{"id":3223,"date":"2021-03-17T21:56:07","date_gmt":"2021-03-18T01:56:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/?p=3223"},"modified":"2021-03-17T21:56:07","modified_gmt":"2021-03-18T01:56:07","slug":"frank-bruni-on-the-teachable-pandemic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/frank-bruni-on-the-teachable-pandemic\/","title":{"rendered":"Frank Bruni on the Teachable Pandemic"},"content":{"rendered":"

I heart Frank Bruni.<\/p>\n

I first encountered him at an AAC&U conference in early 2015, in the days of my role as vice provost for learning innovation and student success at Virginia Commonwealth University. Bruni was on a panel discussing the character and value of a liberal arts education. He was so eloquent, open, unaffected, and precise<\/em> that I instantly became a fan. He eventually wrote a column on the topic<\/a> (likely behind a paywall for you, alas), and it’s well worth reading. You can find a summary here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I’ve subscribed to Bruni’s weekly newsletter for the past year or so, and he never disappoints. Today, though, was exceptional. He summed up, and emphasized, many of the things I’ve been mulling over, things I bet many of you have been thinking about too. As is often the case with great writing, even the thoughts or sentiments you’ve encountered before appear more vivid, and more intelligible, as Bruni articulates them.<\/p>\n

I was so struck by Bruni’s column today<\/a> that I wanted to share this part of it with you. There’s a link at the end of the story that will let you subscribe to his newsletters if you wish. I hope you will. His words are always insightful, and very often, a balm for my soul.<\/p>\n

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\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/FrankBruni\"<\/a><\/div>\n

March 17, 2021<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

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If you missed the previous newsletter, you can read it\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Max Whittaker for The New York Times<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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\"Author<\/a><\/td>\nBy\u00a0Frank Bruni<\/a><\/p>\n

Opinion Columnist<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n

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A year into the pandemic, it\u2019s finally possible to imagine a return to a semblance of our lives beforehand. While new coronavirus variants and fresh Covid-19 spikes could certainly change our current trajectory and foil our hopes, the quickly rising percentages of\u00a0vaccinated Americans<\/a>\u00a0have many of us looking toward the far side of this scourge.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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And I know more than a few people who aren\u2019t ready for it.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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They wish, as any sane person does, that the pandemic had never happened. They hate what it did to this country, to this world and\u00a0to many aspects of their own lives<\/a>\u00a0and the lives of loved ones.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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But its brutal winnowing of their social obligations and commitments beyond home? They actually didn\u2019t mind this, at least not so much. Their movements had grown hectic and their schedules overstuffed.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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The way in which shuttered schools, canceled extracurricular activities and closed offices compelled them and their children to spend more time together? There was stress in this, often proportional to a home\u2019s square footage, but there was also intimacy. They liked how many nights everyone ate dinner together.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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Now these people brace for a resumption of social overkill, activity bloat, rush hours, staggered dinner times and airport metal detectors. They seem to regard that as inevitable.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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But it\u2019s not. At least it doesn\u2019t need to be. From the\u00a0unfathomable loss<\/a>\u00a0and grinding horror of this pandemic, shouldn\u2019t we wring some positives, including a recognition that we don\u2019t have to do everything as we once did, that bits of what was imposed on us over the past 12 months amounted to improvements and that some of the alternate routes, contingency plans and risk-conscious behavior that we latched on to have lasting merit?<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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I\u2019m talking about big stuff like\u00a0remote working<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 and the flexibility that it affords \u2014 but also small stuff, like\u00a0hand washing<\/a>. It shouldn\u2019t take a pandemic to prompt us to do that repeatedly throughout the day, just as it shouldn\u2019t take a pandemic to make us more conscious of our ability to spread illness. Why not\u00a0wear masks<\/a>\u00a0when we leave the house with bad and contagious colds? (This has long been customary in parts of Asia.) Definitely, we should stay away from the office if we have any sort of potentially communicable bug and retire the idea that it\u2019s stoic \u2014 valorous \u2014 to show up and soldier through our sneezing, coughing and such. No, it\u2019s inconsiderate. Bosses must make that clear.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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Did you find that extended contact and deep conversations with a tiny bubble of people was more fulfilling to you than brief contact and shallow chitchat with a huge, rotating cast of them? You can structure your life that way by choice going forward.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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Did you discover that\u00a0daily walks outside<\/a>\u00a0and more quiet, contemplative time did your soul good? Then don\u2019t jettison them when the world whirls back into frenzied motion.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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Did less fussing over your appearance feel not like a surrender but like a liberation? No rule compels you to fuss anew.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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Most of us have made significant sacrifices during this extraordinary and harrowing period. Some have made profound, acutely painful ones. There may be more of those to come.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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But while the trade-off isn\u2019t in the vicinity of equal, we\u2019ve also learned something (I hope) about our responsibilities to one another and what matters most to us. It would be a shame not to heed those lessons.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
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Forward this newsletter to friends \u2026
\n\u2026 and they can\u00a0sign up for themselves here<\/a>. It\u2019s free and it\u2019s published every Wednesday.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n
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By Giovanni Carnovali – Own work, user:Rlbberlin, Public Domain, https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/w\/index.php?curid=2168686
Not a portrait of Frank Bruni.<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I heart Frank Bruni. I first encountered him at an AAC&U conference in early 2015, in the days of my role as vice provost for learning innovation and student success at Virginia Commonwealth University. Bruni was on a panel discussing … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3226,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3223","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Giovanni_Carnovali_-_Ritratto_duomo_in_atto_di_scrivere.jpg?fit=390%2C480&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4bHwM-PZ","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3223","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3223"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3223\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3228,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3223\/revisions\/3228"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3226"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}