There’s not much in this post, but I wanted to mark a significant date. It is the first day of the rest of 2023, but in addition, it is the beginning of a new chapter for me. Yesterday was my last day as an employee of the University of Southern California, after 20 years (!) and today is my first day as an employee of the University of California, Santa Barbara. (I mentioned this was coming up in a previous post, and some of its significance is explained there.)
Of course, since I’m still on a research retreat at the Aspen Center for Physics, none of this seems entirely real just yet. Electronic signatures winging back and forth over the web don’t really substitute for the physical business of changing where you show up for work, who you meet there, and so forth, and so that will have to wait for little while. That having been said, lots of electronic welcomes and so forth did help a lot with that “new job smell”, if that’s a thing. But I’ll be showing up in person soon enough, and it’ll be fun to begin to construct a new routine.
Sadly I’ve not had a lot of time to properly sit and contemplate and let this all sink in, to be honest, so I’ll have to find time to do it later. (That photo, above, of me at the top of Aspen mountain is nice, but I was in that spot for about 5 minutes!) Right now, there’s travel, and then sorting and packing and more packing to do, along with family matters, and all that entails. I’ll have to leave the contemplation for a bit later.
Perhaps during a nice long run along the beach…!
-cvj
