To err is human; to forgive oneself, divine.
I could not have been looking forward to teaching my new Design & Innovation class this semester more. It had doubled in size. Double the joy of meeting students who had flown in from around the world and twice the fun of connecting them with their most innovative selves.
The semester began with an unexpectedly quiet bang, a 4-minute, 33-second John Cagean silent interlude that extended to 60+ minutes in a classroom that had everyone in it except me. I was happily on my way to another recurring engagement when the emails started coming in from some of the canaries in a professor-less coal mine. Jean, who travelled from France to begin class that day wrote, “Hi Professor, when will you be arriving? The class of Fall 2023 is currently seated in room…”
Gulp. I was experiencing a ripple in the matrix. A tear in the force. An epic lapse. A snafu.
The turmoil and confusion of that morning reminded me of earlier incidents that earned me the affectionate title of “luftmensch,” or “airhead” in Yiddish, from my mom. She used to say: “If your head wasn’t attached you’d lose that too.” She was secretary to the superintendent of schools of Great Neck, a critical part of the school district’s infrastructure and someone who kept the administration operating like clockwork. So when she realized her son was a dreamer through and through, she had her work cut out for her. This head-lost-in-the-clouds trait is one I’ve not only come to treasure in myself, but (yikes!) instill in others. Not the “Idiot, you forgot to go to class” kind, but the wide-eyed, daydreamy state, that lets us be our most innovative selves.
With teachable moments, three’s a charm:
1) I’ll lump all my childhood air-headed-ness into one: an abundance of lost gloves, notebooks, shoes, lunches etc…
2) 17 years later: I had just spent a month working with Gerald Marks, a renowned expert on 3D technology and innovation — a creative and technical rockstar who had recently completed the first ever fully 3D video for The Rolling Stones. We were collaborating on a presentation for People Magazine and I was to present our finished work to a room full of C-level, media professionals at 7 o’clock. I formed a perfect picture of the event in my mind — the sun glinting off the 32nd floor of the Time-Life building, cocktails, and a celebratory atmosphere. Ah, the power of the human mind to manifest an experience! Only this event was scheduled for 7am and not 7pm. And I slept peacefully through the only opportunity I’d ever get to make the presentation. The next day, the producer of the event refused to accept my apology in the form of a potted plant.
3) And here we are, 36 years later on day one of the new semester. Sheepishly, I slipped into class four days after the false start. I connected my laptop to the bright, shiny 60-inch display, and projected a single, bold word onto the screen: SNAFU. Only a couple students knew what it meant, so I provided an explanation: Situation Normal, All F**ked Up. And there I stood, bathed in an embarrassed and inglorious light.
I next tried to convince the class that the tiniest of typographic oversights had led to this predicament: in my earliest read on schedule, I mistakenly read, “Design & Innovation 10:15–1:15pm T” as “Design & Innovation 10:15–1:15pm F,” blindly assuming that the location, time, and DAY were the same as last Fall. I had literally “F-ed” up. Once the class grasped the magnitude of my minuscule F*kup, I moved on to talking about how defining moments, even embarrassing ones, can impact the focus and trajectory of our lives.
We can only teach what we know, and in this instance, I shared the value of embracing failure and uncertainty, two things fundamental to being an innovator. My students were kind and forgiving, phew!and the administration, rightfully frustrated by the havoc I caused, generously rescheduled 14 weeks of classes. My mom would have been aghast.
I’m sure it’ll be 2051 before I again subject an institute of higher learning to a SNAFU of this kind. But I’d feel better if some of you shared how you’ve F-ed up royally in the comments below :)
