Dunce Day!

"....the dunce cap comes from a 13th-century philosopher named John Duns Scotus, who, not surpisingly, was born in Duns, Scotland."

"This well-respected but terribly oblique scholar felt that conical hats actually increased learning potential. Here's the theory -- knowledge is centralized at the apex and then funneled down into the mind of the wearer."

"Scotus was widely praised in his day, but eventually fell out of intellectual favor. His "duns cap" was a pretty obvious target of derision and came to symbolize stupidity."

So welcome to Dunce Day! I have to share that I celebrated.
See, Tuesday is an administrative meeting kinda day. I meet with the veteran psychologist at ten and by eleven I'm on the road so I arrive by twelve-thirty for my administrative meeting. And no, it's not exactly treasured time! Give me the seasoned psychologist with the fancy letters behind his name--pretty well known child psychologist who continues to work with us past his official retirement simply because he a) loves working with children and b) he openly states that he comes to the unit for the fun the grownups have with him. And someone's going to have to explain why I pay HIM when we're his source of entertainment...LOL

And then there's that 12:30 meeting.
Honestly, I'm sure they're good folks--we're simply interested in different things. There are three familiar faces, people who've been there for multiples of years, who are invested in the agency and are mission driven people. And then there are the rest....newer folks who readily raise hands for projects that will put them in the center of the CEO's attention, who state they're interested in learning all they can because their aspirations are to become 'bigger' and 'better'.

It's not my aspiration to become 'bigger' or 'better' at doing anything except what it is that I'm already doing.
Fact is, I didn't ask for this position when it was handed to me.
Heck, never once have I WANTED to progress up some career ladder. With every move comes less time doing what it is that I'm committed to doing. I spend more time manipulating to GET more of that time than I do caring about who has what position and what project they're involved in.
Nice people, I'm sure--different mission driven lives.
And I admit I get irritated with the game playing that becomes involved. It's just plain silly.

Yeah, well--in a nutshell, that's the 12:30 meeting. I managed to 'excuse' myself from attending for a good chunk of time(1 1/2 years).....until the boss came to me one day and told me "I NEED you in that meeting....." That's when I surrendered and started to show up.

And I showed up today with my Dunce/Duns Cap.
Yep, my red cone was on my head with the word "Duns" written on it.
I assured them it was to channel my apex and enhance my supreme intellect.
I'm thinkin' some of those folks could use a lesson or two in how to "play"....LOL And not one of them knew it was Dunce Day!

And they think they're so dang smart!
It was a hit with a several folks. The boss asked for the groups forgiveness. The CEO, Anne, asked to borrow it and slapped it on her own head cuz apparently she needed HER apex channeled--this after I challenged her idea which sounded good in theory but in practice was simply not doable....but I offered a more workable solution which she bought and endorsed....so that was good! I did notice the boss looked a bit green whilest I was dickering with Anne....*shrugs*

The BESTEST news is--- I don't have to be IN the work group to start the project...LOL Some aspiring wanna-be volunteered so I don't HAVE to lose time with the kiddos and families and staff that I work with!! Woooohooooo!!!!
And I did get my Duns Cap back from Anne.

The boss did ask me to remind him WHY I suddenly was attending the Administrative Meetings after near a year of refusing to participate?? "Because you said you NEEDED me at the meeting, 'member?"

"Vaguely.....was I having delusions when I said that?"

I just nodded.
Sometimes it's better to take your Duns Cap and exit before someone else wants to don it and channel their intelligence.
He's a BIG fella!
At six foot ten, he could seriously hurt me! LOL