Standing barefoot on our brown tweed kitchen carpeting, I leaned against the orange Formica bar to steady myself against feelings of shock, excitement, and fright. Had I heard right?

I’d been reading, flopped on a blue print velour couch (part of a new four-piece set from Wickes) in the living room, when the phone had rung at 10:30. Marv and the kids were long in bed. I’d scrambled to the kitchen to answer the wall phone by the back door. The caller introduced herself as the director of the new nursing department at Trinity Christian College, seventeen miles northwest from us. “I got your name as someone who may be interested in coming to help us start a baccalaureate nursing program. We need a person with a psychiatric nursing master’s who can also teach foundations.”

My exact qualifications. But why such a late call? Desperate? Me, the gal who may have a diploma mentality forever. Would I even be able to teach baccalaureate students? Plus it was June already, and I had already signed my 1983-84 contract.
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