a meeting early this morning with the university attorney it was determined
that the faculty member will be terminated immediately. Other action may be taken as well. I will keep you updated.
This incident, unfortunate though it was, affords us an important teaching moment. It brings home the urgent need to place security at the very top of our agenda. Students need to know that they are safe. Faculty/staff need to know that they can go about their important work in an atmosphere of peace and security. Parents need to know that the beloved children they have entrusted to our care will meet with no harm. To this end, the provost and I will appoint a study committee to consider what measures can be put in place to assure student and faculty/staff safety in the future. Other institutions have recently installed university-wide e-mail and cell-phone alert systems. This is only one of many ideas that will be evaluated for its appropriateness to the LOLA community's needs. Another measure we plan to look at from a feasibility point of view is the campus-wide distribution of individual pocket or purse panic buttons, connected to GPS technology in the Campus Security Office.
In closing, I want to offer a personal expression of concern and caring to each and every member of the LOLA community and to remind you that my door is always open.
With warmest personal regards,
Lee Wayne Dreddle
I need to speak to you as soon as possible. Please give Marcy a call when you get in this morning.
Dear Prof. Blau,
I'm writing to let you know that my daughter Jade has been unable to get help from your office in her efforts to document transfer credits. She gave the form to your secretary on the first day of classes and has yet to get it back. She tells me that she has come by the department on several occasions to find nobody there. When she calls she gets a recording, and when she leaves messages, they go unreturned.
I understand that standards tend to be less stringent in an academic department than in the offices of a law practice, but I can tell you that any secretary who was chronically absent from her desk and neglected to return calls would not last long here at Wertz, Faust and Blasingame.
I would very much appreciate your expedited attention in the matter of Jade Wertz's transfer credits.
Sincerely,
Donald Wertz
A week ago I complained to the department secretary that the registrar has placed my 105 HistSurv, with an enrollment of 78, in HD317, which seats thirty. Students are sitting on the floor. I've tried to complain directly to the registrar, but as you know, this is a quixotic undertaking.
In past semesters I've counted on Dolores to apply steady pressure on the registrar. The current incumbent seems to have done nothing at all, which is odd because apparently she has plenty of time on her hands. I see her smoking cigarettes out on the Bledwell Pavilion several times a day.
Dear Dr. Blau,
Over the past ten days, a 1992 Oldsmobile, gold in
color, has been parked consistently athwart the fire lane in the West Oak faculty/staff lot. A number of citations have been placed on the vehicle's windshield, but as yet this office has not received any response and the violations have continued.
The vehicle's owner or driver has been observed entering your building. She is identified as a Caucasian woman in her early to middle forties with blond hair. If this individual works in your office, or in any other office you know of, please contact us immediately. Parking in a fire lane constitutes a fire hazard, and if this infraction is repeated, we will have no choice but to tow and impound the vehicle in question.
Sincerely,
Bettina Podler
Campus Security Liaison
Dear Employer,
Frequent and regular follow-ups are an integral component of our program here at Second Chance/New Start. Click on the attachment to find a short questionnaire that will help us to initiate an ongoing evaluation of the performance of Hayley Gamache, a diplomate of our program
who was hired at your firm or place of business on September 14. Please take a moment to fill it out.
With Best Regards,
Frank Buonafortuna
A
s he turned away from the computer screen to call the dean's office Ben saw that the message light on the phone was blinking. He blinked back at it for a moment before deciding it could be safely ignored—it was almost certainly Hayley's daily trouble report and first estimate of arrival time. He dialed the dean's extension and Marcy Bainbridge picked up on the first ring. Ordinarily he found her fire-glazed cheeriness bracing—he knew she viewed her boss with considerable irony—but this morning her chipper “Dean's Office” jarred him deeply.
“Marcy,” he said, “is she in?”
“Oh,” said Marcy, “Ben.” The hush in her voice alarmed him. “She certainly is. She's in there waiting for you.”
“Coming now,” said Ben.
“Good luck,” said Marcy.
Just as he was rising from his desk, his computer trilled to announce the arrival of another e-mail. Sitting down, he clicked on a link, forwarded by Rhoda, that led him to a YouTube video entitled “Prof Goes Nuts.” At first he could make out only a congeries of moving shadows, but soon enough he understood that he was looking at a murky cell-phone documentation of the SCAC inspector's eviction from Charles Johns's classroom. The ten-or fifteen-second sequence was repeated a number of times, sometimes at normal speed, sometimes—to undeniably comic effect—
greatly accelerated. The video was accompanied by a grinding rap soundtrack with a taunting female obbligato snaking around the bass line. Each time Charles and the inspector were shown clearing the seminar-room doorway, Ben's startled face loomed into view.
After a few minutes the screen went blank; the audio hissed and hummed. Then the scene shifted to the steps of the Student Union building, where the cell-phone documentarían was recording the reactions of student witnesses. The first to be interviewed were a pair of female students. “I don't know,” said one. “It made me uncomfortable when the guy just walked in there. We've got privacy rights, don't we? But the professor didn't have to have a complete meltdown like that. I didn't think he was setting a good example.” “Yeah,” said the second girl, “talk about anger management! He looked like he was about to stroke out.”
The interviewer moved on to two males who'd been quivering impatiently in the background. “Man, he went
off
on that dude,” said one. “It was
awe
some!” said the other, his head bobbing in frenetic agreement. “He ran that pencilneck out on a rail.”