After reading Aaron Mattingly’s recently published Synapse article “Leadership or Lip Service?” about his disappointment in Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Daniel Lowenstein, Dr. Dan Lowenstein, during the Annual Chancellor’s Leadership Forum on Diversity and Inclusion, I’m compelled to weigh in. In last March’s article “Living the Dream,” I highlight the issue of perpetual fatigue caused by UCSF’s stressful work environment. I state that in truth, the dream of coming to UCSF can sometimes feel like a nightmare. Unexpectedly, I received a formal response to that article. And lo and behold, who did it come from? The same antagonist from Aaron’s article: Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Daniel Lowenstein. This is what he wrote to me:

Given the recent events surrounding the presidential election, I find it hard to scribble about the topic I originally had intended to delve into: love. I mean, in such a packed city, how do I find so many single people who just can’t find the one to swipe right? I planned to make some profound statement about our hopeless yearning for romance through a screen, and just the general lack of intrigue happening on campus — but in light of what has happened, I think the real question is where is the love?

When nature calls, you go. There are no gender lines, arbitrary rooms and designated stalls. When your bowels are moving, sweat is dripping and the tensions are tight as can be, regardless of what sign that bathroom has up, you go. Nature happened to call really strongly upon my friend one day while we were working through the late night in the SimLab Clinics and to her terror, the women’s restroom was undergoing a cleaning. So like any normal person with an exploding bladder, she went into the men’s.

Welcome back students! The school has dearly missed you. Since you’ve been gone, there have been some new additions. As you must have noticed, the school is now officially an open campus. They’ve managed to finally make the hole on the Parnassus side of campus the size of three tanks, although they have been working very adamantly and carefully not to make the progress too noticeable.