The Texas Times, Volume 19

Greetings from San Antonio and welcome to the 19th annual Wilkins Family Holiday Missive! I've begun typing this after handing out my last final exam (December 13). At present, there are 27 undergrads thoroughly engaged in this little exercise and of course you can cut the tension in the room with a knife. If you're too old to remember that feeling specifically, I'm hoping that some of it will seep through.

Where to begin? Well, to say that the last 12 months have been a whirlwind would be quite the understatement, but I'll go ahead and say it anyway ... the last 12 months have been a whirlwind. Most of you have been reasonably well informed about the Major Life Changes that have occurred during this period, and the rest of you are about to join that crowd. As usual, I'll try to be both brief AND engaging ...

The Move

As many of you know, for about the past decade we'd not been particularly thrilled with the direction that Texas A&M had been heading. Although the Accounting department was able to maintain an astounding level of rationality and my 5-year PPA students were still terrific and a huge amount of fun to be around, the level of dysfunction in Paige's department (Finance) was quickly approaching infinity and the goals of the college and university were no longer within shouting distance of ours. When we finally gave up and admitted that we really had no idea what we were supposed to do with our lives and, most importantly, stopped fighting the idea of leaving, we found out about Trinity's professorship in Finance the very next day. And from there it just got weirder and weirder and weirder, including Trinity being able to fund a similar position in Accounting that had gone unfilled for the past few years. So HERE (click) we are. I think the lesson is that when you genuinely pray for direction you'd better be ready for change.

Do we like it here in San Antonio? Very much. As I've told some of you, U.S. News has ranked Trinity as the top small university in the West for the past 21 years and our goal is to not screw that up. So far, so good. The students are very good and a lot of fun to be around, just like those we've had in the past. The geek factor may be marginally higher here than it is at large public universities, but really I've not noticed any significant interpersonal differences between these kids and ones that I've interacted with in one way or another since ... well ... forever. Enrollment is about 2,500 (as compared to 50,000 at A&M) and obviously the focus is liberal arts. The cool thing, though, is that the Business program is solid and we even have a thriving (if small) Master's in Accounting program. If you were to count the number of peer universities who can check all of those boxes, you wouldn't have to use your second hand. As such, what we are able to offer is rather unique. Is it perfect? Of course not. Every university has its share of egos and hidden agendas -- rather, agendas that people think they are hiding, such that the comic effect is decent -- but our department is fantastic and I really have nothing but good things to say about the school as a whole. And have you seen a better spot than this (below) for me to hold office hours? Me neither. So ... send your kids to Trinity! We'll treat them right.  :)

The Kids

Continuing with the Trinity theme, Reagan transferred here from A&M along with us. While his experience at A&M was basically just a continuation of high school, things here are rather different. He's still majoring in English and planning on being a writer / professor (I think), but he's living on campus and doing the college life bit. His roommate is great and has a mom who is super-nice and ultra-friendly and outgoing and a dad who is very dry and sarcastic. Wow. Sound familiar? Reagan is in the choir (click), he's part of a three-member band that has opened for and will be opening for some guy who was on The Voice (apparently that is a TV show), and he's doing tutoring for abused kids along with other residents in his dorm. I think he may actually like this place more than I do ... which is a Very Big Statement.

The other three kids are doing fine as well. Hunter and Hadley both go to Alamo Heights High School and Hollis goes to Woodridge Elementary (for those of you who know San Antonio). Both of those schools and Trinity are less than four miles from our house, which of course is fabulous. I cannot begin to tell you how happy we are that we decided not to live in the suburbs. Anyway, all three of the kids like their schools a lot, have made new friends, etc. Hunter, who is now a junior, is involved with theatre and choir and is particularly looking forward to the Princeton SAT review classes that will be starting at the end of January. If you don't know Hunter, you can't fully appreciate that idea. If you do, you may finish reading when you have stopped laughing.

