tired

this day has seemed to last forever. i'm tired, my head and my heart are tired. i want to sink into my bed right now and forget everything, but i won't.

i think i'm just dejected because i'm running on a shortened amount of sleep, on top of everything else; but it's as if only today has it really hit me, what happened on our campus, and that is compounding all of the other small, inconsequential grievances, like the rain today. i had driven to philly for a committee meeting, and no one at the meeting mentioned the subject to me until the very end, when we were walking back out to our cars. i expressed that the whole campus is so appreciative of the love and support being shown by alums, parents, our town community, and fellow institutions all over the world. i said we were hanging in there, and we would be ok.

and then i got back in my car, and started driving down the turnpike, and before i knew it i was sobbing. i recovered after a few minutes and made it back to the office, but now i realize how badly we all need this support, no matter what our relationship was to those involved. because we're all involved.

i've always been proud of gettysburg, and these past couple of days i have been even more proud: of the college and our president for encouraging us to reach out to each other, of the maturity of our students in handling their grief...i can't think of what situation we would be in, if people turned against each other, started making accusations, spreading rumors, degraded the community they belong to. i am grateful that the community we have built here is strong enough to hold us together.