Correction appended
AW: What is your favorite way to relax after class? KCM: I am kind of a people person, so I like to pal around with others. I've got two fantastic children who are immensely distracting - I don't know if I would call it relaxing, but they are very entertaining. ... I don't think everybody enjoys their kids as much as I do. ... They're both at good ages. My toddler is learning how to talk. It's very absorbing. You can't hold back when you're around them. But I like to go out walking. I like to do yoga and swim.
AW: What area of D.C. do you and your family live in now? KCM: We don't live in D.C. - I wish we lived in D.C. ... now we're out in the Reston [Va.] area, so it's a long ways away. It's a great neighborhood: kids and dogs. We're very close with all our neighbors. It's a fun little house. The commute just sucks, there's no way around it.
AW: What is your favorite aspect of AU? KCM: I love interacting with my students. I crave even more of a connection with my students than in the large classes oftentimes afford me. But I'm teaching this "Individual Freedom Versus Authority" class this semester, and I just have this great group, and there's 40 people in the room and yet we have these terrific discussions that are very thoughtful. There's lots of ... joshing and chiding. And they come into my office, and I learn a little more about each of them over the course of the semester, and it's fun because then you know them as people. I've got this other class in comparative politics, and we had these prospective students come in for a section on revolution theory that was actually really dry. It was like structural functionalism. I kept falling asleep while reading it, and yet these students just totally rose to the occasion. What do we call ourselves students at AU, Eagles? They really were. They rose like Eagles - they totally soared. I was so proud of them. I told them this much afterwards. I'm the kind of person who recognizes a challenge and rising to it. They showed themselves very well. They made AU proud, so it's interacting with the students that makes teaching great.
AW: What is one thing your students or colleagues don't know about you? KCM: I'm probably an open book. This summer I swam across Barnegat Bay [N.J.] with two teenaged friends. It was about a mile and a half across the bay, and we were written up in the local paper for our feat! ... Our rescue boat broke down on the way home, and we had to be towed in by the Marine Police. What an ending!
AW: What is your favorite word? KCM: My favorite word is "caesaropapism." It means largely that the religion of a state is the religion of the leader. I just think it's a really funny word, and I try to use it whenever possible. My husband says my favorite word is constitutional jurisprudence. I can usually use that in lots of places.
AW: If you had $50 million, what would you do first? KCM: I would travel a lot. I would buy a house either in D.C. where there are good public schools nearby so we wouldn't have to commute. I'd like to go all over the world. I want to see Turkey and India. I've never been to the Middle East. I think it would be really cool to go to Egypt. I would spend lots of time in Europe and China. Also, I would see lots of things around here, lots of performances, concerts. Diverse things, like Irish dancing and Chinese dancing, just cool stuff like that. I would paint. I would take lots of time off so I could paint. I haven't done it in a long time, and I like it a lot. I think it would be really good for me at this point.
AW: What is your favorite quote? KCM: Do you know "Desiderata?" It's a long poem arguably found on a gravestone in Baltimore. I think it's attributed now to Max Ehrmann. It's this wonderful thing about channeling yourself and accepting of yourself. So this would probably be the best part, "Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be, and whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul. With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy." It's something that I've known as a kid. I didn't know it was copyrighted by an individual. I think it stretches back centuries. It was discovered in a Baltimore church in 1692. It was written in 1927 by Max Ehrmann.
Correction: The headline reads that professor Kimberly Cowell-Meyers swam the Barnegat Bay in high school. Cowell-Meyers actually swam the bay last summer.
