No Make Ups

On showing up right where I am

Errrrrhhhh-wurhhhhh, Errrrrhhhh-wurhhhh

The weather alert bypasses my always-on-silent phone settings to interrupt my drive to campus. 

TORNADO WARNING in San Diego County. Shelter in place until 1pm. 

Rain pounds and the road is a spray of mist and puddles. But, really, a tornado? In San Diego?

Months earlier, a “hurricane” canceled my son’s first day of school and nothing happened. Our lawn chairs did not even flip over. It didn’t even actually rain on that first day. 

A week earlier, I received flood alerts on my phone and laughed it off. This NorCal girl (where we had real weather) scoffs at the San Diego drivers in the rain and how they’re either way too slow and ginger-footed or way too fast and reckless. They do not know that you shouldn’t brake or steer if you start hydroplaning. They did not need to navigate the turn signal and windshield wipers simultaneously during their driving test. They did not grow up with snow days or the indignity of low-rise flares soaking up rainwater to your knees. 

So when the tornado warning blares, I have my doubts. I crank the wipers up a notch and keep driving. 

I keep driving until the pelting rain starts pooling across the freeway. Until I can feel the gentle lift of pre-hydroplaning and my stomach drops.

While the SoCal rain may seem inconsequential for a NorCal gal, one thing that is true about San Diego and weather is that we are not prepared. 

The roads do not drain and intersections flood with mere inches of rainwater. A dear friend’s house flooded because the city failed to clear out a drainage area. 

I exit the freeway when I have the chance and make my way to the sopping Starbucks parking lot.

The wind rocks my minivan, and I read the alert more closely. 

Shelter in place until 1pm. Stay inside and away from windows. 

My first class is supposed to start at 12:30. I had just emailed a student to confirm that there was class. I couldn’t help but roll my eyes a bit when I pressed send. Of course we’re not canceling because of rain. 

I call my mom who is trapped outside my daughter’s school. She reports that the kids, who were supposed to be released at noon, are safely tucked in their classroom away from windows while my mom and the other caregivers are stuck in the car pick up line, wind shaking their vehicles. 

A silent text comes through from the campus emergency alert system, but it offers no guidance for professors. “There is a tornado alert for San Diego County and shelter in place order. Campus remains open as usual.” 

What? 

Open as usual, but shelter in place? There is nothing usual about that. 

My class starts in 11 minutes. I cannot, in good conscience, ask my students to leave their dorms and apartments to walk across campus. I cannot ask my commuting students to risk flooding their cars in poorly designed intersections just so we can continue with Close Reading and essay outlining.

It’s week two and the semester has already been marked by tumult. A faculty strike had started with zealous fervor and ended with a whimper, on the first day. Class was off. Class was back on. I pivoted on a dime.

I was tired of pivoting. Of changing plans. I was tired. 

I send an announcement from my phone to cancel my 12:30 class, feeling guilty but justified with the tornado warning still in effect until 1pm.

Now I have a trickier choice: drive to campus and prepare for my 4pm class or cancel that one, too. 

I’m convinced it’s more work to cancel class than just teach it unless you’re actively dying. My strict sense of responsibility coupled with the pandemic offerings of synchronous and asynchronous options means I am committed to getting the students the expected material by whatever means necessary. Cancelled class means building out more worksheets, uploading new assignments to the learning management system, adjusting the due date and points, and then reviewing and grading those new assignments so that it all adds up to the same amount of work/effort/learning for the students. And if I don’t release an assignment right away (like because I’m puking or dizzy or stuck in a Starbucks parking lot during a tornado), we still have to make it up somewhere.

The sky is dark, but I sense a small flicker. 

Maybe we don’t– have to make it up that is. 

With a lump in my throat, I copy/paste the announcement text from my first class and send it to my 4pm class as well. 

Sweet relief floods my body for a millisecond or two before I am engulfed with panic. Did I just cancel class without a make up plan? Schools out, pencils down, YOLO? Like King George in Lin Manuel’s Hamiliton, “I wasn’t aware that’s a thing that a person can do.”

But I did it. 

And the sky didn’t fall (well, not any more than the torrential rain that was already pounding.) I didn’t get an immediate scolding from the department chair, although I could picture her mean side eye reserved for dopey undergrads. I could just not test the students on the material we missed, and no one would know. I’m the professor after all. 

I sit back in my van seat, heart pounding with a mix of rebellion and relief. I exhale, close my eyes, and imagine the worksheets I’m not going to make. The alternative assignments I’m not going to post. The extra grading I won’t do. 

Was it fair to previous semesters? Did it align with the learning objectives from the syllabus? 

Maybe not. 

But we were in a natural disaster, in San Diego. 

No regrets. No make ups. 

***

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I share this story back from January when I was still teaching as one of the first of many times I’ve tried to embrace this idea of “no make ups.” It’s not a lesson I signed up to learn, but chronic sinus infections and the disruption of moving has forced me to cancel, shuffle, and raincheck plans all over the place. Normally, I would apologize profusely, berate myself for not meeting expectations, and work hard to figure out a way to make up or balance out the missed coffee date, class session, or even workout or writing time.

While there is a real loss with missing out, it turns out most people have a lot of grace to give. They’re not holding it against me for being sick or having a hard time. I’m trying not to hold it against myself either. It’s so much easier to jump back in without a backlog self-inflicted of to-dos. I am so grateful for the ways I’ve been able to pick back up with friends, with my OCD & Creativity community, with writing. Even with this Substack, I’m tempted to strive to make up for my relative absence over the last year-ish. I’m tempted to double up on posts (2 per week!) and go back to tell you everything that I’ve learned in chronological order in the exact manner I learned it. 

Don’t worry, I’m not. 

What I am going to do is show up right where I am, which may be reflecting on the last year, sharing new stuff, or a mix of both. 

I’m the professor of my own life, after all. 

No regrets. No make ups. 

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I’d love to hear from you! Do you have a tendency to try to make up for missed opportunities or expectations? If no, tell me your secrets! If yes, what might it look like to let go?