I was invited to the UC chancellor’s mansion. The directions took me down a familiar street at night, the dark winding curves recognizable. The map said “turn here,” and as I looked to the left I saw a driveway I had never seen before, tucked away behind edging plants, and out of sight

.

As I turned in to the hidden driveway, it revealed its expansiveness. It was winged, with paths on either side of a massive fountain. Before you got lost in its grandeur, a helpful attendant appeared to direct all traffic toward the right—the show house.

The event invitation makes this seem a social call. But from the moment the parking attendants wave you into the nearest available spot, you are counting down the minutes until you can pull right back out. This was the First Year Faculty dinner, the culmination of three solid weeks of orientations and get-to-knows.

Getting out of my car, I fell in line with the army of new hires. We threaded along the undulating path. Past the hedgerows, we were met with a massive rectangular lawn, manicured to perfection. Just beyond the lawn was sawtooth-edged patio dotted with dining tables and chairs.

But, it wasn’t time for dinner yet. First order of business? Show your face. Earn your meal.

The chancellor himself was standing at the front door, pressing the flesh of every single new faculty. A stooping, bald white man in his 60s, he was casually dressed in a button-down white shirt and blue slacks. He seemed affable.

When I reached the door, he spoke to me in a broad-chested Teddy Roosevelt manner.

“So, you are?” He asked, bending down to hear my response.

“Sabrina Strings.”

“Professor Strings! Yes, that’s right, in Sociology.”

“Uh, yes.” Somehow I was alarmed, rather than comforted, by the name recognition. Sometimes, as a faculty member of color, the last thing you want is greater visibility.

“Well, welcome.” He stood up to his full height, allowing me to walk past.

“Thank you.” I nodded and headed into the reception area.

The hall was strategically lit. The lights were dimmer in the entryway, where attendants were on hand to relieve you of your pesky belongings: your jacket, your purse containing your phone. The unspoken message was that we reclusive, intellectual types were not to hover near exits, pretending to be on an urgent call, while really just trying to get away from additional human contact. No, we were to stay inside and feel awkward. It occurred to me that they were trying to prevent us from using our phones, and had taken our keys. One way to describe these actions is that we were being held hostage. I took my phone out of my purse before checking my bag, and slid it into my pants pocket.

I walked by a couple of tables where conversations were already in full swing. At one of them, people were chopping it up excitedly! All candor and verve! I thought cynically that they were putting on a good show for the chancellor’s benefit. I smirked. The hosts aren’t going to use my pretend mirth opportunistically. I thought. My well-timed guffaws were not to be used to generate photo-ops for the university website. No sir!

I walked into the next room. The dysphoria was so thick you could touch it. No fake laughs in this one. No, this one was being managed in the more adult fashion: with people staring into their solemnly into their drink glasses. The catering staff were few in number, and it wasn’t clear when you might get your hands on a canapé, much less another glass of liquid to help you get loose. You could feel the anxiety of people who were getting down to their last few sips. They were afraid of the horrifying prospect of finishing their drinks and being left without any props. I decided to stay and see where that energy might lead.

I sidled up to a woman I recognized from an earlier training, a white woman with a wide face and deep-set eyes. She was one of these women who liked to say “my husband” a lot. She believed she “had it all,” and couldn’t wait to tell others about it.

“Hey Janice.” I said quietly.

She turned and smiled at me, mouthing “Hey.” We regarded one another. It was clear that neither of us had remembered a single thing about the other that wasn’t work related. We quickly realized this interaction wasn’t going to blossom into something more meaningful, and began avoiding eye contact.

An Asian man standing next to me was holding court. He was telling some story for the benefit of the white woman on his left. He was clearly on the make, and this grandstanding was his ploy to keep her focused on him. It was working, but you could tell from her eyes it was only because she didn’t think there was anything better to do in there. Sensing a break in his story, Janice saw an opportunity to horn in. She took it upon herself to introduce me to the group.

“Everyone, this is Sabrina. She does work on the history of fat stigma, and the contemporary obesity epidemic.”

“Hi,” I said waving to the mass of them. The man on the make screwed up his face, afraid I would steal his thunder.

“Really?” He asked. “What department are you in?”

“Sociology.” I replied. The people around the table looked at me slack jawed. I saw Janice’s neck stiffen.

“What department are you all in?” I asked.

