Wednesday, October 11, 2017
behind door 4 The Cowardly Angel
behind door 4 The Cowardly Angel
I knocked on Angels door, but there was no answer. I knocked again. Nothing. But I just saw her walk in, and unless she escaped out the window-- I went to my office and rang her phone. Busy. Maybe that explains it. Thirty minutes later the phone was still busy, so I returned to the door and banged vigorously. "ANGEL open the door!" The door opened. "Oh, I didnt know it was you!"
The Angel puts her home phone number on her syllabus and gives her cell phone number to every member of the faculty and staff at the university. She is warm, friendly, open, and accessible. Everyone loves her, and everyone thinks she is their best friend. Thats why right now shes hiding in the dark listening to the knocking and the ringing. She cant make it stop, and she cant possibly do all the things people want her to do. Its not humanly possible.
The Cowardly Angel is not a gendered identity, either (though the hiding-in-the-dark strategy might be). The first person I met like this was a powerful male figure in my discipline. College deans and university presidents are often like this, politicians, too. Still, I never really understood the phenomenon until the day I stood outside Angels door and discovered that she had the ability to sit there in the dark and listen to the knocking.
Disclaimer: Although I do think that all those people have some breaking point or way of dealing with the bottom line, I think their strategies vary, and this hiding in the dark is not the strategy of a famous person. Those people are behind door #3.
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