can i come too?

Being a non-faculty Ph.D. at a university is definitely interesting. It seems that my department and I are both still trying to figure out who I am exactly. I'm not a faculty member, but I have more publications than some of the young faculty members here. I'm on the staff, and I'm doing lots of staff-type work, but I'm geekier than most of them.

This morning I had a meeting with a young, female faculty member in another department who is part of a large project that I'm working on. About halfway through our meeting, she said "Oh, you should come to this picnic with me after our meeting! It's for female science faculty members...you know, a chance to meet one another." Being new here, I was thrilled at the prospect of being able to meet a few new people. But would I be crashing the party like a faculty member's kid sister? Once it sinks in that I'm not simply a secretary here, people seem to treat me like a faculty member, which is great, but I feel a bit awkward about it. I also recently found out that I can be a PI on grants, which both pleased and daunted me.

I wasn't sure what to do about the picnic, so I just went back to my office. Waiting for me was an email from our department chair, inviting me to the same picnic. But it was a funny invitation. She had sent it out to the female faculty members in our department early in the morning...then sent it to me a few hours later. So it seems that I'm not the only one who can't figure out where I fit in!

At this point, being in between faculty and staff feels just about right. I have no faculty-envy as I peek into their offices and see them with their noses to those esoteric grindstones. And I'm very much enjoying how varied and challenging my work is these days. But I'm also very glad to have a department chair who holds me in high enough regard to invite me to the geek girl gatherings.