nachos & big ideas

Tonight I rode my bicycle home from work in what I think might have once been called a freshening breeze. In the twilight I could see the first stars peeking out behind the high clouds. Tomorrow is a big day on campus, with Academic Convocation, and then Sunday we have our Commencement. There's an unreal quality to this moment between the rush of the final weeks of the semester and the behind-the-scenes fluster of activity to send off our graduates.  Under the darkening sky, I felt a settling quiet. And then I remembered something.

Last week I had an impromptu stroll with a friend, a professor, a break from grading for her, and a break from I can't even remember what for me.  We were talking about big ideas: language acquisition, codes, Basil Bernstein, and a paper she's writing, also about codes, in Porgy and Bess.  We each had to talk quickly because we only had that one loop around campus to spill out all the things we'd been thinking about. We were on the final stretch, (perfect timing), when we came to a natural pause in our conversation. I thought a moment, and said, "Well, I always come back to old William Golding, that line from Free Fall."  And here I stopped to deliver the line with expression: "To communicate is our passion... and our despair!"

She looked thoughtful and said, "Yes.  I feel like that could apply to many things."  And here she added some sweeping arm gestures along with the dramatic voice: "Nachos and cheese... are our passion... and our despair!  Cake and ice cream... are our passion... and our despair!"

And then we were back at our tasks, and I forgot all about passion and despair and George Gershwin and nachos and cheese. Until just tonight, rolling home in the wind.