Hadley is a freshman this year. I know, I know ... crazy, right?? She plays forward on the JV soccer team and will be resuming her quest for 100m hurdles gold in the spring as well. Her only problems at this point are that high school classes are kicking her butt and she's getting way too interested in boys. Unfortunately those are my problems, too. Wait ... that didn't come out right. I mean that Hadley's PROBLEMS are my problems as well, by virtue of the fact that I am her father. (Special thanks to Paige for serving as Editor-in-Chief). Anyway, Hadley still at least pretends to like us a whole lot and she's not YET exhibiting any of the crazy high school girl tendencies that I've been dreading for the past couple of years. I know it is just a matter of time, but I'll take sanity as long as I can get it.

And finally, Hollis is in 4th grade and has adjusted fine as well. As many of you know, he had crazy ridiculous medical issues beginning in September of 2011 and extending through June of 2012. These things comprised a fair bit of the whirlwind referred to in the second paragraph. Suffice to say that all of our considerable family medical problems have paled in comparison to this one, but we hope that it is now under control. If none of this sounds familiar to you and you want the most recent update (from his surgical procedure in June), here it is (click). Six months after the procedure he is still doing fine (knock on wood), and we remain firmly convinced that this is one of the main pieces of evidence that our placement in San Antonio is Divinely inspired.

Random Stuff

I'm not real sure what is going to materialize in this section, as the entire past year has been both completely random and completely non-random ... and frankly I can't remember hardly anything except medical stuff and the move. But we're 2 hours and 15 minutes into the final and there are still 12 people writing away, so I guess I'll start typing and we'll see how it goes.

• Around the same time that Hollis started having problems last fall, my mom was diagnosed with Multiple Myeloma. Yeah, 2011 was fabulous. Long story short, she's done everything and had the stem cell transplant and because she basically is perfect and all, she had a relatively easy time of it and is doing fabulously.
• Kate Rusby's twenty-year retrospective -- aptly named, "20" -- was released this October. Buy it. If you don't know who Kate is, you should. Now is your chance.
• If you know anyone who is moving to College Station and who needs a six-bedroom house, let me know. Ours is still available and I wouldn't mind selling it before the mortgage is paid off in 4 1/2 years or so. And as your economics lesson for the day, if you Google "liquid asset," our house will not be pictured. 
• One of the classes I taught this semester was the Business Ethics course for the graduate Accounting students. On the desk in the classroom where I am STILL sitting (15 minutes before the final exam for the Principles class officially ends), there are multiple copies of the final exam for the New Testament class that is offered through the Religion department. Reagan is taking that class next semester. Should I take a copy? I guess not ...
• Book recommendations ... here are three. First up is Wendell Berry's "Imagination in Place." I am a big fan of Berry's work and this is a terrific set of essays. Second is Billy Graham's "Hope for Each Day." This is the best set of short, daily devotionals I've ever seen. Third is the new McCrorie (click) translation of "The Iliad." One of my colleagues in the Classics department here at Trinity wrote the Introduction to this translation, and that alone is worth the purchase price.
• For those of you who are into British comedy, I highly recommend "Father Ted," and "One Foot In the Grave." Both of these series were done in the 1990s and are available on Netflix. As for movies, I don't really have anything in the way of recommendations this year. I will note, however, that it is a good thing I am not Batman ... because if Anne Hathaway had offered me the opportunity of leaving with her on that cool bike (or a broken tricycle, for that matter) instead of hanging around and saving the city, the world would now be short one metropolitan area. A super-hero I am not.

And with that, I'll close. We all hope that you have a terrific and blessed Season. And if your travel plans involve San Antonio, be sure to let us know! When she's not power-washing the concrete in preparation for your arrival at the guest house out back, Paige can be found on Facebook ... and I am available on Twitter (@mkwlkns). Our other contact info is provided below.

God Bless,

Mike (mw0705@mac.com) and
Paige (paigefields@satx.rr.com) and etc ...

1009 Garraty Road

San Antonio, TX 78209

210-314-5336