Story Detail
A Moving Experience
by Patrick Gallagher, Head of School
Many stand-up comedy routines have reflected on the arduous process of moving, and the very best bits very often riff on the ultimate test of friendship: helping a friend move.
"Helping a friend move is worse than picking them up from the airport. At least at the airport, I can stay in the car.”
Before I began working at University School, I had for years been living and working at a boarding school. Living on campus, with duties in the dormitory many nights and most weekends, it could be difficult to distinguish between “life” and “work.” For some, the tension proved impossible. They escaped to day schools or left education altogether. For me, the lifestyle was immersive and I was all in.
As a result, I had grown accustomed to spending a great deal of time on campus. In fact, my car would often sit for weeks, dormant, because everything at school and in town was nearby and readily accessible.
When I moved to the East Side of Cleveland in the summer of 2005, then, my number-one priority was proximity to my new school. Heeding new colleagues’ warnings about traffic at the Mayfield and SOM Center Road intersection, I signed a lease for an apartment in Mayfield Heights—south of Mayfield, importantly—so as to cut down on the morning and evening drive times.
Three years later, I had many voices in my ear. “It’s a buyer’s market.” “Interest rates are great right now.” “You are throwing your money away! You need to buy a house and build equity.” That winter, after learning that school was closed for a snow day, I secured a realtor and started visiting homes for sale. With my then-latest US contract helping me to be preapproved for a loan, within a few weeks, I had put in an offer, signed a mortgage, and prepared to move to a new home in University Heights. I was alternately elated and terrified.
One day, I was thinking aloud about the challenges of the imminent big move and getting all of my worldly possessions from the apartment to the house. I was in the English Department office at the Hunting Valley Campus, one of the “bullpen”-style where teachers tended to be when we were not in class.
“What day is it?” asked Jack Fisher ’96, one of my departmental colleagues at the time. When I answered, he did not miss a beat: “I’ll be there.”
Within hours, nearly a dozen colleagues had volunteered to join me that upcoming Saturday. Many would be there bright and early to pack up the truck and make the trek to my new home, and a few more still arranged lunch for us all in the afternoon. Fellow English Teacher, Jim Stephens, not only offered, but insisted, that he pick up and drive the U-Haul that day. The rest of the group packed up their own vehicles with smaller and more fragile items. The last to depart the apartment and the first to arrive at the house, I remember driving alongside my colleagues’ cars en route to University Heights. As it happened, we even spotted Director of College Guidance Whitney Lloyd driving alongside the convoy. (I honked and waved but he did not notice us.)
The day was not without its pitfalls. For example, some of the School’s finest minds wrestled with the geometry problem of getting my couch down a flight of stairs unscathed, before, at long last, finding the solution. Just how much my colleagues were going above and beyond was clear to me throughout those busy hours.
I still think of that day with a mix of awe and appreciation. I knew how hard those same colleagues worked every single day, very often giving more time to the boys of US than the day itself seemed to allow. Free time was a rare commodity. That they would give over a Saturday, to help the junior-most member of the English Department move, moved me then and continues to move me now. I didn’t ask. I didn’t have to ask. Our caravan on Fairmount Boulevard that day was symbolic of the extraordinary generosity of the US community. While my home was now in University Heights, I was there because of the home I had found at University School.
The fact that the collective effort had begun with a single offhand comment in a department office was also fitting. Not all schools have such spaces. Elsewhere, teachers may head to and hole up in their classrooms with little interaction with other adults during the day. US is different. Department offices are home to communication, coordination, and collaboration—enriching the experience of colleagues and, ultimately, of students. Countless conversations just like the one that had spurred my moving day help to galvanize the bonds among colleagues. How any community uses time speaks volumes about its priorities and values.
That day reminds me that, for US faculty, no job is too big, and no job is too small. With so many hours logged together teaching, coaching, advising, sponsoring, chaperoning, and proctoring, it is perhaps unsurprising how close we can become. But it is more than just time and more than mere closeness. “None of us is as smart as all of us,” says author Ken Blanchard. That is true of the US faculty, and I would add that none of us is as dedicated, resourceful, caring, or kind as all of us, either. Being a member of the US faculty has been the greatest honor of my professional life.
We have all experienced the power of the US community, often in tangible and visceral ways. The teammates we come to call brothers. The call the fellow alumnus takes to help out a freshly minted graduate. The many maroon-and-black neckties at the memorial service of a beloved community member. Learning of the ways US touches others’ lives can clarify and magnify its impact on our own. I realize it may seem trivial to recall a story about a six-mile drive on a spring day in Cleveland, yet what draws together so many examples, mundane or momentous, is how we show up for one another. Legendary NBA coach Phil Jackson reflects: “The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team.” US is stronger because of all of us, and the US faculty “team” remains one of our community’s strongest assets.
Thirteen years later, I moved again. I would come full-circle, living on a campus once again as I moved into the Head of School’s residence. This time, the move was both less about US and more about US. This time, I was back at school 24/7 and honored to show up every day for US, albeit with a shorter commute. This time, I paid forward my colleagues' generosity. I hired movers.