“Molecular Biology.” The man on the make replied, brimming with authority.

In case you didn’t know, there are partisan lines in the academy. There’s the Natural Sciences (sometimes chauvinistically labeled the “hard sciences”) like chemistry, physics, and biology. Then there’s the Social Sciences (sometimes derisively called the “soft sciences”) under which umbrella are sociology, anthropology, and political science. Finally, there’s the Humanities, who as philosophers of sorts, might defensively theorize their superiority, while every other discipline looks down their noses at them because they are not doing “science.”

The MOTM’s declaration of “Molecular Biology,” hit his peers like a dog whistle for their ascendancy. I, on the other hand, was supposed to feel some form of deference to those doing “real science.” Instead, I just felt annoyed that a boring and pompous person, who was never going to fuck that white lady, was trying to use my introduction for additional self-aggrandizing. I grinned and said,

“Excuse me.” And walked off.

I landed at a table with a lone white man. He was more formal than most of us, wearing a jacket and a tie, which you could see he regretted. His goatee was a bit off-putting. He was standing there, staring longingly at the last remaining swig of beer in his glass.

There were no chairs at any of the tables. The entire reception was standing room only. The tables were rib height. Tall enough for you to set your drink on while you chatted, and maybe an elbow. But, the lack of furniture for taking a load off was intended to convey the message that you were still at work.

“Hi,” I said to the lonely man. As I looked at him, I noticed a glimmer of desperation behind his eyes. It expressed something to the effect of please God, let this end. The party only started 20 minutes earlier.

“Oh hi.” He said, game for conversation. Talking to a stranger was better than standing there alone. We politely exchanged work info.

New people were steadily arriving. Seeing a non-intimidating party of two, several of them made their way to our table. Next thing either of us knew, ours was one of the more boisterous tables in the reception hall.

An older white man stopped by our table and started talking to me as if we knew each other. Walked up to me like,

“Hey!” Startled, I was like,

“Oh, hello.”

Now, people commonly assume they know me. I have a familiar face. And there’s been more than one white person who has confused me for one of the Black people they’ve met. This solicitous white man starting going on about the spreading FOROW: Fear of Running Out of Wine.

“God, I hope they don’t run out of wine here. Some of these people are going to be unbearable without it.” He said this without irony. Then, he tipped his head in the direction of the Molecular Bio table and shot us a knowing glance.

I smiled, rummaging in my pocket to check my phone. I had been there about 40 minutes. It was time for an absolutely believable bathroom break. I excused myself, but now touched with the paranoia of No Wine, I decided to bring my wine with me to the toilet. Because what if when I came back to the table, a waiter had taken it? Or worse, it was still there, but mixed in with other discarded glasses so’s for me to look absolutely insane trying to assess which one I could drink from without getting hepatitis?

I walked out of the palatial main hall and back outside, which tellingly enough was where the guest restrooms were located. At the restroom door was an attendant, waiting. I realized I couldn’t very well walk in with my glass of wine, so I discreetly hid it in a nearby shrub. Then turned and headed into the toilets.

I didn’t need to go. I was just in there trying to gauge how long I could hold the stall without anyone noticing or getting pissed off (hehe). There wasn’t a line or anything yet. But I could only be in there so long before any smells emanating from the lavatory were going to be attributed to me.

Ten minutes for a woman seemed reasonable. After that, I gathered myself, then came out of the stall. I washed my hands slowly and methodically. I took a look at my hair in the mirror. The twist-out I’d come in with had transmogrified into an afro. Goddam soft-hold gel! Uggggh! Nothing to be done about that. I dried my hands and smiled at the attendant as I walked out of the restroom and back into the sad festivities.

I returned to the shrub into which my wine had been safely nestled. It wasn’t there. Where is it?! Was it here? Or here? I was going from bush to bush, peeking in. I was quickly spotted by a waitress.

“Do you need help with anything?” She asked.

“Oh, I just think I misplaced my wine glass.” I said.

“In the bushes?” She wanted to know.

“Well, I mean I set it on this rock right here behind the bush…” Hmm, I had not considered this option when I left for the bathroom. Rooting around in the bushes searching for discarded wine. This worse than the first two options.

“Miss, if any of the waiters saw it, they would have dumped it.”

I felt my chin quivering.

