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Retirement

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Moving Right Along

For several years, my wife and I have known this day was coming. Ever since the explosion of the blood vessel in my head and the removal of the benign meningioma that had attached itself to the right frontal lobe of my brain, we knew that we needed to move back to Pennsylvania to be near our family. We wanted to see our grandkids growing up. We wanted to see our younger grandkids enjoy their school and church programs. We wanted to see our older granddaughter develop into the excellent student and athlete that as a ninth grader she is showing the promise of becoming.

Through the years there were times when our daughters needed our help and support. Now, it was our turn to need their help, support and comfort. Doing those things from a distance of 650 miles had become much more difficult for all of us. This illustrates one of the biggest shortcomings of a mobile society. It also highlights the sacrifice that military and missionary families are called to make in service to their country and their God. As my wife and I faced the projected difficulties and pleasures of the upcoming years, dealing with them from a distance of 15 to 20 miles was much more appealing to us.

Therefore, three years ago when it was apparent that I could not work full-time as a college professor or administrator, we put our house up for sale. The past three years have not been the best three years to try to sell a house. Our real estate agent kept urging us to be patient. He would say, “Your house is a gem, the right buyer is out there.” He would remind us, “The house is a three-story, Sears house, erected in 1922, in mint condition. It is a classic, a house with character. It is just waiting for the right person to come along and buy it.”

This past fall the right person came along and made us an offer we couldn’t refuse. This kicked our preparations for a move up a couple of gears. We hurriedly found a one-level, first floor apartment that has three bedrooms so that I can have an office, my wife can have her sewing room and we have room to entertain overnight guests. It met our other non-negotiable condition: it is within 20 miles of each of our daughters.

Having made four long distance moves previously, you would think that my wife and I would be seasoned professionals at the moving process and know what to do when. We should have been old hands at this process. However, that is precisely the problem: “We are old hands.” There is one more complication. This move is coming out of our pocket. The tab for the previous four were picked up by my new employer. This time we have to pay the entire bill ourselves, which is no small task for a couple on a retirement income, facing mounting medical expenses.

Now, all of a sudden M-Day is here. We will be moving in less than three weeks. This meant that instead of going along in fourth gear, we had to find the overdrive that we have not used in three years. Even in fourth gear, I have felt that I didn’t have time to maintain my blog as I would have liked. Looking ahead at the next two months, I know my blog is going to have to take a rear seat to the move. So, this is not farewell, it is just good-bye for awhile. I will see you on the other side of the move.

In the meantime, I leave you with this video clip of what the last two months have looked like and what the next two months will look like for us. It combines several of my favorite TV characters, Dr. Who and the Muppets:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mo6QeBmXn18

 

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Hello world!

Welcome to my site. THe following Grand Rapids Press article tells a little bit about my story. This story told the story to October 2009. On December 30, 2009, another adventure began. I had four grand mal seizures and was hospitalized again for a week. I am now classified as an epileptic with all the challenges of that disease. I hope the blog will help me speak about higher education the thing that I love the most besides God, my wife and the rest of my family. I hope to post an original essay each Monday and a commentary on a selected news item from the top Higher Education Newsletters.  For those who are wondering what’s up with the beta squared, since my initials are BB and I am a mathematician, I have been using beta squared for years as my initials. ?2

Former Cornerstone University provost develops aphasia after blood vessel bursts in brain

By Nardy Baeza Bickel | The Grand Rapids Pr…

November 21, 2009, 4:35AM

GRAND RAPIDS — For 40 years, Bayard “By” Baylis has worked with words to develop curriculum for students and to help faculty teach better, most recently as the provost at Cornerstone University.

But after undergoing brain surgery earlier this year, words have been a bit tricky for Baylis: They behave like cats, not dogs, the educator said.

Bayard BaylisCourtesy Photo of Former Cornerstone University provost Bayard Baylis, shown here with his wife, Elaine Baylis, had a blood vessel burst in a brain tumor and developed aphasia, a disorder that impairs language skills.“Dogs come when you want them, but cats … they come to you when they want to come to you, not when you call them,” said Baylis, trying to explain what it feels to live with mild aphasia, a communication disorder that limits a person’s usage and
understanding of language.

Learning how to pick through his brain to find the right words has not been easy for the 63-year-old, who until recently spent his days revamping Cornerstone’s curriculum and designing new strategies to improve student retention and enrollment at Christian institutions.

“He was a beloved provost because of his humble manner. Faculty and students could sense that he cared about them. He’s such a good listener,” said Alan Blanchard, who worked with Baylis in developing Cornerstone’s journalism program he directs.

“He really seems to genuinely care about people.”

Now, Baylis keeps a small notebook in his shirt pocket to make sure he will capture the ideas as they come to him. He also color-codes the ideas throughout his writings to make sure he does not leave any of them without proper explanation.

“That’s part of the insidiousness of the disease. There are times that I know I sound as if I’m making sense, but it’s not the sense I wanted to make. This week I’ve been (writing) an article about liberal arts and practical education, and I’m trying to understand the ancient Greek system. It’s just been a battle,” he said.

The experience has done nothing but strengthen his relationship with God, Baylis said.

“God is a god of miracles and not a god of convenience,” Baylis said. “The timing of the episode was a small miracle. If it had happened 15 minutes later, I would have been making 70 mph on I-96. And if it had happened a couple of months later, we would have been in Illinois, not knowing many people, not having doctors, not knowing the medical (community).”

“That in itself was a miracle,” agreed his wife, Elaine Baylis.

This spring, Baylis resigned as the second-in-command at Cornerstone to revamp the academic curriculum at Trinity International University in Deerfield, IL, where he was to become dean and vice president of academic affairs.

He was in a meeting with faculty and staff at Cornerstone when he got the worst headache he ever has had.

His speech became slurred, he broke out in a cold sweat, and his face became ash-white.

Baylis has no recollection of what happened later: Of his friends calling 911, fearing he had suffered a stroke; of the ambulance ride to the hospital and of doctors finding, and removing, a non-cancerous tumor in his brain.

His wife, 63, was told to gather the family. If he made it out of the operating room, doctors told her, he never would be the same.

When Baylis woke up after surgery, his speech was altered, but he couldn’t tell the difference.

“It was so frustrating. There was a word that described the condition I wanted to describe and I couldn’t come up with it. I would have trouble following directions, oral or written,” Baylis said.

After months of physical, occupational and speech therapy, Baylis said, he is doing much better. Now retired, he had to pass up the job at Trinity.

He can follow a conversation without much help and already passed a test to regain his driver’s license.

But he still is easily exhausted and, once in a while, words elude him, he said.

Just recently, while attending a funeral service for a Cornerstone employee, Baylis said he had trouble recalling names of former colleagues.

“I knew what they did. I knew what they taught. I knew where their offices were, but I couldn’t come up with their names,” he said.

Still, he pushes forward. Baylis and his wife hope to move soon to Pennsylvania to be close to his family. They still spend most of the mornings, and some afternoons, talking with colleagues about the future of academia and what colleges should do to better to educate students.

E-mail Nardy Bickel: nbickel@grpress.com