Last Day!

Wednesday was my twenty-eighth last day of the "year," and fifty-sixth last day of the semester. Actually, it's more than that if you count my time as a T.A., but fifty-six is already a mind-boggling number, so I don't want to count those grad-school semesters.

I had only two students in my Italian Civilization class this spring (normally, it's offered once every two years; this was an experiment in offering it in two consecutive years. A failed experiment, obviously). When the dean saw how small the class was, she could have cancelled it, but luckily she's one of the good deans, and she said, "So what—it's her last semester. Let her keep the class." I was even luckier that the two students were wonderful.

Photo courtesy Lori Catanzaro, hostess of my amazing retirement party

You can see how beautiful these two ladies are. You can also see how much we dress up for class at Vandy. What you can't see is how hardworking and intelligent and fun they are! I'm so happy that they made up my last class.

No, that's not champagne, although if it were, what would they do—fire me? Sparkling cider.