Dave’s Midlife Blog

I was sitting in the senior awards assembly at Stone Bridge High School this morning, and I got to thinking about people from my past, people who were good friends or mentors or teachers, with whom I’ve lost contact.

I realized that I will be one of those people for some of these kids. For some reason, I began to feel rather guilty at the bad job I’ve done keeping in touch over the years.

I especially remember my boss from the early 1980s, the Dean of Residential and Judicial Affairs at Vanderbilt University, K.C. Potter. He was a great dean and mentor who taught me a lot about teaching and guiding adolescents–several years before I even thought about becoming a teacher.

K.C. was the spirit of Vanderbilt while I was there. He actually lived on campus. He wore bowties in black and gold (Vanderbilt’s colors) and was at every event. He had a law degree from Vanderbilt Law School.

As I was stewing in my guilt today, I realized that I didn’t expect any of those kids at Stone Bridge necessarily to “stay in touch.” I won’t be at all hurt if they don’t. I’ll consider it a great treat in my life if I hear from one of them in five years. Right now I expect them to move on and get started in life.

When I had finished my Ph.D. in German from Vanderbilt and was applying for assistant professor jobs in 1992, I asked Dean Potter to write me a letter of recommendation. It contained one of the most keenly sharpened turns of phrase I have ever encountered:

David Shepherd knows how to pierce a bureaucratic veil and arrive at the desired result.

Even my dissertation advisor, who really wanted me to get letters from respected academics rather than university administrators, was impressed with that sentence.