100 Days of Wonder – #15
Yesterday I talked about fun. When I was at university in Leicester I would frequently visit my then girlfriend who was doing a degree in PE teaching in Chichester. The way my timetable fell I could often stay for a chunk during the week. I’d take work with me and while she was out in lectures and then playing cricket or rugby, I would wade through contract law cases and work out why, as a 19 year old, I should care about Administrative Law. I distinctly remember declining to join a game of rounders and not even joining the spectators sitting in the sun sipping something pink and alcoholic. Instead I opted for a book. My girlfriend’s comment was: Well you’re no fun. It was a theme that came up repeatedly and at the time I remember being defensive about it. I was fun. Of course I was fun. But was I?
I don’t know. I think it took me a long time to work out ‘fun’. I was bookish and serious and independent and ‘grown up’ as a kid. I continue to be fiercely independent but those moments of silliness and laughing so much that you (nearly -hm) pee yourself that I had always treated as rare and very private moments are now moments I embrace and I’m proud of. I no longer take myself or anything particularly seriously. Fun for me has never been about parties, big groups, playing sports or pranking each other which is I think what Rachel was referring to when she put me in the ‘not fun’ box. Fun for me has been about stories, about shared moments that touch the soul, about seeing others light up and mostly about seeing the ridiculousness of most things in life. Sometimes teaching and researching in law doesn’t lend itself to being fun. I bump up against inequality at best and atrocities at worst all the time in my work, some student stories a re heartbreaking and law is, after all a serious business… but finding your brand of silliness and fun seems to me to be crucial to making sure we look after ourselves when we’re doing work that can be emotional and hard. So if you think I’m mad as a hatter and a bit juvenile – you’d be right, I just don’t think that’s a bad thing.
100 Days of Wonder – #14
Fun. Why do we so often think of work and fun as 2 different things that never really come together? I’ve had a really busy work week with my teaching, teaching cover, a workshop in Worcester, meetings, head of school stuff and general administration plus an Open Day today. Looking at my calendar and the lack of gaps suggests anything but fun. I’m tired, sure but I had soooo much fun this week. I taught something I didn’t think I knew anything about or understood and I loved learning it, I had a really great discussion about Constitutions with our LLM students, I had references to and pictures of the Disney Castle, the Avengers and Figment in my keynote on Wednesday. Many of my meetings gave me chance to check in with wonderful humans and hear about, plan and reflect on exciting things to come. When we get caught up in the busy-ness of life, it seems to me to be even more important to stop and consciously look for the joy and fun in what we’re doing. Pause a minute, stare out into your life in wonder and I hope something makes you smile!
100 Days of Wonder – #9
As I recover from Covid and try and pick up my training for the 2025 Dopey Challenge again, I am reflecting on running and what it has taught me, what it means to me and where I am with it now. There’s lots more about my running on my running blog including a write up of this particular run. I loved this run. That’s rare. I am still not entirely convinced I actually like running. But it means a lot to me because it has taught me a lot about myself. I have always been pretty good at everything I do but that’s simply because I just don’t do things I am not good at. Running is the exception. Running has taught me to stick at something, that doing something just because is a good enough reason to do it, that not being good at it doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy it. I am more patient with myself and others because of running, I struggle less with the inevitable failures of academia because running taught me I don’t have to excel at everything and it’s ok to have a bad run (a classic reviewer 2, a not perfect teaching session, a not so great meeting). I have (mostly) let go of the competitive streak in me because the world didn’t end when I came last in a race. Running has also taught me to celebrate and ‘bank’ the wins, the glorious runs – like this 5k – where everything feels right, the sense of achievement when you cross a finish line, run a new distance, go faster than you ever have or have recently or the wonder of kingfishers, herons, kites, deer and all sorts of other wildlife you stumble across on early morning trails. I try and note and enjoy the joyful teaching moments, the ‘your paper has now been accepted’ emails, the invites to go talk to interesting people about cool stuff because there will always be another long ploddy run in the cold rain and its academic equivalents – they need doing, they help make the magic happen but having a memory bank of of what the magic feels like definitely helps!
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