Yesterday, October 24, 2006 I had an oral examination to satisfy a new requirement for Ph.D. candidates, to recertify that they were still on top of their game in their field. In that sense, for that purpose, it went okay. On the other hand, I wasn’t very satisfied with where I came out in my own estimation.

I have spent the last year and a half defending myself against a $15,000 collections lawsuit filed against me by the University of Pennsylvania. I was ultimately successful, after pouring unlimited time and energy into understanding the legal proceedings against me, and after also pouring unlimited time and energy into first, getting the complete record of the University’s charges, and then understanding the accounting conventions used in the archive thus produced, and then matching that archive against other records, and emails, concerning my bill with the University. Half that amount of $15,000 was late penalty charges, at 1.5% per month. Of the other $7,500, I had paid, after locating UPenn errors in billing, $9,500. That is, I had already paid $2,000 in late fees, over and above paying all the tuition due for the corrected billings. Others agreed, and prevailed upon Collections at UPenn to drop the law suit.

For the final Arbitration Court Hearing, therefore, the University’s (nasty) lawyer did not show up. I went into the three-person panel and showed that in the original pleadings I had asked for lawyer’s fees, and since I had not been able to find a lawyer, had served as my own lawyer. I asked the panel to award me the fees I would have had to pay a lawyer. They demurred, explaining that courts often do not award lawyer’s fees in any case. They did ask me what costs I had incurred, especially as I had filed and been awarded a Petition to proceed in Forma Pauperis. I replied that I had paid the cost of filing the Answer with the Prothonotary. I misremembered the amount as $90, although it was $129, and the panel decided in my favor and ordered UPenn to pay me $90.

Should I take that award to the people who finally agree that my dissertation satisfies the necessary paper and microfilming requirements to be filed? That is when I will pay $80 for the Copyright and filing with Proquest for a microfilm copy to be deposited as a permanent record of the work?

Two months after that Arbitration Hearing, I am preparing a major paper for delivery at the Annual Convention of the American Academy of Religion and the Society of Biblical Literature. I am preparing the bibliography for my dissertation; I am revising a paper on Aramaic for publication. “I don’t have time for this!” But I rationalized that since I entered before the requirement for an oral exam, I can do this for an hour.

That was yesterday.

Today, very suddenly, I am first sad, in a post-traumatic stress disorder funk, about all that has been lost in that protracted period of the lawsuit. I am sad, too, because the bright shiny goal of the Ph.D. in Religious Studies, doing original work on an ancient text, and significantly shifting the context for its reading — that bright and shining goal has been tarnished by the behavior of the University that will be granting the degree. That degree will never regain its luster, I fear.

I am hoping I will be able to write my way out of the pain that I feal now.

A bright spot, for a few moments today, came when I saw this cartoon in Slate. The cartoon refers to the sentencing decision in the Enron case; Jeff Skilling will spend more than 24 years in prison, and pay some restitution. The cartoon reminded me of the day of victory, when the Arbitration Panel declared in my favor and awarded me costs of $90. Sometimes there is justice. And sometimes (maybe later?) justice is enough.