A retirement party

A couple of weeks ago, I hosted a big party/fundraiser for the language program I direct. The occasion had two purposes: to celebrate the career of my predecessor and to establish a scholarship fund in his honor. In its forty-plus year history, my program had never held a fundraising event, so I was a bit nervous. Would anyone come? Would we raise any money? How embarrassing would it be if we went through all this work and sent out invitations and planned a big party, and then no one showed up and we raised $40? I had no experience with this type of event planning, and I wasn't receiving much help from others either. I got pretty stressed out.

But, as these things tend to do, it came together at the last minute. A colleague of mine offered the use of his brownstone and patio in Murray Hill as an event space. This saved us thousands of dollars. The college's Communications office designed beautiful invitations for us, and the college Foundation paid for printing the invitations. We sent out over 1200 invitations to alumni and friends of the program all over the world. And then I waited to see what would happen!

In addition to organizing the party, I was responsible for the food, drink, music, program, and general coordination. This was a lot of work. I wanted it to be all classy-like, but we had no money for it in the budget, and I was planning an event in Manhattan at someone else's house, which comes with its own complexities. In the end, about 60 people came, we raised over $20,000, and most of all, my former boss/mentor felt honored and appreciated. All four decades of alumni were represented, as well as many departmental colleagues. I was really inspired: I could look around the room and see the legacy of a 40-year teaching career. I don't think anyone will be saying the kinds of things about me that people were saying about my predecessor, but it is a worthy goal to aspire to!

 We got lucky with the weather: the previous day had dumped 5 inches of rain on the city, but the sun came out just two hours before the party was due to start. A vigorous sweep of the patio and quick arrangement of furniture made it the perfect place to chat over wine.

Presentation of the food!

People came and ate

Listening to toasts out on the patio

Including mine – can't resist a captive audience!

And my real triumph: my predecessor loves tapirs, and we gave him a book print from an 18th century French natural history text. I found the print, paired it with a quote (suggested by a colleague) from Euripides, and got the thing custom matted and framed, all within a week before the party!

I never want to do this again – I will find the money beforehand to hire a darn caterer – but I have to say, in the end, it was worth it.