Read More Articles
Many stand-up comedy routines have reflected on the arduous process of moving, and the very best bits very often riff on the ultimate test of friendship: helping a friend move.
"Helping a friend move is worse than picking them up from the airport. At least at the airport, I can stay in the car.”
Before I began working at University School, I had for years been living and working at a boarding school. Living on campus, with duties in the dormitory many nights and most weekends, it could be difficult to distinguish between “life” and “work.” For some, the tension proved impossible. They escaped to day schools or left education altogether. For me, the lifestyle was immersive and I was all in.
As a result, I had grown accustomed to spending a great deal of time on campus. In fact, my car would often sit for weeks, dormant, because everything at school and in town was nearby and readily accessible.
When I moved to the East Side of Cleveland in the summer of 2005, then, my number-one priority was proximity to my new school. Heeding new colleagues’ warnings about traffic at the Mayfield and SOM Center Road intersection, I signed a lease for an apartment in Mayfield Heights—south of Mayfield, importantly—so as to cut down on the morning and evening drive times.
Three years later, I had many voices in my ear. “It’s a buyer’s market.” “Interest rates are great right now.” “You are throwing your money away! You need to buy a house and build equity.” That winter, after learning that school was closed for a snow day, I secured a realtor and started visiting homes for sale. With my then-latest US contract helping me to be preapproved for a loan, within a few weeks, I had put in an offer, signed a mortgage, and prepared to move to a new home in University Heights. I was alternately elated and terrified.
One day, I was thinking aloud about the challenges of the imminent big move and getting all of my worldly possessions from the apartment to the house. I was in the English Department office at the Hunting Valley Campus, one of the “bullpen”-style where teachers tended to be when we were not in class.
“What day is it?” asked Jack Fisher ’96, one of my departmental colleagues at the time. When I answered, he did not miss a beat: “I’ll be there.”
Within hours, nearly a dozen colleagues had volunteered to join me that upcoming Saturday. Many would be there bright and early to pack up the truck and make the trek to my new home, and a few more still arranged lunch for us all in the afternoon. Fellow English Teacher, Jim Stephens, not only offered, but insisted, that he pick up and drive the U-Haul that day. The rest of the group packed up their own vehicles with smaller and more fragile items. The last to depart the apartment and the first to arrive at the house, I remember driving alongside my colleagues’ cars en route to University Heights. As it happened, we even spotted Director of College Guidance Whitney Lloyd driving alongside the convoy. (I honked and waved but he did not notice us.)
The day was not without its pitfalls. For example, some of the School’s finest minds wrestled with the geometry problem of getting my couch down a flight of stairs unscathed, before, at long last, finding the solution. Just how much my colleagues were going above and beyond was clear to me throughout those busy hours.
I still think of that day with a mix of awe and appreciation. I knew how hard those same colleagues worked every single day, very often giving more time to the boys of US than the day itself seemed to allow. Free time was a rare commodity. That they would give over a Saturday, to help the junior-most member of the English Department move, moved me then and continues to move me now. I didn’t ask. I didn’t have to ask. Our caravan on Fairmount Boulevard that day was symbolic of the extraordinary generosity of the US community. While my home was now in University Heights, I was there because of the home I had found at University School.
The fact that the collective effort had begun with a single offhand comment in a department office was also fitting. Not all schools have such spaces. Elsewhere, teachers may head to and hole up in their classrooms with little interaction with other adults during the day. US is different. Department offices are home to communication, coordination, and collaboration—enriching the experience of colleagues and, ultimately, of students. Countless conversations just like the one that had spurred my moving day help to galvanize the bonds among colleagues. How any community uses time speaks volumes about its priorities and values.
That day reminds me that, for US faculty, no job is too big, and no job is too small. With so many hours logged together teaching, coaching, advising, sponsoring, chaperoning, and proctoring, it is perhaps unsurprising how close we can become. But it is more than just time and more than mere closeness. “None of us is as smart as all of us,” says author Ken Blanchard. That is true of the US faculty, and I would add that none of us is as dedicated, resourceful, caring, or kind as all of us, either. Being a member of the US faculty has been the greatest honor of my professional life.
We have all experienced the power of the US community, often in tangible and visceral ways. The teammates we come to call brothers. The call the fellow alumnus takes to help out a freshly minted graduate. The many maroon-and-black neckties at the memorial service of a beloved community member. Learning of the ways US touches others’ lives can clarify and magnify its impact on our own. I realize it may seem trivial to recall a story about a six-mile drive on a spring day in Cleveland, yet what draws together so many examples, mundane or momentous, is how we show up for one another. Legendary NBA coach Phil Jackson reflects: “The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team.” US is stronger because of all of us, and the US faculty “team” remains one of our community’s strongest assets.
Thirteen years later, I moved again. I would come full-circle, living on a campus once again as I moved into the Head of School’s residence. This time, the move was both less about US and more about US. This time, I was back at school 24/7 and honored to show up every day for US, albeit with a shorter commute. This time, I paid forward my colleagues' generosity. I hired movers.
Read More Articles
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