“But, it looks like the chancellor is just about to give his speech. It’s going to be great! You don’t want to miss it. And don’t worry, we were going to collect the wine glasses before dinner anyway. There will be more drinks served at the table.”

That goofy old white man who thought he knew me! Stoking the FOROW for no good reason. The party organizers obviously knew better and had come prepared.

I’d planned to wend my way back to my table, but the party was packed. I couldn’t see how to get by. The chancellor was about to begin his speech. Didn’t make sense to elbow my way through the crowd to get back to a table where no one knew me. I had to settle for standing on the outer ring of the audience, on the brick patio just outside the main reception hall. I wasn’t alone. There were about 40 of us standing outside for the indoor speech. We locked eyes, then shrugged, like this is all BS anyways.

Turned out, though, the chancellor gave a rousing speech. He said,

“We value inclusive excellence at this university. We know that as a bunch of old white guys, we do not have all the answers.”

I blinked twice, thinking, you don’t hear that every day. But then I lost interest.

It occurred to those of us on the patio that we were going to get first dibs on dinner seating, since we were basically already standing at the dinner tables. Hot damn! Suddenly there was a buzz of anticipation among us. We would be rewarded for our tardiness! Haha! Yes!

The chancellor wrapped up to an applause that signaled an appreciation for both the speech, and the fact that we would finally be allowed to sit down. I rotated on my heels, and found myself near the front of the buffet line. I filled my plate with salmon in a light cream sauce, roasted vegetables with rutabaga, and baked purple fingerling potatoes. I stepped gingerly in the direction of the dinner tables. Having my pick, I sat down at one of the tables near the exit. I smiled, realizing that I had been winning all night in terms of being well-placed to transition to the next thing.

Other young faculty seemed to have a similar idea. An Asian woman in a purple blazer I recognized from one of the earlier trainings, Jasmine, joined me at the table. We had an instant rapport. She was followed by a Black woman, and I knew right then, that we were The Cool Table.

Soon we had all the women of color, and we could’ve rivaled Molecular Bio in our self-satisfaction. Our evident prestige led the white women to want in.

We ended up with a pretty fair balance of women of color and white women. The white woman sitting directly across from me was named Jacky. She too, was familiar. I had certainly seen her at one of the other trainings. She had a round, pleasing face. She seemed open, amiable.

We made small talk around the table, chatting about the full week of soul-stealing orientations that preceded this grand finale. And yet amid the suffering and complaints, we had to admit the meal was delicious. There were smiles and light laughter in between sipping and supping, the glow from the patio lights illuminating each woman’s face. It felt good to be in the company of intelligent, successful women.

And then, before we knew it, the shindig was over.

Jacky got up to head to the restroom before taking her leave. When she returned, she was carrying a vase from one of the reception tables.

“Hey, where did you get that?” I said.

“Oh, they’re giving them away!” She said breathlessly. “The chancellor doesn’t live here full time and the arrangements will just go bad, so…”

She trailed off. I turned around to see a young black gentleman I’d met a few days prior power walking toward the parking lot carrying a window box.

“If you want one, you’d better get it now, before they’re all gone!”

That’s when it happened. New faculty in business attire sprinting to denude the tables of their centerpieces. Then, they scurried out of the party with the loot. I thought maybe that riot music from The Flintstones should be playing in the background. It was all very sad. But I got myself one just the same.

I was standing in the parking lot holding a 5lb glass box filled with water and roses, like I was on the receiving end of one of Oprah’s more frugal giveaways. How in the hell do I get this home now? Ugh.

Jacky walked up behind me, a grin plastered across her face.

“Say,” she began, “Did I hear you say that you’re a yoga teacher?”

“Yes. Well, I used to be. I’ve been thinking about holding a few classes here.”

“Well let me know,” she smiled, “I’d love to take one of your classes.”

“OK.” I smiled back.

“Let’s exchange numbers.” She suggested. We swapped phones and added our contact information.

“Have a good night.” She said, smiling as she turned to go.

It wasn’t what she said so much as the way she said it. There was a flirtatiousness in her voice, a coquettishness in her expression. I lingered just a moment under the phosphorescent lamps of the parking lot. Then that damn vase got heavy, so I hurried back to my car.

To learn more about my sexual escapades, check out The End of Love: Racism, Sexism, and the Death of Romance.