Ph.D., Northwestern University
Office: Living Learning Academic 133
Phone: (828) 262-2419
E-mail:
wentworthja@appstate.edu
Orson Scott Card taught me that a job is wonderful and rewarding but one's career is the family. I agree and have cut back some on school duties, but the problem is, I really have two -- the most important biological one and the other, the Watauga family.
My home family does well: wife Nancy Wells is Director of Study Abroad Programs at ASU and has to suffer through such indignities as visiting sites in England, Ireland, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, and France as well as enduring a special Fulbright Fellowship to Germany for three weeks this April/May. Our oldest son Kevin is a naturalist who works on eco-tour boats for a month in Baja in winter and Alaska in summer and does teaching and computer whiz stuff to earn most of his living; he returns to grad school in the fall. Neva is wonderfully well married and will begin chiropractic school in May. Her husband Tony, our newest son, is a crackerjack pilot, but the only grandchild they've given us is Drummer, their Australian sheepdog. Our twins, Rion, a bassist, and Bradley, a drummer, entered North Carolina School of the Arts as sophomores and are now looking at conservatories for college. Sean is a freshman in high school and intends a career in marine biology; he's already a certified SCUBA diver who has seen sharks, rays, green turtles, morays, and a zillion other creatures!
I putter along. My response to an extravagant Christmas present from Nancy's parents was to dislocate my shoulder while body surfing in Hawaii -- ever the ungrateful child! The hoped-for Fulbright did not come through for Turkey and we decided, reluctantly, to turn down the offer for Romania. A semester leave allowed me to write 300 pages of a novel which now languishes, but another project is still hot. Bob Chumbley and I did a 30 minute piece based on one of my children's stories, The Tree of Fallen Stars . Bob composed music, Drew Detweiler made a video, Teresa Lee directed, and Cindy Klingberg made wonderful masks. The show was performed during the summer of 1996 by the Broyhill Chamber Ensemble with Teresa and me narrating . Currently, the Atlanta Ballet is seeking corporate funding in order to turn the story into a full length ballet! I'm excited! There will also be a children's book -- with marvelous illustrations by the costume designer, Judanna Lynn.
My only professional activity of note -- other than driving students crazy in courses like "Performance Art," "Poetry," a new course on "Myth and Dreams" with Joan Woodworth (Walls to you old-timers) and the core courses -- is running the 1997 annual conference of the interdisciplinary professional organization, The Association for Integrative Studies. We had that conference at the Broyhill Inn in Boone in October, and I'm still recovering. I was elected to the Board of Directors of the organization as punishment for making money (for AIS) on the conference.
ASU students seem to be getting academically stronger as university standards go up (up to the standards WC students have always set!), and we still get the risk-takers, the pick of the crop. What a great place to teach -- where I'm always working with family! No wonder I still love it.
