[Alumni-chat] Facilities Committee

[Steven Duffy]

Hello Ms. Debra and all my other friends...please be hyper-vigilant and
active when it comes to the library's (and Joe's) legacy.

As Joe might have said...."The idea boys are working overtime"...I am
afraid this is the case even in through here.

So SisterSara and others......please be concerned and active.

sisterSara....I know you have some old local roots...so when the great
north becomes frigid maybe you will go over

the river and through the woods to Fairmont. Maybe we can have a lunch
date...I know we met once but thousands

of folks have come down the instutitional river...with your email moniker
I will just have to imagine you looking

like Sally Field for now.

The Library needs external and internal care and protection from folks
with their own agendas.

And really to be correct The Big Olive's legacy even predates Joe.....Paul
Bixler and Bruce Thomas were also

extraordinary directors.....many folks have taken great care over decades
with us.....

Sometimes consultants and new folks are so interested in their own
innovative ideas they trample on the

real legacy here...and then folks wonder why there is alienation. from the
legacy crowd.


Eventhough we are a little tattered...we are marvelous...during freshmen
week parents meandered in and out...of the library.

and one parent said...feels homey.    (not homely, eh?  I made sure thare
wasn't wax in my ears and I heard it right)   

And I know that this isn't the future vision thread but I would hope that
some new curriculum would include

seminars in conflict resolution and small and larger group interaction.  
Truth is...when you are always looking

at the world and looking at yourself and when folks program you to try to
win that victory for humanity.....well..

when you discover all the things wrong with the world and yourself...anger
and frustration are some of the hardest

and most paralyzing emotions that seem to surface.  and do trickle down
into the culture...

A re-invented Antioch would hopefully still have folks running around the
planet and then back home to recover

or regroup.        My theory is that anger at ourselves (internal and
external) is a major force in preventing us from

thriving.  Just as many places might have mandatory composition
classes...well...our composition classes look at the

way the world is made.....how to deal with anger.....and frustration.

How to speak, how to write, how to resolve issues.....we need lotsa Jay
Rothmans.

and it is interesting to see a name like David Apter in the
conversation..I have often had "you" behind the desk on

2hr reserve and can't count the number of times you have been in students'
hands throughout the decades.

It's like hearing from a celeb.

Don't forget to keep on talking and networking....

   check all those antiochian websites...including the College one...and
please make sure that it is up to snuff...
    and contact the alumni board committees...and come see us some time.

 The newest folks floating down the river are called millenials.    When
Jimmy Williams (former Dean) started telling me what the next generation

was spozed to be like I was skeptical(as all Antiochians are) ...turns out
that that research is sorta right.

  The millenials have certain positive traits that folks from the last
four decades seemed to have lacked.
    They do like to work in teams and are exceptionally altruistic.

 Imagine ...that at the Community Meeting before the BOT and Homecoming
the tallk was about cleaning and policing
the place  before company might arrive....and about good behaviors when 
the elders returned.

   Some alums from the nineties said who were here (in advance of the
masses) said " Gee, my generation wasn't

that way..we would have been obstinate or contrary on purpose"....  well
the institutional river has taken a turn or

the water has a new clarity.

Gotta go......thanks to all for your care......take a hint from the
millenials........teamwork......

>From the river..at the Big Olive (Kettering Library).

Duffy '77 and the years since