A Portrait of the Professor in the Garage
By Benjamin J. Birkinbine
I am sitting alone in my garage on a cold night. An old desk lamp with a torn shade provides the only source of light, and the light beams barely reach the corners of the garage. Every now and then a gust of wind causes the entire garage to shudder. My only heat source is a small space heater, which sits behind my old office chair. The chair does not really help shake off the cold either, but I find ways of coping. Sitting on a pillow at least helps me avoid sitting directly on the chair’s cracked faux-leather covering, which is always cold.
I have just completed recording a 75-minute lecture on my laptop computer. Luckily, Zoom comes with a virtual background feature that makes it look like I am delivering my lecture on a beautiful sunny day on the University of Nevada, Reno campus. I try to stay upbeat during lectures, but every now and then I can hear our baby daughter, Sophia, crying through the walls inside. I wonder whether students can hear the crying baby through the audio of the Zoom meeting and whether they immediately feel stressed the same way I do? All I really want to do in those moments is end class and go inside to be with her and my wife, Roberta.
Sophia was born at the end of October, 2019. She was almost five-months old when lockdown orders were issued. The lockdown allowed me to spend most of my day with her, although I needed to retreat to my garage office at various points throughout the day. Sometimes it would be hours in the garage, particularly when I was teaching. Being in lockdown with a baby brings its fair share of struggles and joyous occasions. The lack of options outside the home requires some creative solutions for keeping the baby stimulated, especially finding new activities or experiences. Yes, we took walks in the park and a few other outdoor activities, but most of the time was spent inside.
Luckily for me, Sophia shares a love of music. I purchased an acoustic guitar shortly before she was born, and my amateur noodling helps pass some time. That she seems to enjoy my playing probably gives me more confidence than I deserve. After all, I never learned music formally. When I was 17, some friends in high school were starting a punk rock band. They needed a bass guitar player, so I bought one for $300 from a local shop. A family friend helped me pick one out. When I visited my parents in Wisconsin a few years ago, my mother found an old folder packed with bass guitar tablatures that I had printed out using our family’s first computer. The bass tabs for the entire Ramones self-titled album were still in there. It seems absurd now to look at rows of “55555555, 5555, 7777, repeat (x4)” printed on more than 20 pages, but this was the method by which I learned music. Very simple, yet effective. And Sophie loves that record! She loves all my records. Nearly every day, she walks over to the collection, picks one out, and says, “weh-cawd.” Once I start the music, she reaches up to me and wants to dance. For some records, she will lay her head on my shoulder. These are the moments that soothe the soul.
Back in the garage, my bass guitar sits idly on its stand right in between the space heater and an old rolled-up yoga mat. It is the only bass I have ever owned, and at times my brain stops to think about how the changes in temperature and humidity will risk permanently damaging the instrument. But the pandemic and its attendant consequences has a way of crowding the brain. My primary coping mechanism has been to sort these thoughts according to priority and urgency. Family comes first, then I deal with the rest as it comes.
The onset of lockdown was particularly trying. I was simultaneously struggling to learn the ropes of effective online instruction (the sooner, the better, but “good enough” is fine for now), putting together my tenure and promotion application (due in April), finalizing a special issue of an academic journal I was editing (due in May), supervising two master’s student theses (also due in May), and serving as the Interim Director of Graduate Studies in the Reynolds School of Journalism (all semester). I wonder whether the prospective graduate students I spoke with realize I was answering their questions while pacing around my garage? Finally, I also needed to prepare to teach an online summer class (June) when the cold and windy nights in the garage would give way to afternoon classes in the oppressive heat.
And yet despite all the disruption, stress, and impending deadlines, I felt fortunate. I was in a position where I could continue to work, while also being able to spend every day with my family. Roberta and I were there to nourish Sophia just as she nourished us. She developed curiosities, interests, feistiness, a sense of humor, and some great dance moves.
I have always found it useful to think about contradictions, and the pandemic has brought plenty worthy of consideration. Technology makes it easier to connect, yet I have never felt more disconnected. A global pandemic requires a global perspective and global solutions, yet my perspective shifted almost entirely to familial needs. In a time of immense suffering and loss, I was able to find moments of joy. Should I feel guilty for this? In the face of the pandemic, I experienced a strange sense of helplessness. At a time when care for others was arguably more important than ever, I retreated to isolation.
Now that I have the benefit of hindsight, I am convinced this was a coping mechanism. After fluctuating between various highs and lows, which were all compounded by the stress associated with the series of major work deadlines, I simply needed to stop. To unplug.
After teaching the online summer class from my garage, my family and I packed up our car and drove for three days back to Wisconsin. Sophie handled the trip very well. There was plenty of singing along the way. We stopped for picnics. We even wrote a song for Sophie during the trip. Once we got back to Wisconsin, we spent time on a relatively secluded lake in the northern part of the state. I needed the disconnection. No internet, no emails, no virtual Zoom backgrounds to make it look like I was somewhere beautiful. I needed time with family on the lake. I needed the outdoors. I needed to get out of the garage.
Once we returned to Reno, I abandoned the office in the garage. We were able to set up a small desk in the corner of a room inside after some rearranging. I also finally got around to repairing my bass guitar. Now all that remains of my office in the garage are my memories, which will take their place among the other relics remaining in the garage. The old lamp, the space heater, the yoga mat, the office chair with the cracked faux-leather covering, and memories of the assistant professor sitting in the garage.
Photo/David Calvert.
Benjamin J. Birkinbine is an Assistant Professor of Media Studies at the Reynolds School of Journalism and Center for Advanced Media Studies at the University of Nevada, Reno.
His research focuses on the political economy of communication, with a specific focus on free and open source software and the digital commons. He is the author of Incorporating the Digital Commons (University of Westminster Press, 2020) and co-editor of Global Media Giants (Routledge, 2017), and his research has been published in Media, Culture & Society, the International Journal of Communication, The Political Economy of Communication, and the Journal of Peer Production.
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