Here we are, another Friday. 🥳
I’m especially thankful for this Friday—chiefly, our central AC has been fixed as of this morning. 😁 I can’t wait to get home and chill in centrally-cooled air (I’m still at work as I type this particular paragraph, haha). The mere mention of it, and I’m feeling cooler already! 😅
[Narrator: it was indeed nice and cool once he arrived home.]
On the flip side, it’s also a bit of a bittersweet Friday. This afternoon, I attended a retirement party for someone I worked with when I was working in the School of Architecture. He is retiring after twenty-four years there. While I’ve been at the university for near twenty-six years—ten of them here in the School of Medicine—I worked with him for almost 16 years. He’s a really great guy, and it’ll be sad to see him leave. Back when I was still working in Architecture, he and I would attend a golf tournament even autumn. I should probably italicize “tournament“, as it wasn’t remotely competitive, and we basically spent the better part of the day golfing and drinking bloody Marys. One year, I even won a plaque for having the skill luck of getting closest to the pin on one hole.
I have absolutely no idea where that plaque is…
In other news, on the recent episode of security podcast I enjoy listening to called Shut the Backdoor, one of the hosts remarked that a security incident is a really bad time to build relationships with peers and colleagues. That really struck a chord with me—and she was absolutely right (thanks Meghan!) Security should be a team sport—not just within the organization, but with like organizations elsewhere. Granted, I’m not saying to spill the playbook and proprietary info, but why reinvent the wheel, when someone else has done it already, and perhaps done it better than you had envisioned? In that moment of inspiration, I took to LinkedIn (because I’m already always on there), and typed up a post to look to connect with colleagues and others who may be in the same situation as me. Please feel free to connect with me, and/or share it with others. I want to learn from others who may share in my challenges and frustrations. Heck, maybe there’s a whole community out there in existence that I haven’t yet discovered!
This Got Me Thinking
Now that my role at work has officially changed, I’ve been thinking more about the space I occupy—or maybe more accurately, the space between spaces.
I work in the School of Medicine, answering to both the academic division and the clinical health system, with no security team of our own. Two systems, two governing bodies, two different ways of thinking. And then there’s me—somewhere in the middle, doing my best to translate, to adapt, to hold things together without losing myself in the process.
I have no profound insight or neat takeaway here. Just this quiet noticing: existing in the in-between can be hard in ways that don’t always have names. It asks you to be fluent in contradictions. It asks you to be patient, even when you’re not sure what direction the current is flowing.
And still, I show up. Still, I care. Still, I want to do this well—not just the tasks, but the way I carry them.
With clarity.
With calm.
With kindness.
And always with empathy.
Maybe that’s the real work. Not figuring it all out, but learning to hold the tension gently. Learning to move through complexity without hardening.
I have no answers regarding this—just an open heart, and a quiet reflection.
Finally, here is a look back at what I wore to work this week. I hope you enjoy them. Have a nice, safe, and cool weekend. I know I sure will! 😁
-Terry
June 23
June 24
June 26
June 27
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