Catching singedwhiff of burnout or year-end case of the enough-alreadies (it’s like the slows but more existentially introspective), I was looking ahead to February 1’s deadline for Faculty Activity Reports, trying to reconcile Virginia’s 60+F temperatures with December, and regrouping after an unusually challenging writing program administrative week. Sometimes you take a hard look, you know?, and remember these orbits are few, the lifting not entirely yours to heft. I keyed in the neighborhood of eight “comfort inventories” from 2004-2011, but then a decade passed and for those ten years, none. Wonder why. Today, in the spirit of FAR anticipation (FARticipation would be a whizpopper portmanteau but risks poor poor taste), keen on the feelings a’coursing through the great resignation, a discomfort inventory for 2021.

• Chaired 2 faculty searches that brought 9 new colleagues (4 TT, 5 instructors). In the last 2.5 years, that brings it to 4 searches for 25 new colleagues.
• Completed 2 external reviews for tenure and/or promotion. I could’ve said yes to 2 more, but I just couldn’t. In a balanced year, 3 are possible; this year, only 2.
• Reviewed 1 book manuscript. A terrific book which I cannot wait to teach, but I wrote to the publisher this week and learned it won’t be out until September 2022.
• Reviewed 4 articles (Enculturation, CCC x 2, Intermezzo)
• Co-led a workshop on daily drawing for the Lifelong Learning Institute
• Gave an artist’s talk about the pandemic bestiary
• Prepped the pandemic bestiary for the Squires gallery, and then submitted 1 piece, which sold for $225, to the Artful Lawyer show in downtown Blacksburg. With this, I’ve made more cash from illustrations than from writing in this life.
• Did 44 illustrations. I think? Could be more. But at least 44.
• Gave an invited talk and teaching workshop at U Virginia in January (virtually)
• Sent Radiant Figures into the world (i.e., published chapter and co-edited collection)
• Taught 1 section of Technical Writing
• Wrote 9 letters of recommendation
• Bought a 70-year old house in a bona fide hollow and a used car (Honda Civic).
• Drove the Michigan-Virginia roundtrip 6.5 times
• Interim co-directed the Center for Rhetoric in Society
• Committees: 7. Served on Comp, Ex Comm, RW, Professorial Personnel, ad hoc Teaching Evaluations, CID Advisory, and LVE Community Engagement Committee, chairing or co-chairing two of these. Must give up 2 in the year ahead.
• Coordinated 4 Writing Program Dialogues sessions (WAVA and/or UVa)
• Highlight of highlights: presented at the CID, “Lines Drawn Home,” with Ph. and Is.
• Published a co-authored chapter in Composition as Big Data
• Co-developed/co-piloted SSWPI placement system, but breakdowns have us redrawing things (generative failure, in effect). This included receiving 300 emails from first-year students in June alone.
• Served on 10 dissertation committees; 3 who graduated in 2021; 2 new ones; chairing 2
• Co-authored or co-sponsored 2 course proposals: 1) Food Writing and 2) Advanced Writing and Research.
• To date, I’ve done exactly 200 transfer equivalency reviews; in all of 2020, there were 182. Up is up!
• There’s more: promotion to professor, serving on various boards, including CWPA and WAVA, again negotiating and executing a program textbook, illustrating its cover, and so on, but this is a pretty thick-cut slice of what the year has held, and I know for casting it as I have that the volume, it’s nope not sustainable.