Kentucky ?!?!?!?!?!!!

What? Are you serious? You have got to be joking!

Nope, no joking here. We just had a MAJOR change of plans.

So one week after my last blog about moving to Utah, S. got a phone call. He was on his way home for dinner, and taking way too long. I was sitting at the dinner table contemplating eating dinner with out him, as I tried to call him to see where he was in his travels, but he didn't answer. A few minutes later he walked in the door on the phone with someone, but who? S. wanting to share the phone call, turned the volume onto speaker. Some guy was talking about the ceramics program at Morehead State University (in the town of Morehead, KY which is 1 hour east of Lexington). My curiosity peaked. The next thing I heard was "will you accept the full-time ceramics position?". I was jumping up and down in my chair quietly telling S.: "say yes, say yes!!!". And he did.

Nine years of schooling, and a year full of hard times and struggles, S. was finally able to reach his treasure: teaching higher education full-time. We almost stopped short in the oasis. (For clarification regarding the treasure and the oasis, you'll just have to read The book THE ALCHEMIST , and think of S. For this book has kept S. pressing forward, knowing that his treasure would be found and obtained.)

To backtrack....

Last year, 2009, S. applied for the professor position at Morehead State University. He was invited for an on-campus interview in April 2009 just before his thesis exhibition. He felt the interview went very well, and the way the department chair talked to him about the position gave him great hope that he would be offered the job. But this obviously did not happen. In March this year S. attended NCECA (National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts), an annual occurance. There he found out the same position was open again, and was determined to apply. When he came back from NCECA, he also had an email from Morehead State University asking him to apply to the position again. Seth applied for the position.

Since January S. had applied for over 30 higher-ed positions....and nothing. Then out of the blue a fellow ceramics friend who teaches HS in Jordan, UT called and asked Seth if he would like to teach HS. Well, it meant we would get to come home, and it would be a full time job (the oasis); we did not know or expect anything else to come along, and we were very happy for the opportunity, but S. still felt sad he would not be fulfilling his goal of teaching higher-ed (the treasure).

To make a long story longer, we were set for Utah, until the Dept. Chair from MSU called and offered S. the job with out an additional interview. They liked S. last year but felt he needed more teaching experience. Oh the tender mercies of the Lord, to send us to Kalamazoo, MI, where S. would have 3 schools to get ample teaching experience.

Sorry Utah.....Kentucky, here we come.