PhD Year One
Recap
I started this journey on my 45th birthday; June 1, 2020. I can’t forget that day. I sat at my dining room table. No cushions on the old wood chairs, and I plugged in for my first doctoral studies course. We were supposed to be at the university, but as you all are familiar with by now…Covid happened.
My 11-inch MacBook Air rested on a Roost laptop stand, high enough to give my neck a break from hunching down to the keyboard. Thank goodness I had a wireless mouse and keyboard. Notebooks lay to my left, pens and coffee to my right. I sat alone, waiting to be admitted into Zoom; more than 60 days of isolation from my family and friends, less than 7 days removed from the murder of George Floyd. My wife and I thought they would be safer elsewhere, away from the mayhem of increasing Covid cases in Western Massachusetts. We took a gamble; we paid by being apart for 90 days, hoping the other would be safe. I, at home with our cat, she away with our child.
I remember that day for so many different reasons. I remember it as the first day of doctoral studies. Tattooed on my memory, more than anything else, are the details from that evening. A call from my wife and child. They sang a birthday song. We said how much we missed each other. Then, the birthday wish that broke my heart.
“Dad, guess what I want to get you for your birthday!”
No idea. But I played along, a new car; ice cream cake; a trip to Mars.
“Noooo dad. I’ll tell you. I want to get you a gun so you can protect yourself from the bad cops who want to kill Blacks, Browns, and Native People…people like us.”
Any other memories I had of that day, previous to that conversation were slowly buried over the past 11 months. Someday, maybe, if I am lucky, I may be able to dig them out. I have my doubts. What I cannot forget is that birthday gift wish. No 10 year-old should ever need to wish for that…but there we were.
Tonight I am going to sleep well. All the work I’ve done, the work I’ve yet to accomplish…all of it with different goals that intersect on this: that no child ever wish a parent a gun to protect themselves from death by police.
At first glance you may not think that higher education has issues of systemic racism. Well, that is erroneous. The work I do today, work I will do tomorrow, the world I hope my child inherits from me is one where there are no birthday wishes for guns to protect yourself from law enforcement. My corner of that work begins in higher education.
My birthday wish for June 1st of 2021, that the world be ready for me as I do not plan on backing down…and I don’t need a gun for that…my mind and voice are my weapons of choice.
